Talk:Fire striker

message: The ancient P and D shaped firesteels in the photos? Why those similar shapes, and how do they function? Seemingly they are not mere iron powder or scraping sources (as implied). <Br> --69.110.90.147 (talk) 22:28, 5 June 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Photos of firesteels? 

message: What mean this sentence: "To create confusion, ferrocerium rods, described below ..." ?
Zomby5178 (talk) 19:34, 22 November 2012 (UTC)
thread_title: To create confusion

message: I submit that the title of this article be changed to "Percussion firemaking" because the firesteel or firestriker is incidental to the technique (which can actually be used with iron pyrite as well).
Then we can set up sections for both archaic flint-and-steel and ferrocerium firemaking. 
I made a category for Percussion Firemaking, since this and other categories were classed under Friction Firemaking. 
I am going to take out the mentions of Ferrocerium, since there is a separate article for that. Kortoso (talk) 00:43, 18 January 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: In retrospect, maybe this should be called "Flint and Steel Firemaking" since many people now refer to Ferrocerium sticks as firesteels. Ideas? Kortoso (talk) 23:09, 18 January 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Percussion firemaking" 

message: Tinderboxes in the home provides some supporting documentation:
:http://www.oldandinteresting.com/tinderbox.aspx
And this may be a copy therof: 
:http://www.colonialsense.com/Antiques/Other_Antiques/Early_Lighting/The_Common_Tinder-Box.php
:-Kortoso (talk) 20:38, 13 October 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Sources 

message: From personal experience, I've never been able to strike decent sparks from anything but simple carbon steel. Is there a citation source that indicates that steel will work is alloyed with anything but carbon?
Kortoso (talk) 21:06, 27 July 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: No response on this in almost two years. I'll take it out. Kortoso  (talk) 22:00, 27 February 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Alloyed steel? 

message: There is an image, part of which (and it's the relevant part) is already in Wikimedia Commons at
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Fr_Haguenau_Retable_de_l%27Eglise_Saint_Georges_-_d%C3%A9tail_Sainte_Famille.jpg
The painting, no copy of which can I find without the bottom cut off as it is above, is in a church named "St. Georges" in Haguenau, in Alsace, in France.
If you zoom in you can see how Joseph, Husband (or Fiancé) of Mary, is holding the firesteel, wearing it like brass knuckles with fingers through the curled ends. This painting is the only one I've ever seen from Medieval or Renaissance times that confirms a conjecture I had since childhood, that the shape of a firesteel with its bouts at the ends was for the purpose of wearing it like brass knuckles. The flint you would be rapping might have a fine edge on it (or so I conjecture) because the finer the edge the greater the shower of sparks. But an edge that fine could cut your fingers unless you donned the firesteel like a brass knuckles and curled your fingers out of harm's way. The firesteel would never let the flint blade touch your flesh. The material to be lit by the sparks is held in the same hand as the flint itself so that the sparks need not travel far, the material can be blown upon, and once it has a durable glow it can be moved to light additional material. This is a better demonstration than that in the photograph of 1918 Dalarna, Sweden.2603:7000:9906:A91C:1C64:8308:33BC:E2D6 (talk) 07:48, 9 May 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  How to hold the firesteel