How It's Crafted: Paracord Belt

Bumbling Bushcraft Comic: All Tied Up

Waiting on Pins and Needles: Review of Sail Makers Needles

Last week we looked at all other possible uses of a canvas needle other than for sewing purposes. This week we will be reviewing the iconic green and white package that is W. Smith and Sons Sail Makers Needles. Before we open into these there are a few things on the outside of the package that I feel are worth pointing out. The first thing I notice is that it says "Manufactured by W. Smith and Sons, Redditch, England." If you recall on the package of Dritz needles we purchased they are labelled as "European quality." This could mean that this brand claims to be of or similar quality to the W. Smith and Sons needles, or it could just be a particular way that the needles are manufactured. Either way, I thought it was worth bringing up. The next thing worth noting is the "forged and hand-made." This to me says that they were manufactured with some sort of human involvement, meaning that there are going to be less imperfections. For the price of these needles, less imperfections are certainly a better deal. Their saying "Made by hand, not to cut the twine," is printed on the package. It is also labelled "Reduced Edge" meaning that the point of the needle is made into a wedge shape so not to fray the thread when going in between the fabric.

The last thing I would like to point out on the package is the qty. 5 and the sizes 13-19. I'm now going to open into the pack to show you what these mean. There are 5 needles with varying lengths and thicknesses, however if I had to estimate the height difference between the smallest and largest needle is roughly 1/4-1/2". Based on diameter I can infer that the smallest needle is the size 13, and the largest is the size 19. I believe the second largest needle to be a size 14 because it appears to be the most versatile. It is about the same length-wise as the 13, but  slightly heftier. This leads me to believe that the other two needles are a size 15 and a size 17. I have arrived at this conclusion because I have seen the needles referred to in odd numbered increments. I also know that David Canterbury and the Self Reliance Outfitters sells a size 14 needle on its own so the sizes 13, 14, 15, 17, and 19, seem to make the most sense.


I have with me some leather, the same leather in fact from last week. My goal is to see how well these needles can awl through leather. Last week I could only get one needle to perform this task and that was a challenge in and of itself. I am going to start with the size 19 needle since it is the biggest and I will believe it will go through the leather easier than any other needle in this set. I am correct in saying that as the needle does go through and it goes through like butter. I tried to awl the leather with both the 13 and the 14 as well and I was just as successful in that endeavor. I am thoroughly impressed by that. If I had thread I would be able to sew the leather or if I need an awl tool on hand I have one.

Since I have my leather out I am going to try to make what is called a leather palm for sewing. The cool thing about this is that I am making it for my needles, but I am going to use my needles to make it. The first thing I am going to do is cut my leather into a strip that takes up most of my palm and is just a bit wider than my palm (I want a bit of excess on both sides of my hand. Now I am going to take the largest needle I have (in this case the 19) and I am going to thread it with frayed bank line. Of course you can use anything you have like paracord or what have you.

Now I am only going to knot my bank line at the tail end, not near the needle, and there is a reason for this. So first I am going to make a hole in the leather with my needle and I am going to pull it through until it stops at the knot I made.






Now I am going to pull the end of the thread that is not knotted through the hole I just made and bring it to the opposite side of the leather. The knot in the other side will keep the bank line from coming loose.






Now I am going to come straight across from the hole I just came through and make another hole keeping the needle in the eye.








Once the bank line is through I am going to make a knot in the end so that it cannot slip back through the hole.








Now I am going to repeat this process two more times on the middle and bottom corners of the leather so that I have three straps of bank line. All I have to do is cinch them down on my hand and I have a leather palm that keeps the needles from digging into my hands when I am using them to awl leather.




Now I am going to test the needles to see how well they can actually sew. I have some canvas and I am going to start with the size 14 needle, the inner strand of some paracord, and I am going to do a simple running stitch. I am pretty satisfied with the results. The grouping is even and looks nice. Next I am going to use the upholstery thread with the size 19 needle. Now this time the gauge of the needle was a little to big for the thread so I am sure that if I had used the size 14 or maybe 15 I would have had better results. I was able to use the needles with the bank line when we made the leather palm, so the only material that leaves is...the jute. As you can see from the photo to your right, I was able to sew with the jute which tells me that if I can make natural cordage in the bush, I can sew with it using these needles.

