How to Make Wax Dipped Cotton Balls - Part 1 of 2. [Homemade All-Weather Fire Tinder]

Description

Krik of Black Owl Outdoors shows you how to make wax-coated cotton balls, one of the best all condition fire tinders. If the wax coating is effective, the cotton balls will be waterproof, as well as accept a spark from a ferro rod or the flame of a lighter. The cotton balls, although they can be messy, are easy to use and will burn for upwards of 7 minutes per ball. [Part 1 of 2]

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Tags: black owl outdoors,nature,camping,hiking,backpacking,survival,bushcraft,wilderness,forest,backcountry,fire,fire craft,firecraft,how to make,waxed,wax-coated,waxxed,cotton balls,tinder,all-weather

Video Transcription

hey wassup Turtles it's Creek here with blackout outdoors today I'm going to be doing a video on how to make cotton balls dipped in wax which is used as a fire starter I have three examples with me here

one large full-sized cotton ball right here and this and these two over here is a cotton ball ripped in half just to practice just to see if they work coating all that stuff but today's video I'm going to show you how to make these before I get into making any of them I'm going to actually use one to start the fire and we'll be using to melt the wax down I'm going to use one and um and we're going to time it actually how long one of these are one of these is going to burn it's a lighter cord for foil but basically to do this to use one of these I'm just take a knife I'm going to cut into it so you can kind of crack it open get down past the protective layer of wax that's sealed in the cotton I'm gonna take it now just open it up and open it up and it's cotton coming through that

you see what I'm trying to do error ago is expose some of the engines of the cotton you can see what that's done is by dipping this cotton in the wax this is still dry cotton you can see I'm pulling this fiber it's still fibrous I'm pulling that out and what that's done is put a protective layer of wax over this so it'll be waterproof anyway let's it let's get this let's get this lit and we'll start timing it but what's great about this as well as a kit and how long this is going to burn for you is you can get it with a spark this is going to get a flame hold the flame for you and it can be done with just with the spark all right time in it now we're not going to watch this whole thing burn we'll come back when sis order on its last legs and I'll get the fire going then with this flame to to melt the wax down and actually make these but I just wanted to show this before we made these of why and how great these really are as as a fire starter and really ideal for wet conditions this is going to burn for minutes on end it's going to get big I'm not going to cut away yet I want this to sort of catch a little bit more it's just to show you how big this can actually get the flame can get and put my phone down now you know the times going great to keep in a kit really lightweight really easy to make pretty cheap you can I'm going to be using beeswax for the video but you can also use paraffin wax or if you have candles you want to use all that good stuff and honestly in a wet in a wet condition or any condition for how long is it's going to burn if you can't get a fire going it's just not meant to be because this is going to burn for a long time it's going to keep a sustained flame you've got two flames going right here check the timer because we're going to cut away soon here so where are we at right now

minute 20 you see the size of the flame going

so we'll be back whenever this is soda on its last legs which I'll show you the timer and then I'll get the fire going and we'll start making one of these check it in now this is about as big as it's probably going to get the flames going to get what's that time let me look at it real quick over three minutes still going strong and surprise as big as it's going to get just checking in showing you we'll be back another check-in I can't tell where we burning out right now upside down 653 six minutes 53 seconds and look at this thing still going strong it's obviously just a pile of black but it's burning going well still nice to stay in flame check back in all right we're on 8 minutes and 40 seconds this flames almost out I'm going to call it close to good but I want to get this fire going off of this right now I'm going to bring this try to bring this back to life and actually get the fire going so excuse me why you get involved a few pieces of birds here just to get my get a flame back for me and I'm going to use this fire then now to taxi melt the wax like I alluded to before burn baby burn their stuff on there help dry this out in news but that's really cool it's such a cool piece of you know your equipment fire equipment you can do on your own that's really cheap the first time I saw this I want to give credit to mr. David Wendel bushcraft on fire check out his YouTube channel it's a great stop for information really like what he's doing that's the first time I saw it this done and I wanted to try it really easy to do like I said be hard-pressed to find another something that's going to work better than that that you can make at your make yourself for really cheap you know if you if you know something let me know but honestly in my experience what I've seen that seems to stop the timer' these cotton ball is dipped in wax her freaking amazing really cool really awesome stuff so how are we going to do this what do we need to start with well first of all all our videos are shot outside I'm going to be doing on the fire you can do it in your house in the kitchen more controlled environment but you're going to need some sort of metal container that you need um need to melt the wax down so I just have a soda pop Pinsky can here cut off that I've used before you can see it's black and by the fire have that here make sure attention to the fire soda-can was the same sort of can obviously your need some some cotton balls and just make sure this keep this fire going don't need a huge fire for this but

all right so I got my soda can here what you just saw burning in the video was with these cotton balls here specifically and this is kare 1 it's calling it triple triple size triple size and you want to make sure it's 100% cotton that the blend whatever you have here is 100% cotton that's important these are pretty big you saw that one burning for eight and a half minutes you can definitely definitely I think you have ones that will burn longer depending how much cotton is actually impregnated with the wax and that depends on the heat but basically I need some cotton balls which I have here I'm going to pull a few out just to set aside not sure how many I'm going to make and I have a piece of foil here just to set the hot cotton once they get dipped and I have beeswax a bag of beeswax that I bought in a chunk or stoney and I bought and chunk I think sexy stone II did but I've cut down from the bigger chunk I brought smaller pieces with me but I'm just going to use that fill it up in the fill it up in here for now and then I'm going to find a spot for this on the fire once it burns down just a little bit if you have any experience with other you know how many natural fire starter tenders that works better than this or method you prefer to make these you know let me know leave a comment always appreciate them

you know petroleum products or alcohol and mixed with um you know Vaseline and a cotton ball work really well too but definitely not as good as a not as good as this so at this point I'm just going to get this can on top of the fire and let that start to melt down a little bit and I and you can't see it because of the angle but this is already starting to go down to liquid form see it moving and this will take a little take a little bit of time depending on how much wax you're putting in and honestly I'm a conservationist that heart meaning I like to try things that try to get things to work with the least amount of resources possible so sometimes I skimp on something when I'm trying to figure it out and use that you know the least amount like I said to get it going but for this for this video I'm program just use a little bit more and I have my victory victory Knox angler over here has a little bit of a fish pliers to grab a fish so I can use this to grab this hot can if I want swish around we would over the fire a little bit humid today fire wouldn't be my first choice of activities to do on a hot humid day and hot you in summer day in Pennsylvania but nonetheless it's so fun just being around a fire making things practicing skills spending time with my brother all that good stuff like to do outside now we're getting somewhere now give us a little shade coat that Oh smoke follows you you're beautiful or something like that definitely don't want this to tip over in the fire keep this fire going on this side a little bit so use it if I need it you