When your hand drilling watch for what I call a "dead hand." EVERY body uses mostly one hand to turn the stalk with. It's easiest to identify a "dead hand" by having your partner watch the motion from top down. You really have to make conscious effort to use both hands equally. When you use both hands equally you get far more RPMs.
Also if you want to be a world class hand driller I suggest you just see how long you can keep smoke going.
Forget about getting a coal.(!!!!) Don't even make a notch.(!!!!)
Just try to keep smoke rolling for like a solid 45 seconds at first. Then go for a minute and a half. Then go for 5 minutes!
Keep building hand drill endurance, keep striving for ENDURANCE. Forget about coals!! When you got plenty of endurance THEN you can EASILY get a coal with lots of materials, even crazy materials. Even in pouring rain.
Remember the Karate Kid Movie? Daniel-son kept begging Miyagi to teach him Karate. Miyagi would not "teach" him Karate. He made him paint the fence, up & down, for days on end. Daniel agreed and was patient hoping it would earn him a Karate lesson form Miyagi later.
After the fence was painted Miyagi made him Wax-on, Wax-off. After all the cars got waxed Daniel was STILL denied a karate "lesson", got
FRUSTRATED and let Miyagi know it.
Miyagi finally relented and yelled "paint the fence!" and started throwing punches at Daniel. Daniel blocked the punches with a paint the fence
motion.
Miyagi yelled WAX ON, WAX OFF and started throwing Punches. Daniel Son blocked each punch with waxing motions. Daniel had mastered
some fundamental but highly important Karate moves, with what he *thought* was the furthest thing from Karate-do.
In the same manner I submit to you & all my students that: seeking & looking for a coal as you hand drill is counter productive & even inhibits the learning curve.
I beat the world record for a hand drill coal several years ago. I did it by training with an oak dowel rod from Lowe's on an old seasoned hickory board. (The harder the wood your working with the harder it is to work with in friction fire. = Train HARD, Fight Easy!) I never made a notch on that set. Every day I came home from work and hand drilled as long as I could possibly could keep the smoke rolling, until I could not go any more. I'd often flop over in the floor heaving as if I had sprinted an all out 100 yard dash - on my hands/arms!
I'd rest and do it again long & hard as I could. I did that three times every day for like 5 weeks.
That is what got me to world class hand drill level. I broke the record ( back then, is it the same now?) with a Horse weed spindle on Paw-Paw
wood fire board.
Your building muscle endurance with muscles in a way you have not used them before. Awesome technique and lots of coals FOLLOW endurance like the caboose of the train. Did you get that?
AGAIN.....
"Awesome technique and lots of coals in hand drilling FOLLOW endurance like the caboose of the train."
I have had many people ask me to teach them the "Float technique." I can not teach you the float, nor do I believe any one can. Sure I can
explain what my hands are doing, but I don't believe you can "learn it." However when you train as stated above the float will come to you
naturally. Like riding a bike, all of a sudden you'll realize you have been peddling a long while and have not fell over!
And you can go beyond the float. It's not really all the hard to do hand drill "stunts" when you train this way. Stunt? Like start with your hands at the BOTTOM of the stalk, "float" your way UP the stalk and have a coal by the time you get to the top end of the stalk. Another stunt is to use a stalk the length of a cigarette. It will dazzle commoners in the primitive skills community. But its not super hero stuff. It's just consistent training, the right way, with the right focus. And you can do it.
If you don't know what Hand drill is, look here (not me in the vid.)
"Best hand drill demo on YouTube."
Also if you want to be a world class hand driller I suggest you just see how long you can keep smoke going.
Forget about getting a coal.(!!!!) Don't even make a notch.(!!!!)
Just try to keep smoke rolling for like a solid 45 seconds at first. Then go for a minute and a half. Then go for 5 minutes!
Keep building hand drill endurance, keep striving for ENDURANCE. Forget about coals!! When you got plenty of endurance THEN you can EASILY get a coal with lots of materials, even crazy materials. Even in pouring rain.
Remember the Karate Kid Movie? Daniel-son kept begging Miyagi to teach him Karate. Miyagi would not "teach" him Karate. He made him paint the fence, up & down, for days on end. Daniel agreed and was patient hoping it would earn him a Karate lesson form Miyagi later.
After the fence was painted Miyagi made him Wax-on, Wax-off. After all the cars got waxed Daniel was STILL denied a karate "lesson", got
FRUSTRATED and let Miyagi know it.
Miyagi finally relented and yelled "paint the fence!" and started throwing punches at Daniel. Daniel blocked the punches with a paint the fence
motion.
Miyagi yelled WAX ON, WAX OFF and started throwing Punches. Daniel Son blocked each punch with waxing motions. Daniel had mastered
some fundamental but highly important Karate moves, with what he *thought* was the furthest thing from Karate-do.
In the same manner I submit to you & all my students that: seeking & looking for a coal as you hand drill is counter productive & even inhibits the learning curve.
I beat the world record for a hand drill coal several years ago. I did it by training with an oak dowel rod from Lowe's on an old seasoned hickory board. (The harder the wood your working with the harder it is to work with in friction fire. = Train HARD, Fight Easy!) I never made a notch on that set. Every day I came home from work and hand drilled as long as I could possibly could keep the smoke rolling, until I could not go any more. I'd often flop over in the floor heaving as if I had sprinted an all out 100 yard dash - on my hands/arms!
I'd rest and do it again long & hard as I could. I did that three times every day for like 5 weeks.
That is what got me to world class hand drill level. I broke the record ( back then, is it the same now?) with a Horse weed spindle on Paw-Paw
wood fire board.
Your building muscle endurance with muscles in a way you have not used them before. Awesome technique and lots of coals FOLLOW endurance like the caboose of the train. Did you get that?
AGAIN.....
"Awesome technique and lots of coals in hand drilling FOLLOW endurance like the caboose of the train."
I have had many people ask me to teach them the "Float technique." I can not teach you the float, nor do I believe any one can. Sure I can
explain what my hands are doing, but I don't believe you can "learn it." However when you train as stated above the float will come to you
naturally. Like riding a bike, all of a sudden you'll realize you have been peddling a long while and have not fell over!
And you can go beyond the float. It's not really all the hard to do hand drill "stunts" when you train this way. Stunt? Like start with your hands at the BOTTOM of the stalk, "float" your way UP the stalk and have a coal by the time you get to the top end of the stalk. Another stunt is to use a stalk the length of a cigarette. It will dazzle commoners in the primitive skills community. But its not super hero stuff. It's just consistent training, the right way, with the right focus. And you can do it.
If you don't know what Hand drill is, look here (not me in the vid.)
"Best hand drill demo on YouTube."
