Monday, June 3, 2019

Slide of the month - Prospectors Poke



June 2019

Time to make: 2 hours

Boys Life "Slide of the Month"

Mar. 1965, page 70

Original design: William Poese






I quite enjoyed making this slide because it brings together an old Scout skill (which I was never very good at as a Scout) and the pleasure of crafting a slide. Making a fire with flint and steel is a bit of a lost art but you can see a good video here or here.

So lets start with the steel striker. The striker here is made from an old file I had around which I but in a vice and broke if off into smaller pieces. Using a grinder, I rounded the corners and ground one of the side edges smooth.  The "flint" is a couple of different stones starting with a piece of agate and then a piece of flint from Florida. I have tried quartz and "Johnny stone", (not shown), but I can produce more sparks with flint or agate. Also shown is some char cloth I made and you can see some instruction on making it from old cotton scraps here and some better ones from cotton rounds here

The bag is made from some spare leather I had around and the cord/bead make up the drawstring.