Survival II

On Thu, 8 Jun 2006 15:19:44 -0400, "Morgans" wrote:


"Montblack" wrote

As kids, we would wait for a calm dark night to go out into the street
with our "farmer matches" and a straw. We'd "shoot" the matches out the
straw, up into the still night air, then wait to see where they landed.
Hours of fun. Pops would come out, shoot up a few himself, say, "neat -
make sure you watch out for cars," and return inside ...leaving us kids
alone outside, to play with matches. :-)

We found that if you wrapped aluminum foil over the tip, (broke off most of
the wood first) then shaped the aluminum over the back a little like a
rocket nozzle, you could shoot them a good distance. Just need heat on the
tip to get it started.

We used to disassemble a wooden clothespin, turn the two pieces of wood
back-to-back, and slip the steel spring over them with one "arm" inside. You
could then cock the spring and slip a farmer match between the jaws. The coil
spring was a natural trigger, and when you pulled it, the contrivance
simultaneously launched the match while igniting it.

Used to ride our bicycles in dogfights shooting at each other....

Ron Wanttaja

("Ron Wanttaja" wrote)
The coil spring was a natural trigger, and when you pulled it, the
contrivance simultaneously launched the match while igniting it.

Used to ride our bicycles in dogfights shooting at each other....


Hey, you're the one who introduced clothespins...!!

I'd take you on with my rubber binder clothespin fly-shooter pistol. Yes,
using the"good" red rubber binders from the Butcher Shop!

"Another dud farmers match from Ron's gun. Ooh, I'm so scared."

Aim ......"Missed!"
Pedaling ..."Reload binder gun."
Pedaling ..."Aim."
Pedaling ..."Fire!"

"Thwat!"

"That's gotta hurt."


Mont-Black-Phantom
"Although some minor variants now compete in frequency, on the whole
Minnesota speech features such dominant Northern terms as andirons, pail,
mouth organ (harmonica), comforter (tied and filled bedcover), wishbone,
clingstone peach, sweet corn, angleworm (earthworm), darning needle or
mosquito hawk (dragonfly), and sick to the stomach. Minnesotans call the
grass strip between street and sidewalk the boulevard and a rubber band a
rubber binder, and many cook coffee when they brew it. Three-fourths of a
sample population spoke root with the vowel of put; one third, through
school influence, pronounced /ah/ in aunt instead of the usual Northern
short /a/, as in pants. Many younger speakers pronounce caller and collar
alike."

Having fun now - from wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rubber_band_gun#Types_of_rubber_band_gun
"The rubber-band Gatling gun is a fearsome weapon...."

"Constructed almost wholly of wood, the Gatling gun usually has between 8
and 12 barrels, each of which can take up to twelve rubber bands on a
similar mechanism to the repeater pistol. This means a twelve-barrel Gatling
gun using twelve-shot repeater mechanisms can fire 144 rubber bands
automatically."

Cool.

In article om, wrote:

MATCHES

The ability to make fire is fundamental to survival and, all else being
equal (never a safe bet :-) the handiest way to do so is to simply
strike a match. But based on the comments I received not everyone is
aware that matches come in two basic flavors and a variety of sizes.



What about carrying one of those disposable cigarrette lighters that you can
buy at walmart for less than a dollar? You could put two or three of them in
an airplane if you like backups.

who cares? wrote:

What about carrying one of those disposable cigarrette lighters that you can
buy at walmart for less than a dollar?
------------------------------------------------------------------------------

While there's no reason NOT to include disposable flint or piezo
lighters in your survival kit, in practice you will find the larger,
hotter flame provided by a kitchen match to be more practical when it
comes to starting a fire using whatever tinder is locally available.

-R.S.Hoover

who cares? wrote:

In article om,
wrote:

MATCHES

The ability to make fire is fundamental to survival and, all else being
equal (never a safe bet :-) the handiest way to do so is to simply
strike a match. But based on the comments I received not everyone is
aware that matches come in two basic flavors and a variety of sizes.



What about carrying one of those disposable cigarrette lighters that you
can
buy at walmart for less than a dollar? You could put two or three of them
in an airplane if you like backups.
Do you really want to carry one of those leaky propane "bombs" in your close
confine airplane with you? Maybe Maybe not!
High altitude pressurized gas could be interesting. No experience here, just
wondering out loud (can you hear my gears turning!).
John

My survival kit has some "lifeboat matches" that are waterproof and
strike anywhere and burn much hotter than kitchen matches. I also
carry a metal match (flint with magneseum--you scrape some of the
magneseum onto your tinder and use the flint to light it.

wrote in message
ps.com...
To All:

excellent post veedub, but I would add a thought or two.