This needle has awled leather, sewn with every type of material I have given it, and now we need to see if it will perform as a redundant compass. Now you can magnetize your needle using magnets, but I prefer to use a battery. If you are using the battery method, use Duracell batteries. The reason being that I tried the Energizer batteries and the positive end actually repels the compass needle and the negative in pulls in, but the pull is not as strong as the pull from the positive end of the Duracell battery. After 50 swipes of the needle on the Duracell battery I suspended my size 14 needle from a thread and watched as it found north, and now I am going to repeat the test with a bowl of water and a flotation device. Instead of using a tea candle this time I am going to use my new invention which is a bottle cap with a groove cut into it to fit my needle. Once again, it successfully finds north.

As before with the other needles you can use these to clean you nails, teeth, and pull grit out of your equipment. For hunting, fishing, and trapping you could use these as a gig or some type of windless trap for small animals. You could hold down the fish while you could descale it, heck you could descale it with a different needle, and you could also do things like testing your bread dough. For my final thoughts, this set of needles will set you back about $12.99. The other needles will set you back roughly $2. Out of the Dritz pack you will get two half way decent needles, with W. Smith and Sons you are getting 5 high quality needles. If you are just getting into bushcraft I recommend going with the cheaper option to get comfortable using them. Once you get comfortable you can definitely upgrade to the better option. Now the W. Smith and Sons needles are all different sizes, but it is my opinion that you could pretty well divide them up  between your different packs that you may have and  have pretty similar results. Now it is time for The Packening. The first thing I am going to pack is my W. Smith and Sons needles because I have been using canvas needles for a while and I need to upgrade. I will be taking along with that: the bottle cap floating device, the upholstery thread, a thimble, and my sewing palm.

And with that we have reached the end of our canvas needle series. I had a blast doing this, although I think I say that every time. Next week we will begin our cargo tape series. I have a lot to show you and you won't want to miss it! As always feel free to comment by clicking the comment link at the end of the blog, hit the follow button in the top right corner, share this blog, and check back next week for a new one on Sunday 10pm (est). If you want to keep up with me and what I’m doing, Follow me on Facebook: @BPackBushcraft and on Twitter @BPackBushCraft. Lastly if video is more your style check out my YouTube Channel backpack bushcraft where there is a video version of this with the same title. Until next time, keep those fires burning and put another log on for me.

Getting Around With Something New: A Review of UST's Explorer Tool

Last week we made ranger beads and did some walking with them to try to lock in our pace. This week as promised we will be doing a review. Today we have UST Technologies 4-in-1 Explorer Tool. I will go ahead and state right now that I don't think that there are four tools here. I think one of the tools that they include in the 4 is just an offset of one of the other tools, however, the lanyard that comes attached to the tool could be counted as the fourth, and we will be talking about why here in a bit. The dimensions of this product are 3.75" in length, 1.5" wide, the lanyard is 5 times the length, and it is very lightweight. I very much like these things about the product. You can put it in your pocket, it your EDC kit and it's pretty much ready to take with you wherever you go.

Let's take a look at the features of this product. Since this is the compass series, let's start with the compass. This compass is going to be different than any other compass you've seen in this series because the face doesn't move, you have to move it yourself manually by rotating the entire tool. The only thing that moves on this compass is the needle which will always point North. To find your direction, line the needle up with north on the compass, then imagining your own travel arrow on the compass, find your direction. I like that the cardinal directions are indicated in large lettering on the compass as well as the degree system. The numbers 20, 40, 60, etc. are labeled in large numbers with large lines between them representing 30, 50, 70, etc. as well as smaller tic marks between them representing increments of 5.

The second feature and I believe the reason people buy this product are the folding binoculars. Simply fold out all four lenses and use the adjustable wheel to make it clear for you to see through. These binoculars are times 4 magnification and the lenses are 32 millimeters in length. The center of binoculars give me a crystal clear view of what I'm looking at but the outer ring of the lens is blurry and disorienting and it causes me to be nauseous when looking through it. In my opinion, if you only fold out one set of lenses and focus with one eye, it will minimize that effect and make them easier to use. Think spotting scope.

The signaling mirror is the third feature of this product. I did this review in doors and was able to reflect light well off of the lighting in the house and I got good results outside with natural light as well. In addition to signaling you could also use this mirror to check behind you or use it to dress a wound if it's in a location that is difficult for you to see well.

The last feature that is included in the 4-in-1 title is a magnifying glass. You can see clearly that it can help you start a fire, but that  is about the only use you will get out of it in the woods. Of course you can  use it to magnify an object, presumably times four, I believe that this is only a feature of the binoculars.  Yes it is a magnifying glass as well, but to me it seemed like a stretch  making that a fourth feature.

