DIY Edelrid Hexon Multifuel Stove With Vargo Titanium Hexagon Wood Stove

Before I purchased the Hexon Multifuel Stove, I did a lot of research and one of it was using with Vargo Hexagon Wood Stove. I have Noticed the nut of the Hexon Multifuel Stove size and the base plate of the Vargo Hexagon Wood Stove had the same size. It was a wild guess without physically seen it. There was no info on the internet that anyone has done it.

Took the gamble and guess what??!! I was right. This is a simple mod to use both stoves together. Takes less than a minute to get it done. Watch the video below

Ferrocerium Rods and Fire Starting Kit

If you have been surfing around the internet on this subject you will definitely find tons of info on it. Ferrocerium Rods aka Fire Steel. Some claimed the Chinese made Firesteels are crap while other champion the Swedish Fire Steel which I still own and now she is laying it my pile of outdoor scrap stuff.

Leatherman Wave Mod - Black Tactical

Black Tactical is completed!

From 17 tools Leatherman Wave now it is a 24 tools Leatherman Super Wave. 

Additional features: wood chisel, awl, nail extractor, steel cutting saw, hard wire cutter, electrical crimper and scriber tools. 

Leatherman Wave with Steel Saw Add-on

I have been scouting for weeks on the internet on how to add a steel saw blade on my Leatherman Wave. Most of the results came from forum.multitool.org and none of it really fits my bill.

DIY 5V Li-ion Battery Charger

Initially started this experiment to revived old dead phone batteries which cannot be charged by conventional charger anymore, read it from somewhere so decided to give it a shot. Somehow it worked and the batteries were revived once more for use. 

So I decided to go further experimenting on live batteries that requires recharge. To my amazed I was able to charge live batteries using 220V or portable 5V Power Pack supply. 

DIY Universal Smartphone Bike Mount

These days we have been using our smartphone as GPS and Fitness Apps  instead of our Garmin Oregon 400t. I have been thinking how can we mount our smartphone on our bikes instead of stopping and taking out from our pocket or bag to use it or rather spend extra money on a Smartphone Bike Mount. 

So finally here I found a simple solution for both of us, a DIY Universal Smartphone Bike Mount and it cost almost nothing.

Platypus Water Bottle Modification

Last few camping trips, we had tested our gears in the most extreme conditions, wet weather, hiking in the dark and filtering the worst condition water ever. 

First of all we would like to thank one of our CiT Fan, Way Point for bring up some ideas on our water filter. He was suggesting that we should add another filtering material just at the inlet strainer to prevent more sediment into the filter element and prolonging it's life span. 

When on with the idea somehow came up more modification for the 2 Litres Platypus Water Bottle. One problem we faced during wild camping trips, at time the water bottle could not stand up right properly due to uneven ground. While filtering water into the bottle it ended up the whole bottle fell flat on the ground, wasting all the effort filtering the water. 

In this Modification included

• Water Filter Upgrading
• Washing point Conversion
• Hydration Bag Modification
• Packing Attachment 
• Hanging Attachment
• Flat Ground Water Filtering

Vargo Titanium Hexagon Wood Stove Modification

This is ridiculous, the stove is not even half a day old and started making modification. The mod was rather simple, made few holes around the lower plating for better air intake. Like any Hobo Stove, the side walls should have holes so that more air can flow into the chamber and create a better combustion during wood burning.

However it was not so simple as it seems, the Titanium was really hard, drilling the first pilot holes was easy but when drilling the final holes, the drill could not cut properly ended with irregular circle shapes. Had to use a rotary tool to smoothing it out. 

DIY Water Bottle Cage Mounting

My bike came with only one water cage mounting. Since I have the Topeak Modular Cage XL which fit 1 ~ 1.5 lts bottle, I have decided make mounting points for it and add extra mountings on other tubing for different setup. 

