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Primitive Canteen

6/17/2014

9 Comments

 
   At times, covering ground in a survival situation is absolutely necessary to ensuring that you make it out alive.  The old adage "stay put until the rescue party finds you" can be situation dependent and doesn't always ring true.  In this case, preparing yourself to survive 'on-the-go' adds an entire new dimension to the skills you may already possess.  'Quickie' shelters, coal extenders, preserved meat and the ability to transport purified water are primary considerations that need to taken care of before trekking into unfamiliar territory. 
   To start, here is a simple and effective method for making a canteen to transport water.  While it does take some preparation, this canteen can be made in a few hours.  First, we need to peel some flexible bark from a tree, hollow a small piece of wood, gather some pine sap and make a 3 foot piece of cordage.
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Next, you fold the piece of bark in half lengthwise, while curling the end together around the hollow piece of wood.  You can cut off excess bark at the top where it overlaps.  From here, tightly wrap your cord around the bark so that it is pinched around the hollow piece of wood.  This should now form a triangle with slightly overlapping seems (.5 inch).  Next step, seal off all the seems with Pine sap glue!
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To make glue out of Pine sap, crush a bunch of charcoal into a fine powder and mix it about 25/75 with pine sap.  This will act as a binding agent, and keep the sap from being sticky once it cools.  To do this, you'll first need to heat the sap until it is liquid.
Now, take the liquid sap/charcoal and spread it under and on top of the seems.  If it hardens too quickly use a hot rock to further melt it in place.  Glue all seems and let dry.  Once the sap is hardened try it out.  You can always fix leaks easily with a little dab of sap.  That should do it.  Surprisingly, I have had one canteen like this last for 2 years of fairly regular use!!  Best of luck and hope it saves your life one day!  tm
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9 Comments
Oats link
12/17/2014 06:34:29 am

25:75 - by weight? volume?

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Tom McElroy link
12/17/2014 07:57:43 am

Hey, thanks for asking.

A: By volume.

Since you asked, the absolute best to keep the sap malleable, Mix sap with 20% crushed-up egg shells and 5% beeswax. That makes a very flexible combination. For some reason this is the best, albeit ont the easiest to procure in survival. The hotter of a location the more hardening agent you will need but approx 25% is good for most situations.

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Michaela
9/28/2016 04:19:24 pm

What kind of bark did you use or what would you recommend?

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Tom
11/19/2016 12:29:51 pm

Sorry for the delay, just noticed this question. I used white pine bark for this one. Ive also used atlantic white cedar, elm, birch mulberry.... Lots of option. Anything that peels nicely and is flexible.

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Michaela
11/12/2016 02:10:28 pm

What kind of bark did you use for this?

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Tom
11/19/2016 12:30:20 pm

This was made from White Pine

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Nick Craft
2/6/2018 01:58:59 am

Is there any way a video could be made on the making of it?

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Tom Mcelroy
7/26/2018 02:00:34 pm

Hey Nick,
Check out my video on youtube for Solo survival on the East Coast, Its the same type of bark and I remove it in the same way. In that video i am making a folded bark bowl, but you will see the process in the video of getting the rectangle piece off of the log. This one only works well in Spring and Early Summer though. Let me know if you have any more questions, best to email @ tomcelroy1@gmail.com

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Nick Craft
2/6/2018 02:07:55 am

I’m mainly confused at how you good the rectangular piece of bark initially to achieve the shape you get

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