Alternative Bow Drill Method: Side-Hole Hearth 

Thanks MutsPub! 🙂

Thanks Lonnie! I've been chatting with your buddy Charlie quite a bit about that approach and have been playing with it a lot lately.

You might be right about that Charlie. 👍

That's great to hear buddy.

Thanks Thomas!

Thanks again Gary. I love that you're getting so much out of these.

Thanks Gary. That makes my day.

Thanks Gary :)

I'm looking forward to that video buddy!

Thanks David. I can see why you would think it would be the classic two-hole method based on the title. I've been playing around with that one a lot lately too.

Спасибо, приятель!

Thanks Survival Mindset!

Thanks Leo!

Thanks Tramp Trade!

Thanks Sepp! 🙂 I really enjoy your videos, so it's neat to know that you watched this. I hope you have a great Easter too.

😅👍 Thanks buddy. It almost feels like cheating when I'm not filming and get to use both hands.

Thanks again Thomas! 🙂

Thanks BWA! Let me know how it works for you.

NW Primate ok. I will.

Thanks Spirit Forest! 🙂

That would be fun! All of my friction fire experience is limited to this area, so it would be fun to go out and scrounge up new materials in a foreign environment.

In my area I've got few soft woods but mainly hardwoods. I've had 3 ice storms in 4 days today got up to 34 and everything wet and had a cow calve on back side of my place needed to stay warm so built a fire took me better part of an hour to get it going. Tuff but fun! I've learned much from you on wet conditions, I too would like try different places to see how I would do. Though not as well as you.

Thanks for checking it out lastniceguy1!

Thanks Rick!

Thanks Gary. In my experience, it seems like Douglas fir and silver fir behave very similarly for friction fire when using saplings, but the wood from bigger trees can be finicky. If you can, try to find dead saplings that are wrist size or smaller and you might have better luck. Let me know how both the Doug fir and side-hole work for you.

NW Primate ok great. Thanks for the info. Yeah Douglass is hard to come by here for the most part. It's white and pitch pines. I'm looking to get down into the Pine barrends for a couple of days. I'll be sure to put this good info to good use.

Thanks LT! Make sure you go nice and easy in the beginning so you don't break through into the tunnel too quickly before things heat up.

I like that Gary. 🙂

Let me know how it goes for you Michael.

😅👍

Thanks Bushman School!

Thanks buddy!

Found a lost Bic in the woods. Going to post about it on the forums.

Nice! They're tougher than people give them credit for, so I'm going to go out on a limb and say that you were probably able to make it work one way or another.

Working on the thread now though don't have many pics so will need to pull them from the video. I didn't expect it.

Thanks buddy!

Thanks S Preston. I can't take credit for figuring this one out. I learned it from a member on the Bushcraft USA forums that goes by "arleigh".

Good eye buddy ! 👍

Thanks Mr. Wick! The title of the song is very fitting for your comment. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-IiMHMhqUDYo.html

Thanks Biker Bushcraft. That is definitely a good idea. In this case, the snow had melted a bit, and then frozen over solid at temperatures well below freezing, so there wasn't any liquid water to worry about. I got a bit lazy. 😀

My boys say cigarette lighter ! Pussies !

I'm pushing 70 but I don't quite ! It's who I am . I run a 1000 ft peak in 95 degree weather with 37 pound pack trying to achieve the fitness level I need to hunt my newest spot.

Hi Gary! While this is the most reliable of the "alternative methods" that I've tried, I still feel that a well ventilated v-notch is the most dependable of all. I still have failures regardless of what method I use, but when conditions are rough, I stick with the v-notch. In my experience, humidity and even rainfall are less significant than the moisture content of the wood, but you mentioned that you were working with a proven set. While I do live in a very wet place, it is unique in that it is either cold and wet, or hot and dry, so I don't have experience working with friction fire in the extreme heat and humidity found in many parts of the country. Warm air holds more water than cold air, so it is possible that this is contributing to the issue. I wonder if increasing airflow could help dry out your dust pile and combat the humidity. Pardon me if you've already seen this, but I put together a short video about a hearth modification that I like using that gets more air flowing through the dust pile. I don't know if it will be helpful for you in your environment, but it really seems to increase my odds of success. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-lQCWpmS2Gs0.html

Thanks MT! I am definitely happy to consider requests. I've played around with the two-stick method a bit and it's usually pretty tricky for me, but this is a good excuse to get some more practice with it.

With your magic ... would make a good video . My latest experiments with fire plow and materials I'm not used to were a complete FLOP .

I have never been able to make a fire plow work; even during the dry months of summer. There's a video on RU-vid of a guy using Western Red Cedar that gave me a lot of hope, but after countless tries, I never felt like I even got close.

Honza J does great work . He hasn't made videos in quite some time . ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-t6qCp0tCESs.html&feature=em-share_video_user

That's not the first time someone has recommended him to me. I just watched the fire plow portion of the video and it definitely seemed helpful. The two things I noticed were his great method of pinning the board with a stick under his leg, and the fact that he started very gradually and only picked up speed at the end. It's kind of ironic that I'm always advocating that for other friction fire methods, but seeing him work showed me that I've been putting in too much effort in the beginning and wearing myself out. Thanks for the great link MT. I'm going to have to revisit this with this new outlook. 👍👍👍

😅👍

You have to wonder if he tastes at least a little bit like lime otter pops.