In the Zippo thread I mentioned they sell a paracord with a removable core which can be easily ignited for a fire starter. Check this one out, called SurvivorCord. The inner core contains a strand of fire starter, monofilament fishing line and brass or steel wire for making snares. That’s a lot of technology in a 4mm cord.
Thus demonstrating that you can sell anything at a premium if you slap the word “Survivor” on it.
Stranger
I thought the magic word was “tactical”.
Spartan tactical ninja survival gear FTW.
When I want to start a fire, I don’t want to have to take down my tarp. Keep these items separate and they’re much more useful and much easier to keep your emergency kit fully stocked.
TAKE ALL MY MONEY!!!
A tarp? What do you need a tarp for? If it doesn’t fit into the hollow handle of my tactical multicam survival bowie, I don’t want or need it. If I need a tarp I’ll kill a moose with a wood-hardened spear and make shelter in its abdomen.
Stranger
Kind of like how some people keep a ferro rod and steel in their survival gear, when lighters exist. Don’t get me wrong, it can be fun to make fire from two metal sticks, but if you don’t have a lighter in your kit, you’re preparing for the wrong thing, most likely.
Lighters leak, break, and most don’t work when the spark wheel is wet. A ferro rod never fails to produce sparks, is virtually indestructible, and never needs refilling. Personally, I keep a plasma lighter, storm matches, and a ferro rod in outdoor/survival kits, and often as not I use the rod albeit more to maintain my skill at finding and preparing good tinder.
But I wouldn’t buy a combination ferro rod/wood saw/signal mirror/skinning axe/shaving kit even though I’m sure UCO or Gerber makes one, because it would do none of these things well, and I would either lose or break it the first time I tried to use it.
Stranger
What if it also had Picatinny, SOPMOD, and M-LOK rails, was made out of titanium, and came in black?
SOPMOD is okay, I guess but only small children use Pic rail on their cap guns, and M-LOK is for Proud Bois and Airsoft poseurs. You can tell real men by the bruises on their thumb, though. The en bloc clip is an enduring work of genius, and if you needed more than eight rounds John Garand would have given them to you.
Stranger
You forgot ‘Zombie’
Exactly. My first sentence was kind of ambiguous, sorry about that, but my point was that it’s stupid to not have a lighter. Likewise, instead of having to take apart your Paracord to start a fire, you could include a few cotton balls with Vaseline on them, or similar to get a fire started.
I just think the people preparing for the zombie apocalypse, with the collapse of all civilization as we know it sending us back to the stone age, are going to have regrets when the actual emergency is that an earthquake took out power, gas, overland access to their town, and they can’t go inside their partially collapsed house so they need to use emergency gear to cook and stay warm for a few days. Having to use ferro rod and steel instead of just flicking a lighter might very seriously suck in that case.
Likewise, for myself, the gear I carry when we are out in the woods for a hike is not meant to get me through a long hard winter. It’s meant to keep me and my family warm and reasonably dry and hydrated in the event we can’t make it back to camp or to the car for some reason. I like having the ability to make a fire with a ferro rod, but in the real emergency I’ll be glad for a lighter.
Oh come on.
2 sticks and a piece of flint rock. Good tinder. You’re all good.
Didn’t no one watch Jeremiah Johnson around here.
Or Fritos.
When I used to go camping, I would have at least two lighters, and kept a tube of Firestarter gel.
No, I didn’t need the gel, but it was handy.
Many years ago, I taught the mountain survival portion of the US Air Force’s Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape (SERE) program. As you’d expect, this included general minimalist survival principles, but also addressed certain assumptions that a downed airman–the target student–would likely have on hand, such as a parachute (rich in parachute gore, as well as the paracord in the OP, and some other useful stuff). That’s my perspective for the two opinions I’ll provide, while acknowleging that other SERE instructors may have different opinions.
To the OP: I’ve always called the issue of purpose-built materials & tools vs N-in-one tools & materials the “El Camino Problem.” The El Camino was an American car of my youth that tried to combine a passenger car with a pickup truck, and IMO, did a poor job of both. From that perspective, it’s a failure. But if you had to have both capabilities, and could only have one vehicle, it’s a more attractive option. Same with survival gear.
That said, I tend to be in the purpose-built camp (NPI). My loadouts these days vary from a 10L daypack to (most often) a 50L fastpack to loading up an SUV, as I do when out with family. In all cases, things have become pretty modular, with ziplocks, pack pockets, and/or ditty sacks combining items by purpose, such as fire-making, shelter, food prep, tools, etc. So I have paracord, fishing line, and fire starter, but they’re separate and take up little more room than SurvivorCord. But that’s not to say that if I’d seen SurvivorCord at REI, I wouldn’t be tempted. Sounds kinda cool.
To the ‘primitive vs modern’ dogleg the thread has taken since the OP, my opinion can be summed up as “learn the most basic skills (because none of them are easy. and they require practice), but if you are in dire need, effectiveness beats efficiency, minimalism, or style points every time.”