The lanyard however, could be considered a true fourth

feature. It is made of some sturdy cord, as hard as I've tried, I can't break it. What I've done is tied two simple knots in my lanyard and thought to myself, "I could make ranger beads." I wouldn't use actual beads being that there are two strands and they would not maintain the same tension at all times/ I would however use paracord because it will have something to hold on to and I can dress the cord as tightly as I need it. And as you can see you have plenty of room for any set up, be it 9 and 4 or 6 and 7 as well as having room for your forester beads.

I spent about $5 for this product at Walmart and I would say it's about worth that. I've seen it go for about $8 on Amazon as well. If you use the scope instead of using binoculars on the side of the compass you really do have an all-in-one explorer tool. You can spot where you need to go, use the compass to get your bearing, use your ranger beads to keep track of how far you walked from your original location, and when you arrive at your destination you can use your signaling mirror if you're in a lot of trouble. The biggest problem I have is that these tools are all very beginner. The compass would be extremely difficult to use with a map and as for the binoculars, times 4 magnification is not going to do much for you in the woods. Overall I give this product a 3/5.

Now where would be the ideal place to put this tool?  I wouldn't recommend putting it in your bush kit unless you were completely new to compass and navigation. This would be a cheap item that you could practice and learn with. I wouldn't put it in my hunting kit because I would really need pair of binoculars, and let's be honest, the binoculars are the worst feature of this tool. If you think about it, this tool is compact, has a lot of reusability, and you can familiarize yourself with them easily. Where have I heard all of those terms before? EDC kit! This would make an excellent addition to your EDC kit and even if you can't fit it inside, you can tie it off to the outside with the lanyard and have it ready to go if you need it.

That's it for this week's blog. Next week we will be starting our second C in our second set of C's, which will be candle. You won't want to miss it! As always feel free to comment, hit the follow button in the top right corner, share this blog, and check back next week for a new one on Sunday 10pm (est). If you want to keep up with me and what I’m doing, Follow me on Facebook: @BPackBushcraft and on Twitter @BPackBushCraft. Lastly if video is more your style check out my YouTube Channel backpack bushcraft where there is a video version of this with the same title. Until next time, keep those fires burning and put another log on for me.

Beads You Can Count On: Making Ranger Beads to Aid With Navigation

Last week we talked about binoculars which are a best friend to the compass and did some survival drills with them at our local park. This week, we are going to be making a craft that is going to help us keep pace a little better on the trail, and that craft comes in the form of ranger beads. I will be showing you how to make these, as well as making ranger beads entirely out of paracord, and talking about the different kinds of ranger beads you might encounter. Lastly we'll be heading to a local walking track where I will be practicing with my ranger beads and trying to learn my pace. Let's get started.

What are ranger/pace beads? They are beads on a piece of paracord, or string, whichever you prefer, and you move the beads up once you have gone a certain distance to keep track of how far you have walked. I actually have two sets of ranger beads, one is set up to mark kilometers, and the other is set to mark miles. We will be going over the kilometer beads first because this is the one most people prefer, and are also the true ranger beads because they go by clicks. On the bottom set you have 9 beads that represent 100 meters each. After you have walked 100 meters, you will push up a bead until you have pushed up all 9 beads, which is 900 meters. Once you reach 1000 meters, you will then push up one of the 4 beads on the top set, which is one click. You will then reset your bottom set of 9 beads and start over. The mile beads are set up similarly except you have 6 on one leg, and 7 on the other. The set of 7 beads represent 1/16 of a mile each. once you have reached 8/16 of a mile and have no more beads, you move up one of your 6 beads which represents 1/2 a mile each.


If you are walking with the mile marker beads, you will be able to count 3 and just about half of a fourth mile. If you are walking with the kilometer beads, you will be able to count 4 and just about a 5th kilometer. Either way, both sets are made up of 13 beads total. If I wanted to convert my kilometer beads into mile beads, I simply undo the knot separating the two sets of beads, move two up from the set of 9 into the set of 4, and I now have a set of 7 and a set of 6. I will then re-tie the knot, being careful to leave an even amount of space and not tying it too tight so that I can't undo it later.

Now I used wooden beads for mine, but you can use regular beads if you like. My problem is, I don't especially like the beads. I notice that they tend to slip, some of them in particular are really bad for it. I wanted to make a set that wouldn't slip and I didn't want to have to worry about buying more beads. I got the idea from a video (How To Tie Paracord Ranger Beads Method 1) and the guy actually tied his paracord into beads and attached them that way. I went in a bit of a different direction with it. I simply took strips of paracord and tied them into a normal overhand knot. They slide well along the paracord they are tied off to, and they actually hold in place really well where I slide them. For my paracord ranger beads I have a set of 6, a set of 7, and a third set of 4 that I'll talk about here in a minute. Whether you have 4 and 9 or 6 and 7, you will sometimes find a set of 4 beads at the bottom called forester beads. The forester beads are meant to keep track of every 20 meters OR 22 yards. Sometimes when you walk through the woods your pace may be uneven due to the terrain, so you can use the forester beads to mark those distances. Once you move up all four forester beads, you can move up your first 1/16 of a mile marker, or your first 100 meter marker.

