Make Fire (Hand Drill)
Summary
The hand drill is one of the simplest friction-fire methods: you spin a straight wooden spindle between your palms against a wooden hearth board to make a hot dust pile that becomes a coal (ember), then transfer it into a tinder bundle and blow it into flame.
Prerequisites
- A dry environment (or at least dry materials you can protect from moisture).
- Time and patience: your first successful coal may take hours of attempts.
- Natural materials:
- Two pieces of dry wood (spindle + hearth board)
- Tinder (very dry, fine plant fibers)
- Kindling (pencil-thin twigs) and fuel (thumb-thick sticks)
Materials selection
Wood for spindle and hearth
Pick dry dead wood that is not punky (crumbly/rotted) and not resin-soaked.
- Spindle: straight stick, ~60 to 80 cm long, ~1.5 to 2 cm thick.
- Hearth board: flat piece, ~1 to 2 cm thick, wide enough to hold under your foot.
Good beginner pairings often use a slightly softer hearth with a spindle that is not dramatically harder. If your dust is pale and fluffy, you are probably polishing instead of charring; switch to a different wood pair.
Tinder
Tinder needs to catch from a small coal. Use the driest, finest material you can find:
- Dry grass seed heads, shredded dry inner bark, cattail fluff, dry leaf fibers, or very fine wood shavings.
Build a tinder bundle before drilling so you do not lose your coal.
Steps
1) Prepare the hearth depression
- Place the hearth on the ground.
- Make a shallow round depression near the edge (not centered): about the width of the spindle.
- Smooth the depression so the spindle tip seats without slipping.
If you have no cutting tool, you can grind/scrape with a sharp stone or roughen the spot by rubbing with gritty sand and a hard pebble.
2) Cut a notch and make a “dust pan”
- From the edge of the hearth to the depression, create a notch shaped like a narrow pie-slice.
- Place a thin chip of bark/leaf/flat wood under the notch to catch the hot dust pile.
The notch gives the charred dust oxygen and lets it accumulate into a coal.
3) Shape the spindle tips
- Bottom tip (on hearth): slightly blunt, like a rounded pencil tip. This makes more dust.
- Top tip (in hands): smoother and more pointed. This reduces friction on your hands.
4) Drill to produce dark, hot dust
- Place the spindle in the depression.
- Pin the hearth down with your foot close to the depression.
- Spin the spindle by rubbing your palms downwards; quickly return hands to the top and repeat.
- Start slow to “seat” the spindle, then increase speed and downward pressure.
Goal: a steady stream of dark brown/black dust that collects in the notch.
5) Form and mature the coal
- When the dust pile is large (about a coin), keep drilling for 10 to 20 seconds more.
- Stop gently and do not jostle the hearth.
- Wait 30 to 60 seconds. The dust pile should continue smoking and consolidate into a coal.
6) Transfer coal to tinder and make flame
- Move the dust pan with the coal into your tinder bundle.
- Fold tinder around the coal while leaving space for air.
- Blow steadily: start gently, then increase as the bundle glows.
- When it flares, move the burning tinder under your kindling structure and feed it.
Verification
- Dust: dark and warm-to-hot to the touch (careful).
- Coal: a single cohesive ember that keeps smoking when you stop drilling.
- Tinder bundle: glow spreads when you blow, then transitions to flame.
Safety
- Clear dry leaves from the area; prepare a bare-soil patch.
- Have water or dirt ready to extinguish.
- Do not attempt indoors or near flammable shelter materials.
Troubleshooting
- Dust is light/tan and cool: increase pressure/speed, change wood pairing, or ensure materials are truly dry.
- Spindle squeaks or “polishes” the hearth: roughen the contact surfaces and blunt the bottom tip slightly.
- Hands slip down too fast: shorten the spindle or use more consistent downward pressure; keep hands dry.
- Coal forms but dies in tinder: tinder is too coarse or damp; make it finer and drier, and shield from wind while blowing.