Firepiston construction 1, demonstrated by a native Semelai. Part 1 of 2

Jamri, a native Semelai, demonstrates the lost art of firepiston construction.
The firepiston creates fire by rapidly compressing a column of air, and thereby sufficiently increasing the temperature in the chamber to ignite the tinder placed in the cup at the head of the piston. (In excess of 430 degrees C)

In the early 19th century European explorers began encountering the native peoples of South East Asia and were astonished to see them utilizing a fire-lighting device they could not comprehend.
In 1877 Carl Linde gave a lecture in Munich in which he demonstrated a firepiston.
Rudolph Diesel was in attendance and this experience later stimulated him to designing the diesel engine.
Unfortunately, amongst its original inventors the knowledge of its construction and use is almost totally lost, replaced by the trappings of the modern world.

The process took approximately 2 hours, the gasket is made from fibres extracted from the bark of the Terap tree (Artocarpus Elasticus), the tinder is extracted from palms such as the Fishtail palm (Caryota) in Malaysia or the Apiang palm (Arenga undulatifolia) in Borneo. It is scraped from the layers which surround the palms heart.

Filmed in Malaysia by BOD and Stuart.

If you have any questions, please submit them via the comments box and we will do our best to provide answers where we can, and seek them where we cant.

Category:

Education

Tags:

• semelai
• bushcraft
• Fire
• piston
• primitive
• fire
• syringe
• worldwild
• survival
• friction

[jpathomas]

When I see this kind of video it makes me feel humble. I've got a garage full of tools, and I've failed to build a working fire piston twice so far. This guy's got a couple of knives, some sand paper and a sharpened screwdriver. I think sometimes we think a thing is harder, and requires more technology than it really does. I'm so giving this another go. Thank you.

[ArtisanTony]

Damn your camera gave me seizures, lol

[LLuE88]

Is the wood named anywhere here? If so sorry I missed it

The wood type is critical to make the cylinder wall smooth enough to help making the seal.  Very good video! thanks

[blackbarracuda]

@jpathomas Me to My Garage in Italia is full and I wrong a lot times with the fire piston!!hahahaha!!

[recurveninja]

That guy is awesome, he really is.

[jmaza2000]

Great video. I am off to Malyasia later in the month and would love to see this first hand. Could you please give me details of where exactly you witnessed this so I can do likewise. Many thanks for your help and for such a great upload.

[chazmyrtormtor]

I love this.... a great video

[desertsurvivalist]

This is very interesting. I would like to know what wood he is using. It looks very resinous like tropical pine or something. Thank you for sharing this.

[cnacc]

@jpathomas I agree with you 110%. I'm in somewhat of the same situation. I think going back to nature for a few months would be as good as any college education and might teach people not to lose sight of life before oil.

Cnacc