Let's talk about how to make one of your own. First take your length of paracord and tie a loop into the top of it. This loop serves as your means of tying it to your pack, belt, walking stick, etc. To make a loop fold your paracord over, give yourself some distance, and tie it off. Now, I like to use two different colors of paracord for this, but now I am going to start adding the strips that will be my counters. to do this, I wrap a new color of paracord around the original that we just tied a loop in, tie an overhand knot, dress it as tight as I can, and then cut it as close as possible to the knot with a knife or scissors. You will repeat tying off the strips of paracord until you had 13 beads total. Then you could separate them however you wanted, and tie a knot off between them. The next thing we need to do is some prevention to keep the ends from fraying. What I have done is taken a lit candle and held the ends of

the paracord I cut close to the flame. You do not actually have to get it into the flame or catch it on fire. If you do, just blow it out gently, no harm done. You just want to melt down the edges of the mantle and the inner string. This will keep the paracord from fraying and falling apart so you get the most use out of your ranger beads.

Our next mission is to head to our local walking track and use the ranger beads to get my pace put in. I have with me on my walk my ranger beads, a pedometer, and a paper that tells me how many steps I need to take to complete 1/16 of a mile depending on my stride. Your stride is the distance you  clear within 2 steps. Based on this, it should take me 83 steps to walk 1/16 of a mile.

After pushing up all of my forester beads I am now ready to push up my first 1/16 of a mile bead. Now it looks like I'm off this first time and was going a bit too fast so I'll try again. The problem I had was that the steps I was counting and the pedometer were not syncing up. When I should have been 1/12 of a mile in, my pedometer said I was 1/10 of a mile in. So what I tried next was resetting everything on the pedometer and trying again while watching the pedometer. Based on the pedometer it took me about 125 steps to clear the 1/16 of a mile. If I divide that into 5 for the forester beads, I'm looking at moving up a bead every 25 steps so that is something I will have to keep in mind. When I began my nature walk I counted 25 steps, moved a forester bead, and repeated that process. The trail I walked was supposed to be about 1.2 miles. At the end I think I may have been a bit overzealous. I had 1 6/16 of a mile and 44 yards. Overall my pace may still need some work to get it accurate.

It is now that time again where we add another item to our pack. This week isn't very difficult as the paracord ranger beads as the only item I used. I'm simply going to attach this to a loop that is on the right shoulder strap of my pack because I am right handed. The only problem I had was the loosening of the paracord strips. I myself am not too worried about it as I can just tighten them down, melt them in to place, or if worse comes to worse I can just replace it even in the field. Next week we will be doing a review of an all in one option, you don't want to miss it. As always feel free to comment, hit the follow button in the top right corner, share this blog, and check back next week for a new one on Sunday 10pm (est). If you want to keep up with me and what I’m doing, Follow me on Facebook: @BPackBushcraft and on Twitter @BPackBushCraft. Lastly if video is more your style check out my YouTube Channel backpack bushcraft where there is a video version of this with the same title. Until next time, keep those fires burning and put another log on for me.

I Will Survive: Comparing the Survival Water Bottle to My EDC Kit

Last week we finished building our EDC Kit and we talked about the three characteristics we want our gear to have: familiarity, compactibility, and re-usability. We packed away all of our stuff into a fanny pack as well. We valued this kit to be about $57, however I only spent $10 on my kit for the fanny pack. The rest of my gear I already had lying around the house. I did not buy gear for this kit. This week we are doing the review. That’s right, this week we will be comparing the survival water bottle to my EDC kit.

First let’s get into the survival water bottle and see what we are getting for $20. The water bottle itself is a 1000 ml. plastic water bottle with a red carabiner attached to it. I have some black 550 paracord at the top of the water bottle, one bandage (the card says there were supposed to be three),

an aluminum carabiner with a compass and an LED flashlight. It also comes with a tiny pocket knife with a tiny nail file. The next item I remove is an orange safety whistle, and a floating compass with a container that stores matches, however, no matches were provided. The last few items are a survival blanket that reflects up to 90% body heat, an emergency poncho which I can see from the package is very thin and will not last long, (I may be able to fly it like a tarp), and an emergency sewing kit with a button and a latch pin. I am not satisfied with what I have for $20. I do not feel that it meets the criteria of 3 minutes without air, 3 hours without shelter, 3 days without water, and 3 weeks without food. My final note is that repacking the bottle was extremely difficult and all of my gear was crammed back inside.