Initial intention was to make mounting points on the Seat Tube, additional mounting on the upper Down Tube as it was too low and the bottom of the Down Tube. After taking measurements on the upper Down Tube soon realised the drill could not fit in....Crap!!

DIY Alcohol Stove Pot Trivet / Pot Stand

This is an easy to DIY pot stand that can be used on any Alcohol stove. Material is Aluminium and it weighs almost nothing. Took the template from The Pocket Stove Trivet, below the post are the measurement you can used and make one for yourself.

Tools Requirement

• Pencil
• Ruler
• Aluminium Windscreen
• Scissors
• Hole Puncher
• Mini Files

CiT Mini MX Alcohol Stove

Partner said "make me a mini alcohol stove" so I did and here it is. The mini cans are really tough to drill and fit because of the angled base but somehow I managed.

The weight of the stove is only 10 grams. Both base and diffuser are 25mm, the inner chamber height was 30mm. The diffuser holes are around 10mm apart. I had my own template to mark those holes. The actual circumference of the can is 165mm or 6½ inches. Do you own measurement.

Waterproof Tinder Straw

Here is an idea how you can make a tiny waterproof straw container for tinder. This will protect the tinder from drying for many years. In this tiny waterproof straw tinder, I can have as many as 25 times to start a fire. You can use it any time and seal it back. All you need is a bubble tea straw and some Vaseline. 

DIY Aluminium Foil Windscreen

Recently we re-organised our 2 person backpacker Kitchen Kit and we forgotten something, a windscreen. Our current MSR and folding windscreen could not fit in the Kitchen Kit so we decided to DIY one using Aluminium Foil.  

The construction is rather simple, takes some measurement and just fold the windscreen to shape. I decided that the height of my windscreen to be around 15cm heigh. When I folded the Aluminium Foil in half, it was around the height....perfect!!

Survival Darts

After testing out few different kinds of DIY darts, finally settled for one simple method to make it. These darts are normally used with Blowpipe a native hunting tools which is still used around the world. The hunting gear is easy to fashion out, you can use a copper pipe, bamboo or anything that is straight and hollow. The pipe diameter should not be too wide. Blowpipe effectiveness should be at least 1.2m long. However you can try out different length to test it out. The current Blowpipe tested was using Bubble Tea straws, length 60 cm and effective range of 10 metres.

I have other intention that is to construct a compress air gun that can have a range 40 to 50 metres. Still on the drawing board. 

In my survival kit, I have a roll of duct tape and some nails. I carry nails just in case needed to peg the tent down on a tent wooden platform. I can use the nails to make a hunting tool. Now I found that I can make darts with it in matter of seconds.

I first started out making the dart using bamboo skewer and cigarette bud. It did take quite sometime to make one dart. Next I tried using Post-it and nail, it too took sometime but much faster than the bamboo dart. Finally duct tape and nail, it took seconds to have one ready. View the photos below how it was done.  

After testing out all the darts, the Post-it and Duct tape nail darts were more accurate and it sank into the carton box deeper. Maybe is because of the cone shape design which have lesser drag.

Royce DM-300 Rotary Power Tool.

My childhood dream tool, I use to do a lot of Tamiya plastic modelling, having such tool was perfect for my hobby. Those days these tools were very expensive. Finally I got my hands on one such tool, no more plastic modelling but plenty of DIY and repair use. 

I have been using it for couple of weeks and found it extremely useful. Mostly use it for grinding, polishing and cutting.

This rotary tool is similar to Dremel except it is much cheaper and made in China. It can fit almost all Dremel accessories. Another beauty of this tool, you can use 110V or 220V 50~60Hz.

Similar to Dremel, it rans on ball bearings and the long lasting motor brushes are replaceable.

The box itself came with a set of engravers, spindle wrench and spare motor brushes. Instruction manual is in English. I ordered additional Flex shaft attachment and a box of different accessories bits.