one should learn how to make a fire without matches. in a crashed vehicle
you have all sorts of materials that "should" be able to make the sparks
necessary to get a light. even if your battery croaks a permanent magnet
motor and a filament from a light bulb can torch up some tinder. even if the
battery fails it still might have enough juice to produce light up a flight
chart scraped up for tinder.

or a Fresnel lens, although only good during daylight hours.

regardless of the equipment, one needs the skill. how many of you can make a
fire with only one match? how many of you can make up tinder?

as for the knife, you hit it on the head veedub, chuck one in the plane and
forget it. all my vehicles have pocket knives. usually in the glove
compartment. a survival knife isn't worth it.

anecdote. the first season my dad went deer hunting he bought a 6 inch long
hunting knife, a fairly good one. after getting his first kill he realized
he did not know how to field dress a deer. luckily along came a man who was
more knowledgeable than my dad and offered to dress it for him. the gent
took out a tiny pocket knife and preceded to dress the deer, while my dad
felt a little sheepish with his 6 inch knife on his belt.

still has that 6 inch knife, good for splitting pelvises, but a two inch
blade is a bit better for field dressing.

wrote in message
ps.com...
To All:

About a month ago I posted a message having to do with aircraft crash
survival in which I touched on the ability to make a fire, and the
features found in a good survival knife. The post produced the usual
comments some of which were rather surprising and may be of interest to
some of you.

MATCHES

The splint or wooden portion of a standard kitchen match is 2-3/8" long
(ie, about 60mm). This length is a NECESSITY when lighting certain
lanterns and some gas-fired appliances. By comparison, a standard
'box-match' has a splint only 1-3/4" long (45mm). I was surprised
to learn that some people thought any WOODEN match was a 'kitchen'
match and referred to them as such. A couple of these folks mentioned
carrying 'kitchen' matches in a 35mm film canister; clearly
impossible since such canisters are only about 1-3/4" deep.


Picking one little nit here, if you don't have something that needs the
length, once you snap off the excess wood, 2-3/8" matches fit just fine in a
1-3/4" canister.


General Aviation attracts a lot of wingless vultures eager to make a
buck by preying upon the unwary. One method of doing so is to sell
junk disguised as kits of 'survival' gear. But when the problem of
post-crash survival is examined realistically it doesn't take a rocket
scientist to see that the average home-builder is liable to be better
prepared at lower cost (and less weight) by simply applying a bit of
common sense to the problem.

Took a trip across Canada/Alaska in a C120, so of course we took "survival
gear". Talking to a "local" he suggested some snare wire - really handy
stuff - easy to catch rabbits and such for food he sez. Sure. Easy if you
have a clue as to what to do with it... I'm 99.9% sure that I'd never make
it work on my own. On the other hand, safety wire is a good thing to have
along for 101 uses. Duct tape wrapped around the handle of one of your
wrenches is handy too.

A little practice close to home so you know what to do with the stuff (and
if it works) makes a lot of sense, eh?

Anyhow, keep up the good work.

--
Geoff
The Sea Hawk at Wow Way d0t Com
remove spaces and make the obvious substitutions to reply by mail
When immigration is outlawed, only outlaws will immigrate.

My wife (who, in a previous life, did things like take two-week back
country canoe trips with her High Adventure Explorers post in Texas,
with responsibility for food and material planning for twelve 18-year
olds, ie, she can look out for herself) encouraged me to write:

We were car camping once in a rental car and wanted to start a camp
stove. We had very carefully packed matches. Turned out there are two
different kinds of even Ohio Blue Tips, safety- and non. Laura had
packed safety in a match safe. No strike-strip.

We fussed over the notion for several minutes that we had a car with a
full gas tank and a lot of readily available energy in its battery, and
we couldn't figure out how to light a safe fire. What to do?

I extracted a bulb from the brake light and crushed the glass envelope.
I instructed Laura to get in the car and step on the brake pedal when
told to do so. I held a match on the hot filament, lit the match, lit a
candle from the match, etc. We had a nice dinner.

We stopped at a hardware store on the way to the car drop-off point to
get a new bulb. We considered presenting the receipt to the rental
company: "We found that the bulb needed to be replaced..."

Keep track of match type.

David


wrote:

The two basic types of match are those which may be scratched anywhere
versus the 'safety' type which can on be struck on an abrasive pad
treated with red phosphorus. The 'strike-anywhere' type are
preferred since there's no need to provide for the special
striking-surface.

The surprise came from hearing some folks insist that the
'strike-anywhere' type of match was not available, at least to
them. I assume they are the victim of some do-gooder regulation which
allows only the sale of 'safety-type' matches in their locale.

("David Kazdan" wrote)
We fussed over the notion for several minutes that we had a car with a
full gas tank and a lot of readily available energy in its battery, and we
couldn't figure out how to light a safe fire. What to do?


Now I'm curious. Would the match have lit touching it on the exhaust
manifold - under the hood?


Montblack