Firecraft has been my passion for decades. My personal goal is to personally achieve every fire method that I’ve heard of… some primitive, some modern. I have demonstrated many different ways at different events, but my main purpose for pursuing these skills is to be able to stay warm, cook food, and signal for help when needed.

I teach that there are 5 ways to make fire, the categories are: friction, percussion, electrical, chemical, and optical. I usually have a bin full of these firecraft materials on hand for classes but for simple outings I keep these materials to a minimum so I have assembled a small kit in each category to use for spur-of-the-moment demonstrations.

Fire kits can vary based on your interest or needs, each one custom assembled for your purpose, perhaps for fire demonstrations, home emergency kits, Bug-Out-Bags, or car kits. Kit containers can vary from cloth or leather pouches, boxes, or zippered glasses cases to mention a few. Some kits may be historic in nature or just modern-day practical.

Small zip-lock plastic bags can be helpful for tinder containment and to guard against moisture. For kits that I use in remote areas when camping I use tools that incorporate blaze orange so that if dropped they will be easy to find. I also employ redundancy if some tools fail or are lost.

The advantage of kits is to have your tools and associated elements assembled in one place so it is convenient to use and can be strategic in cases of emergency. I would love to see comments on your fire kits.