Battery Survival

To common people, many think when the vehicle battery is flat, we can jump start and all is OK. But many do not know that when the vehicle battery voltage falls below 11.9V at anytime, the battery is deteriorating. At this point of time charging the battery will not help to regain back it original health, you are probably using the battery 75% or less capacity and in no time the battery have to be renewed. 

I have just received a Pulse Battery Charger and trying it out, I really hope this new tech can help us save money and the environment. I got it because our BOV battery is constantly flat and we suspected the battery life span is deteriorating. Also we have 3 numbers of 12V batteries to maintain.

The reason why till now we did not know this new technology even my electrical professor relative who is teaching in a University is simply because this technology will bring down the big boys just like free energy and the oil companies. Example Nikola Tesla and JP Morgan.

The truth...if one day we do not have oil but we have batteries with pro-long life. We still can live in the same comfort zone. The problem with batteries, they have a life span, so I do hope my new gadget I can save my batteries and prolong their life span. We are still in the test stage, will update later.

The above photo is what we called a Baghdad Battery dated more than 2000 years ago. If people those days had used these batteries and today after 2000 years we are doing the same, shouldn't we be more concerned about batteries in our lives. Today we are using all kinds of batteries to fit our comfort zone. 

In my book of survival especially with our BOV, today's world is not about oil but batteries, no oil we can still cycle and batteries will still provide lightings and many household stuff using an Inverter to convert it to 110V or 220V. We can use wind turbine, solar or Sterling engine to charge these batteries or some other methods. This is another high tech way of harvesting free energy worth considering and prepare ourselves when the melt down comes...new Terranova.

Waterproof Compression Backpack Packing

Waterproof Compression Backpack packing requires the use of trash bag, preferable a durable trash bag. Make sure there are no holes in it. This method of packing not only it waterproof all your gears in the backpack, it also creates more storage space in the Backpack. 

Why This Idea

This idea came to me when many years ago, we had a bad experience on Tioman Island, West Malaysia. We had so called rain proof Backpacks. During the off-beaten trail along the coast of the island, we had to back track when the tide came up. Still then, we had to jump into the sea to clear the obstacle. Threw our backpacks into the water and swam with it until we realised the backpacks were taking in water and sunk, nearly drown and it was a close call. We had a hard time pulling up the Backpacks from the cliff's edge as it were all filled with seawater. All our gears were soaking wet including the camera. 

How It Can Be Done

I have seen Taiwanese River Tracers, in their backpack they would purchased another waterproof bag such as Sea-Line and they do not come cheap.

Problem with Hiking Backpacks used for such activity is that they will still take in water as they do not have any drainage holes at the bottom unlike Military Backpacks which comes with drainage holes. I would make a hole to drain the water if I am doing such activity but to make a hole on an expensive Backpack, I rather invest in Military packs. 

DIY Portable Heineken Solar Panel

Decided to rip off  my Solar Focus Mio and reconstruct it. Reason for doing that, the rubber casing around the SF Mio started to crack and there is no option for direct USB charging. 

Material needed

• Femal USB connector
• Heineken Box
• Duct Tape
• Shrink Wrap

DIY Bike Chain Cleaning Tool

It has been a while since I did any maintenance on the bike chain. Made a very simple tool using 2 toothbrushes, 2 inner tube bands and a piece of wood. 

Using some diesel, slowly cleaned each link to get rid of the grease. Method I did was left and right follow by up down. After that was done, hosed down with water (preferable with hard spray but not water jet) and soaped the chain. To clean other hard to reach areas like Chain Rings or Sprockets, I had used a separate toothbrush for that job.

Window Farming - Recycle Material and Construction

The reasons for Window Farming

• Improve my survival skills
• Understand type of green and their environment
• Produce greens that I often use
• DIY 
• Recycle

Living in an apartment has many limitation to produce own greens. My first proto-type did not work really well till I searched the Internet and found there are people doing just the same but at a better scale. You can find more information HERE.