Kindling tools?

Sawbuck + branches

I use a Big Old meat cleaver and a Bounceless Hammer.....works great

I've been collecting sticks from my yardwork over the last couple of weeks. I was collecting little twigs for a while until I found out how awesome twigs are as garden mulch, especially with the leaves still attached. Vines, bushes, pine needles, last year's Christmas tree once it's dried out, I wouldn't want to bust up good splits to make kindling.
There's also my wife's Amazon box habit, a rolled up flat from a cardboard box is pretty good kindling.

mtarbert said:

I use a Big Old meat cleaver and a Bounceless Hammer.....works great

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Using a knife as a froe. My uncle taught me that trick when I was a kid. Very effective at making match sticks.

Doritos work quite well also

To be honest, I just gather up the remnants that lie on the ground near my hydraulic splitter and toss them into a box made from old pallets to cure/dry. Most of it stringy hardwood slices.

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Same for me plus scraps from my wood working.

My stovewood is very well seasoned, 2 summers of drying, and it can be practically lit with a match, so about 2-3 pieces of kindling and couple of newspaper knots using the top down method between two splits starts the fire right up.

Super Cedars seem to have wax in them. Guessing they are not kosher for a cat stove?

Going to order some Cedars! Make things easier for the misses when I'm not around

I love that video... dude is a pro with that hatchet.

I'm remodeling a house that was built in 1896 right now... all the walls were plaster & lath. Those 100+ yr old lath boards make great kindling.

BrotherBart said:

Funny you say that. For 20 years my wife would run the stove when I was on the road. Go out and drag up branches for kindling when she came home from work. She is an invalid now and doesn't operate the stove anymore. One night she came down stairs and I was just starting the stove with a Supercedar. She looked daggers through me and said "Where the hell were those things when I was blowing on coals and sticks to start a fire?!".

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Haha! Your wife did more than mine would. The 1st time the fire would go out she would just turn the furnace on or take the kids and go to her parents

I have an axe head mounted to an 18" or so handle. Plenty of heft so the tool is doing the work. Although kindling is not my thing with SC's available. I just use it to split a slit or two now and then for various reasons.

I'm lucky to have a cedar bird feeder shop here in town and he piles up his scrap cedar all summer long for anyone to take free. That and dead Birch bark works good.

If I must make kindling, I just grab an axe and a good looking split and split until it won't stand any more, then I can tap the axe onto the split while holding (carefully) and then when the wood is stuck to the axe, I just tap until the axe goes through. Never ever take a good swing at something you are holding with your hand. A sharp axe works best.

Otherwise, I just buy firestarters and use them in the shoulder seasons. In the winter the fire never goes out!

I'm a "splitter trash" and "hand tear pieces off splits" guy.

Fiskars X25.

Rip up the lid of a paper based egg carton into pieces and put it into the bottom half. Fill with old candle wax. The egg carton acts as a wick to keep it burning and the wax melts and starts everything it melts onto on fire.

Fiskars X11 otherwise. And a bunch of cut-offs of 2x4's and whatnot from remodeling (easy to split and already usually kiln dried )

I never understand the "old candlewax" suggestions. When I burn candles the wax goes bye-bye. When that candle is gone, then I buy a new one.

Earwax, now see, that's something I'm always making more of and haven't a use for!

BrotherBart said:

I know. Earwax and belly button lint sounds like a better fire starter.

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The good thing about that recipe is you can save it up during the off season. I like to keep it neatly rolled in a ball, then just slice a piece off when needed.

Not to mention what can be harvested from friends & family who don't burn wood....

I've been all over the place with kindling. I grew-up using newspaper & cedar kindling (helps to have your own swamp…)
Newspaper now hardly burns.
Since I started scrounging I've used:
Unpainted wood from home/fence demo (good stuff)
Kindling split from whatever I was burning (Slow & annoying to make & never burned that well).
Fatwood (Works okay, not cheap & not easy to light)
Several other fire starters from the box store (none worth the money)
Lightning Nuggets (awesome, like a smaller, lighter super Cedar, but you can't break them smaller. 1/2 Super Cedar is about same price, 1/4 SC saves you 50%)
Super Cedars (even more awesome, I use 1/4. If the wood is damp I use 1/2)

From all of this I've learned that no matter the method/materials used for starting a fire, the easiest is starting with really dry wood! It almost doesn't matter what you use, when your wood is bone dry it lights off fast & easy.

These are my home made kindling convectors, self named. I used trash cans from home depot and drill a few 1/4" holes in the very bottom to allow any water that got in to get out, and 15 1" holes around the top edge and 10 1" holes around the bottom edge. I filled them with debris from the hydraulic splitter and X25. Most of what i put in was fresh cut white/red oak from a log load. The logs were around 55% when i bucked them. I've had the cans sitting in the driveway in full sun since march. This morning i was reading this thread and got curious, ive been using this kindling for a few shoulder burns so i know its realllllly dry, but just how dry. Well it appears we have gotten WAAAYYYYY past equilibrium. I split a few of the larger pieces and found that i'm around 5-8%. My infrared thermometer was telling me the contents were at about 105 degrees late afternoon middle of august........ This stuff is like match light charcoal, i just hold a grill lighter to any bit of it an off it goes.