I am going to be testing the survival water bottle in the same location where I had my 3 Day Camp. I

am going to attempt to set up my shelter, start a fire, and boil water. Now, I am not going to spend all day out here trying to accomplish these tasks with this kit. If I hit a road block that I cannot overcome or at least overcome quickly, I am going to say the test is done. I am going to follow this same practice with my EDC kit as well. One flaw I am going to point out with the survival water bottle right away is that I had to dig a box of matches out of my car to add to the kit, because the kit itself did not provide them.

The first thing I did was use the paracord to suspend the plastic water bottle over the site where I am going to build my fire. I tied the paracord off to a tree, threw the length over a limb, tied a loop in it, and clipped the water bottle to the loop with the red carabiner. The goal is to get my water to boil by controlling my fire. Normally I would use a tripod to boil water, however  I do not believe I could cut down or carve one with the tools provided by this kit. This attempt failed

I used my matches to start my fire. If I had not supplied the matches I would have had absolutely no way to make fire. I could have added a lighter instead, however, the kit was designed to use matches. While setting up, the branch above me became over encumbered and fell out so I had to improvise and suspend the water bottle from a much less distance. I filled it up with 16.9 oz. of water so that it will be boiling the same amount as my EDC kit.

Unfortunately I was not able to get the water to boil. While trying to control my fire the water bottle began to melt and warp. Also the tripod type branch I was using was dry enough that it started to catch as well. I probably could have waited a little longer, but I was not satisfied with how things were going. If you don’t know how to boil water in a plastic bottle pre-emergency, you are not going to know how to do it in the actual survival situation. I’m ranking the bottle a D, not an F, because you cannot purify water in it, but it can hold a significant amount of water and that’s worth something.

For the shelter I decided to use the poncho as a moisture barrier and I used the survival blanket to wrap up in. It is very noisy and if I were to sleep like this I would definitely wake up any time I moved. Other than that it was kind of nice. I rank the shelter a C. If rain were to come I would be left completely out in the open. If I had a fire to sit next to it would be even better, however the blanket says to keep away from fire. I may even consider getting one of these for my EDC kit.

Now that we have finished testing out the survival water bottle, it is time to test out my EDC kit. Right away you will notice that there are things I can do with this kit that I couldn’t do with the other kit, and actually there is one thing that I could have done with the survival water bottle kit that I could have done, but chose not to. We will talk about why a little later.

I will be testing my EDC kit the same way I tested the survival water bottle according to the rule three hours without shelter, three days without water, and three weeks without food. My first order of business is to make a shelter. What I did was lash a branch horizontally to a tree with my bank line. Next I found some small rocks and folded them into the corners of my poncho, tied off the corner to keep them in place, and then tied the corners to the lashed branch. I took a long stick that was smaller in diameter to the one I lashed to the tree and used my 11-in-1 card to saw it in half. The stick was mostly greenwood so the 11-in-1 card had some difficulty getting the job done, but it did get the job done. Next I used my Camillus Seize to carve the two half pieces into tent stakes. I repeated the process with the stones in the bottom to corners of my poncho, attached them to the stakes, and then staked them into the ground. This results in my poncho being set up like I would my tarp.

The reason I did not do this with a survival blanket is because I was having so much trouble with the

survival water bottle kit, I just wanted to get any kind of shelter together. I absolutely think that the survival blanket could do this, and it is roughly the same size as my poncho so I think it would do it well. The only problem being with that kit, if I chose to make the survival blanket into a shelter, I would have nothing to cover up with at night. If you have a extra survival blanket in your kit I highly recommend that you try to do this. Unfortunately with the survival water bottle kit, I just don’t think it’s worth it.

With the assistance of my lovely wife, we did a weather test on the poncho. I sat underneath it with my moisture barrier, the black contractor bag I included in my kit and she prepared the water hose to spray down my shelter.  Now the water from the garden hose was a lot heavier than any rain I would typically experience, but it held up well and no water got in. The hood of the poncho faced downward and while it did move and buck with the water hitting it, it did not open up to let the water in.

