No matter what time of year it is, there isn’t anything much better than starting a campfire and kicking back with a cool drink at camp.

It’s a long standing Aussie tradition to have a good rolling campfire, and many of us have grown up camping with the crackle of eucalyptus and the waft of its soothing smoke, no matter who you are, it is just one of those things that you simply cannot get past and at 4WD Supacentre this is something that is not lost on us!

We have a massive range of gear that adds to your campfire experience – ranging from cooking systems to completely self-contained fire places which enable much more efficient burning of your firewood!

Not everyone has a parent that has spent years in the bush or a leathery skinned bush guide to show them all the tricks of the bush, so we’re going to run through some of our expert tips and tricks to not only get your fire burning sooner, but also how to get your fire ready to cook on and burn more efficiently without the use of highly volatile and toxic fuels, particularly if you are going to cook your food over the coals in a traditional camp oven like the Bedourie Camp Oven!

Starting out you are going to need firewood, you need to check whether you have permission to not only burn firewood at your campsite, but whether you can collect it, or if you’d have to bring it with you.

With the legalities and technicalities out of the way, you are wanting to look for wood that is already seasoned and mostly dry.

The key to starting your fire is to start with small bits of solid fuel and gradually work your way into larger and larger pieces, this will allow your fire to start from something as simple as a spark from a flint.

COLLECTING FUEL

When you are collecting your fire-wood you will want to look for firewood that meets three basic criteria;

Tinder –
Long before smartphone apps, tinder is a word that is used to describe fuel that is extremely dry, and has a feathery nature to it, tinder can be comprised of anything from the lint from your clothes dryer at home, some tissue paper, a newspaper, a bundle of grass, or even fine wood shavings.
Tinder is the starting point of all fires, and if the correct tinder is chosen, it should burn quite hot, quite quickly.

Kindling –

Kindling is the first “sticks” you’ll need when building your fire, kindling is usually comprised of a handful of sticks that are smaller than your thumb in thickness –  when looking for kindling, you should aim for sticks that are in a range of thicknesses. When collecting you should gather more wood than you think you will need, particularly if you plan on cooking on your fire, when too little kindling is used, it is difficult to get enough heat into your fire. Getting more kindling is also a solution to helping to put more heat into your fuel logs to help dry it out.

Fuel –
This is your “logs” and thicker branches – when looking for your fuel you should look for hardwoods like eucalyptus for its high oil content and if you are lucky casuarina “sheoak” which when the Europeans arrived named it “bakers oak” for its high burning temperature and minimal ash.  These woods generally dry fairly quickly, and because of their dense grain, contain much more energy than soft woods.

Pro Tip: If you are equipped with a bush saw you can trim logs to size and with a sharp axe you will be able split your wood into smaller pieces which take to flame much easier, turning your fuel logs into both kindling and tinder.

LETS START A FIRE!

This seems like it should be easy enough, but out of all the “primitive” skills you should know, this is one that people seem to mess up the most!

Starting with your fires location, if someone has already setup a fire pit at your campsite, it is a lot easier to just light your fire in situ, however if you are in a new spot, you will need to clear the ground, and build a protective stone/rock perimeter, this will prevent your fire from spreading away from where you want it to stay, alternatively, you can use an Adventure Kings Camp Oven/Stove to keep your fire up off the ground which has some benefits we’ll go over later.

With your fireplace established, you are going to need to prepare your kindling and fuel so once your tinder is lit, you wont have to scramble, trying to put your fire together.

There are a few options on how to establish your fire – because of the firewood available in most Australian conditions our favorite is known as a ‘lean to fire’ firstly work out which direction the wind is blowing from and lay a nice thick log, perpendicular to the direction.

With your thick log in position, you should lay a handful of kindling against the log creating a covered pocket on the side of the log that the wind will be blowing against.

you are ready to take your dry tinder out, your objective is to “fluff up” your tinder bundle, which will allow air to flow through it easily and allow it to get really hot, really quickly. If you are using a tuft of dry grass, you should roll it into a ball and then loosen the fibers to take a flame, easily.

There are many ways to light your tinder, ranging from a lighter, matches, a flint, or even your vehicles cigarette lighter – with your tinder lit you need to stick it under the covered area, being careful not to smother it, with a flame burning you can sit and watch and let the kindling start to catch.

As your kindling burns down you can add thicker sticks leaning against the large log support. When cooking over coals, you need to add much more kindling to generate more hot coals.

PUTTING YOUR FIRE OUT!

When lighting your fire you also need to consider how you are going to extinguish it, using a fire extinguisher is an extremely inefficient way of putting out your fire, it may extinguish the flames but it is extremely irresponsible to leave hot coals unattended, this has caused many bushfires and can turn into a life threatening event!

The best way to put out your fire is to extinguish with plenty of water, by dousing water over the coals you get plenty of steam, but it is better than risking someone coming through and getting severe burns on the hidden hot embers!

We make sure we have a bucket with us and can collect enough water to extinguish our fire before we go to bed – or head out for the day!

Benefits of a camp oven!
We mentioned before the massive benefits to using an Adventure Kings Camp Oven Stove– This handy device uses internal reflection and convection of heat, to fully burn your fuel. Not only does the internal reflection help you to get more out of your fuel it will mean that you get a lot less ash in the bottom of your camp oven.

The other benefit to lighting a fire within the enclosed space of the camp oven is the ability to control the amount of air flow into your fire, this is achieved by both the notched door latch, as well as the adjustable flue dampener. This mechanism uses an easy to operate butterfly valve which prevents air from racing up the chimney, by fully engaging your flue damper you can smother your fire and prevent the fire from fully combusting.

We’ve found the main benefit of using an Adventure Kings Camp Oven is its 2.4m high chimney, this chimney makes it perfect for lifting all the campfire smoke up and out of camp, meaning no more stinging eyes and smelly clothes!

No more online reading for you – it’s time to pack the car and hit the tracks to enjoy the vast and breathtaking landscapes and fresh air Australia has to offer!

Here is another way that you can enjoy a campfire at home!
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