In the early 80s, I was alone in the Rockies, maybe a day’s walk from help. I fell and injured an already sketchy knee bad enough that I was done walking on it for a while, just as an unexpected wet winter storm blew in. The sun was dropping behind the mountains, taking the temperature with it. I could have found dry tinder if I’d had mobility, but I didn’t. I wasn’t super scared, because I was young and immortal, but it could have ended badly if I didn’t take quick action. I had a magnesium brick and a ferrous striker that I knew how to use, but with wet materials and being in need of some warmth pretty pronto, I went for my nuke. If I’d had a gallon of mogas and a match, I’d have used that, but what I had was a napalm stick. This is a block of gellied gasoline maybe 3" by 1/2" that once ignited, I’m told will burn underwater.Citation required It allowed me to skip tinder and directly dry and ignite the kindling, and I shortly was warm enough to think straight and plan my descent.
[Sorry: I didn’t intend this to be as lengthy as it is. Though I did post a one-liner a couple of months ago, my previous SDMB post was in 2004. Probably MPSIMS is the best place to let loose.]
I was in Colorado Ground Search and Rescue for a few years. Early 80’s Never did actually rescue anyone. We where an arm of the Civil Air Patrol. We looked for downed/missing private planes in the Colorado mountains. No easy task.
We, or at least I, tried to keep to the KISS principle. We practiced a lot. Mostly what I practiced was rope work. Climbing gear. Well, mostly descending (you avoid taking an injured person up the mountain unless it’s the only place for a helicopter to extract.
I digress though.
Our team marked the treads on our boots. Everyone remembers the standard Vibram sole of a boot. This was the 80’s it’s what everyone had.
On the heal of the sole was one center +. We cut that into an I. Not a cross. That way, if you where lucky enough to see a good foot print, you could tell if it was a rescuer, or someone else.
Overkill? You-betcha. But easy enough to do. The very, very first rule in this type of thing is to NOT become a victim that needs to be searched for or rescued too. I think that is a good principle to follow in just about any situation.
I still remember the rope work, and it has helped me as I have moved through life.
I know good knotwork and abseiling has gotten me out of many tedious meetings. These days, I just wear a Petzl Adjama under my suit and keep an 8.9 rope in my wire dopp, ready to clip in and bail out the window in a backflip as soon as someone brings up their fifth Gantt chart of meaningless ‘milestones’ tjat will change before the end of the day.
Stranger
Stranger, I don’t see any need to make jokes. Call it meaningless ‘milestones’ if you wish.
OP here. For some reason I enjoy watching all kinds of survival videos on YouTube. Everything from hard core, “I built a small log cabin to survive a -40 degree winter night using only my pocket knife” to hot tent glamping. I’m not really an outdoorsman. But after dreaming of it a lot I have decided to do some hobby gold prospecting this year along with a friend and hopefully my son and grandson when they can make it. And do a bit of fishing as well.
Nothing real daring but my first trip last week was a couple hundred yards off the road to find a good spot to pan for gold. I had my second knee replaced 6 weeks ago. I’m 76 years old. So it is possible for things to go south on me and dammit, I’m going to be at least a bit prepared and have fun.
So here is my kit. I bought a small Walmart backpack and everything fits inside. My gold pans and classifiers (screens) which are 14" diameter. Squeeze bottles for sucking up the gold, prospector’s trowel and crevice tool. All that goes in the main compartment. In the smaller compartment I bought a waterproof first aid kit with bandages, alcohol wipes and antiseptic. A space blanket. The Zippo match kit. Old pill bottle with homemade cotton ball/vaseline fire starters. A sheath knife with saw back, magnesium rod and paracord wrapped handle. Several nutrition bars. And of course,a water bottle.
I carry my folding range stool from my shooting days in my left hand with a small shovel where the rifle would have fit. And my favorite item, an extendable hiking stick with carbide tip and sand cup. I couldn’t have made it on the trail without it! I have to cross two fallen trees about 2 feet in diameter and a couple of slopes. The variable length hiking stick really shines on slopes.
On the trail I pass many wild flowers and some chives and fiddleheads. I’m panning for gold on a beautiful crystal clear Ohio stream with exposed bedrock and babbling riffles. Sitting in my comfortable chair and having a great time with peace of mind. I have found a few pieces so far although they are probably pyrite so far.
Here is a link to my post on a prospecting forum showing the idyllic scene:
That sounds very cool!
There are people here with far more experience and knowledge than me, but I have always tried to learn and be prepared. One of the things I’ve learned is that virtually no mass marketed first aid kit is worth it.
I mean, even if by “bandages” you mean Ace bandages, and not band-aid bandages, I don’t think you’ve got what you need.*
Also, if you are worried about being an older guy out there on wet rocks, you might consider taking a wilderness first aid class. If there’s an REI near you, they offer them.
*Ignore if you don’t care/aren’t worried about it. I’d be looking to stock the kit with stuff I’d need if I couldn’t walk back to the car. Stuff that would either make getting back to the car possible, or if that’s not possible, keep you in as good of health as possible while you wait for help. Not having a band-aid won’t keep you from getting to the car. I mean you can throw some in, but think about what you’d need if you took a really bad fall. And be sure you’d know how to use it all. Think about what meds would be good to have.