Now I am going to test the abilities of the second contractor bag that I packed in my EDC kit. First I

can get into it and use it like a sleeping bag if needed. While standing the bag comes up to my arm pits, but lying down I can hunker down into it and it will retain my body heat fairly well. The next thing I am going to test is how well it holds water. I filled the bag up just enough for me to be able to lift it and also so it did not rip out the bottom of the bag. It held up well, I have plenty of contractor bag left to tie it off and store it, and all I have to do is untie it to get more water.

Speaking of water, now it is time for our boiling test. I am going to use the same amount of water as well as the same type of bottled water as I used in my previous boiling test to be fair in judging which boils better. I used my lighter in my combustion kit to light my tinder and get my fire started. After that it was just a matter of placing the metal water bottle into the fire without the plastic lid on top and waiting for it to boil.

Another thing that I want to show you my kit can do is make char cloth. The Altoids tin that is also

the container for my combustion kit can also be used to make char cloth in. Now I didn’t have any cloth packed in my EDC kit so what I did was cut a strip out of the bottom of my T-shirt, placed it in the Altoids tin, closed it, and put it in the fire. It’s as simple as that. Now I can make char cloth while I am waiting for my water to boil, which it did! To remove it safely from the fire, I used my bank line and a small stick to make a toggle, carefully slid the stick into the bottle, and lifted it gently out of the fire to cool. The char cloth actually turned out very nice as well. It blackened well and there were no white spots. Unfortunately the inside of the Altoids tin charred up pretty badly as well so I can no longer use it as a signaling device.

For my final thought, I like to think it is pretty obvious which kit is the winner, but we will still go ahead and break it down. Overall I was very pleased with the fanny pack, more so than I thought I would be. Everything I needed was at my hip and was easy to retrieve. The water bottle just did not have what you needed to survive in my opinion. I ranked the combustion kit in the survival water with a D, because I had to provide my own matches and in that kit that was the one and only way provided to make fire. For cover I ranked it a C because of the survival blanket, but I think there could have been more options in the way of cover. I gave the container a D, because I could not boil or purify water in it. It's saving grace was that I could hold a large amount of water in it. I gave the cutting tool an F, as it was pitiful. It isn't the smallest knife I have ever had, but it was definitely the worst knife I have ever had. I gave the cordage a C. It did it's job, however, I had 33ft. of  550 paracord in the bottle, yet in my kit I had 60 ft. of bank line that was much more compact. Moving on to my kit, I felt it performed above and beyond. My poncho worked very well as a cover, and I was even concerned it would rip but didn't. The contractor bags served their purpose as a moisture barrier and even held up to the task of having extra jobs, so to my cover I give an A+. My combustion kit had a rocky start, but I did have multiple ways of making fire and even created a fourth way to make fire while testing the kit so I give it an A. My container did it's job boiling water and my cordage did a fantastic job setting up my camp. I even had plenty left over. The Camillus Seize performed well in the field. I used it to clean up branches and carve stakes with ease. The 11-in-1 card had a rough start, but it did its job in the end. The final results are the Survival Water Bottle overall is ranked D, and the Fanny Pack EDC Kit is ranked A, at the lowest, maybe a B.

Next week we will be picking up where we left off two series ago. David Canterbury first started off with the 5 C's of Survivability, later he added an additional 5, which in total became the 10 C's of Survivability. We will be beginning next week with Compass. It will also be our first on location video. Make sure you don't miss out! As always feel free to comment, hit the follow button in the top right corner, share this blog, and check back next week for a new one on Sunday 10pm (est). If you want to keep up with me and what I’m doing, Follow me on Facebook: @BPackBushcraft and on Twitter @BPackBushCraft. Lastly if video is more your style check out my YouTube Channel backpack bushcraft where there is a video version of this with the same title. Until next time, keep those fires burning and put another log on for me.

Cordage in a Bottle: Container and Cordage Options for Your EDC Kit

Last week we started talking about EDC Kits, what they are, what they should be comprised of, the problems with bad EDC kits and how to avoid them, and good EDC kits and how to get one. I also talked about three characteristics your EDC kit should have. Last week we talked about the first characteristic, familiarity. I then added some gear to the kit and valued it with the current gear to be about $25. I would also like to reiterate from last week’s blog how important it is NOT TTO BUY FIOR YOUR EDC KIT. You are better off building your kit out gear you already have. Buying new gear takes away from the familiarity of your tools. If you were to recreate the kit that I am using, then yes, you will be out about $50, but I cannot stress enough what a bad idea this is. You likely have similar cutting and combustion option of your own to use that you are more familiar with. This is also effective for keeping costs down.

This week we will be adding another characteristic and two more items to our already growing EDC Kit, The next characteristic we are going to talk about is compactibility, which will give us two distinct advantages over non compactible gear. Number one is the obvious: compactible gear takes up less space. The Camillus Seize in my EDC kit is about half the size of the Camillus Bushcrafter in my full size pack, likewise my combustion kit is about a sixth of the size of the one in my bag. Having lightweight and smaller gear is going to make it easier for you to pack it, as well as make it easier for you to take with you every day.

The second advantage is that most compact gear or at least true compact gear will be just as good as a larger counterpart. My Camillus Seize can do a lot of the same things my Camillus Bushcrafter can do. It can baton wood a bit, strike a ferro rod and carve wood. The same goes for my combustion kit. I can set sure fire, spark fire, and solar fire. I’m sure you are wondering now what the point is in having a bigger option if the compactible gear can do all of the same things. Well the answer is that you have more options with the bigger gear. While my Seize can baton, carve and strike a ferro rod, my Bushcrafter can baton more efficiently, is made of better steel so it casts sparks easier, and it has a bigger belly for carving and even skinning. The same goes for my combustion kit. My larger fire kit can create sure fire, spark fire, and solar fire, the difference is that I have more options and more ways to start a fire. It has two lighters, a large ferro rod, and a very powerful magnifying glass. When you are putting together your EDC kit you will likely notice that the bigger and better gear is harder to pack and you will have to use the compact option. This is okay! Remember, our goal is not to go camping with this gear, but to have it in case of an emergency.

This week’s gear is going to be a container and some cordage. Our container is a 17 oz. stainless steel water bottle. I like this bottle because it is metal, it is single walled, and the plastic cap can be completely removed so the bottle is completely metal at the time we are going to boil it. Being a metal bottle means that I can boil my water. If you can’t boil water in your bottle, you don’t need it. Boiling water is the most simple and easy way of purifying your drinking water. Chemicals can be used to purify water, however, you need precise measurements and any variation can result in unsafe drinking water. I prefer to place the bottle of water into the fire, wait for it to boil, boil for two minutes, and my drinking water is now safe. Some people prefer to go with plastic bottles. I think that is a horrible idea. You might be able to boil water in it, but it is extremely difficult and I wouldn’t recommend it. Chemicals may also break down part of the plastic in the bottle and it will end up in your drinking water which is simply no good. The only problem I have with this water bottle I that it is only 17 oz. My larger water bottle is 32 oz. which is closer to the recommended 64 oz. that it is recommended that we drink daily. I believe this is debatable because we outdoorsmen should probably be drinking more than that. At any rate, to get that 64 oz. of water I will have to make more trips and boil more water to achieve this. It is the sacrifice I have made for a lighter and more compact water bottle. You may not want to do this, it is your own personal preference.

My next gear item is 60 ft, of bank line. I am choosing to use
bank line because it can set up just as well as paracord, and you can make a net with it. This type of cord can store easily, but I will be saving even more space by storing it in my water bottle. Now bank line is not my only option so I thought I would talk about some other choices that are worth a mention. You could wear an 8 in. paracord bracelet. I believe the rule of thumb is that there is 1 ft. of paracord for every inch of bracelet which equals out to about 8 ft. of paracord. This is plenty enough to construct a shelter and with bright colors, you could even signal with it. If you would like an option with more paracord, I’ve made a one ring belt out of 6 strands of paracord that are each 16 ft. The single ring belt is super easy to wear, and yes, the colors I used are very flamboyant, but you can use browns or blacks to make it more discreet.

If you want to make your own paracord belt, you will need a 2 ½” metal ring, 6 sections of 16 ft. of paracord, four strands being the same color, and two being a different color. You will also need a knife to cut paracord to determined length and a lighter to melt the mantle so the cordage will not unravel. Next, you will want to place your ring on something at chest level or higher so that you can work. You will first begin by draping one piece of paracord over the ring with a lark’s head knot. You will want to do this for all 6 strands of paracord. I recommend for beginners a single color, followed by four of the primary color, and the last strand being the color you started with. Now to begin the weaving. Begin by taking the far left piece of cordage, and weave it in front of or behind the cordage directly to its right. You will then alternate weaving over and under until you reach the end and there is nothing else for you to weave against. It is at this point where it is recommended for you to place your line that you have weaved all the way through somewhere to rest so that you can begin weaving the next line. It’s brother line will follow the opposite path that the first line took all the way to the end, for example, if you started weaving over with the first line, then you will start weaving under with the second line. The resting line will then be treated as the last line being weaved and will either come over or under depending on how you are weaving your current line. You will continue this way until you get to the end of the project; you will know you are at the end when you do not have enough cordage to weave through again. I recommend tying them off in pairs so it will all stay together; tying it in any way possible so that it doesn’t come loose, or cannot be undone until  you want it to.

Now let’s talk cost. The paracord bracelet should you choose to pack it is about $5. The paracord belt ran me about $15 to make. These two items are not going to factor into the value of my kit. Y water bottle I bought for $10, but you could easily find it on sale for less. The bank line came from a spool of about 120 ft. that I purchased for $20. I used about half the spool so I will value what is in my kit at about $5. This brings the value of my EDC kit to $40, the equivalent of two of the plastic survival water bottle kits.

Next week we will be discussing the last characteristic, our cover option, and what we will be packing our gear in and why I made these decisions. As always feel free to comment, hit the follow button in the top right corner, share this blog, and check back next week for a new one on Sunday 10pm (est). If you want to keep up with me and what I’m doing, Follow me on Facebook: @BPackBushcraft and on Twitter @BPackBushCraft. Lastly if video is more your style check out my YouTube Channel backpack bushcraft where there is a video version of this with the same title. Until next time, keep those fires burning and put another log on for me.

It’s not homework: 5 blogs I recommend you check out

Last week I told you guys I would more than likely be taking this week off to rest and recharge, and I am currently doing that. However, I thought this would be a good time to recommend just 5 blogs for you to check out. These blogs have been picked for their contents and how it will pertain to the next blog series to come out, but more on that later. Also these blogs will provide you with a lot of insight to the previous series “The 3 day camp” and the reasons I choose the tools I did. Now you could of course check out all the blogs, though if you don’t have that kind of time, just check out these 5.

First off from our combustion series I have to recommend “Cloth roasting on an open fire”.  In this blog I made char-cloth a key component to next fire mentality. Not only that, but it was also a nice wrap up to the entire series. After the char cloth was made I performed a few observations on it. I learned that super-hot char-cloth will begin its embering process if a gentle breeze is present. This make sense because of the 3 facts for fire which are heat, fuel, oxygen. The fuel is already super-heated turning it into char then in the presents of any airflow it begin to ignite. Lesson learned about letting your char-cloth cool before using it. So make sure you check this blog out before next week

Following next was my container series. During this time I spent a lot of times working with mess kits. Even going so far as to make my own. However, the first blog was about your water bottle and its importance. At the time there wasn’t much I could do in the way of an activity for this blog so it turned about to be a lot of lecturing. However, some important points came from there like “My criteria for a Bushcraft water bottle” as well as “what your water bottle should do for you”. Definitely want to check those out so you know which bottle to keep and which to pitch.

 

Speaking of “pitching”, a blog called “pitch the tent and use a tarp” came from

the cover series. In this I used my square tarp that I had made from a rectangle tarp in the previous blog, to demonstrate different set-ups and flys that can give you great shelter options. Never in a million years did I think I would recommend a tarp over a tent. However, my problems with tents like: heat, moisture, and claustrophobia; these aren’t a problem in the tarp. And with a good moisture barrier and some bug repellent would could get all the benefits of a tent without the downsides.

Next in the cordage series, I wrote a blog called “time to get a little knotty”. This entire series was plagued with puns and I apologize for that. However, I do recommend this blog because it shows you the different knots that your cordage should be able to do for you. In this blog, I highlighted 5 or 6 different knots with included a fishing knot and a hitch knot, which lead in to the lashing blog the most popular blog on the website. Definitely will be important so check it out.

Finally in the cutting tool series I have to recommend “Sharpest tool in the shed”. Not only was it our first video episode. But it was the longest blog in process. I very proud of this review. The cutting tools shown in this blog all have specific purposes and different way of tackling a problem. I recommend this one, because knowing what each tool “can do” and “can’t do” will make more sense for the choices I’ll be making in the next series. However, that’ll have to wait till next week.

Now as for the series itself it will be on EDC kits. I will be going explain the importance of EDC kits and the problem I have with most of the ones I see. If ya want a Sneak-peak then here it is: NO PLASTIC BOTTLE. As always feel free to comment, hit the follow button in the top right corner, share this blog, and check back next week for a new one on Sunday 10pm (est). If you want to keep up with me and what I’m doing, Follow me on Facebook: @BPackBushcraft and on Twitter @BPackBushCraft. Lastly if video is more your style check out my YouTube Channel backpack bushcraft where there is a video version of this with the same title. Until next time, keep those fires burning and put another log on for me.