Shadowing Practice: 10 Wilderness Survival Tips | Bushcraft Skills - Learn English Speaking with YouTube

That's not a knife.

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That's not a knife.

That's a knife.

The Swiss Army Knife.

Arguably one of the most popular multi-tools in the world.

Not surprising given that this multi-knife design has been going strong for well over 100 years.

Back then the soldier knife was the main model that was issued to Swiss soldiers.

But now there is a huge variety of models that can suit your needs.

I use the Evo Wood 17 as my everyday carry.

This little dude has been on some epic adventures with me over the years.

The particular model has walnut scales and 13 features which are large blade, wood saw, nail cleaner, small screwdriver,

bottle opener, scissors, wire stripper, screwdriver, can opener, nail file, corkscrew, reamer punch and keyring.

That's right, keyring is a feature.

I'll put a link to it in the video description.

It's a small design, the blade only being about 55mm long, but I'm about to show you just how versatile this little beast can be.

Here are 10 awesome Swiss Army knife survival skills.

You're probably thinking that with such a small knife and saw, this tool isn't going to be able to do much out in the wilderness.

They always say that the best survival knife is the one you have on you.

So let's imagine that this is the only tool you have with you.

In order to get the best out of this small multi-tool, I'm going to need a helping hand from good old mother nature.

Using the saw, I cut a birch stick about 1.5 to 2 inches thick maximum.

I try to find the straightest sections of wood with no knots, as this will make cutting difficult.

I cut the sticks to roughly 10 to 15 centimetres in length, and using the knife I take the top layer of bark off,

and then I begin to make some deeper slice cuts to thin down the material.

Obviously the grind on this knife is only small, so it takes some time.

Once the wedge end of the stick is slimmed down enough, I flip it around and put a bevel on the other end.

This is the end that will take a beating, so by putting a bevel on it, it will stop it mushrooming out.

Ah, what a cute little wedge.

But don't let that fool you.

I'll I'll show you what you can do with this in a minute.

In the meantime, let's saw a log.

When you first look at the saw on a Swiss Army knife, you'll notice that it isn't very long.

You might think that you're restricted to only be able to cut wood

that is not wider in diameter than the length of the blade.

But this is not the case.

Here's a silver birch tree that had fallen down in a storm some weeks ago.

You can clearly see

that it's much larger in diameter than the length of the saw blade on the Swiss Army knife I'm using.

But with the right technique, you can saw through a log this thick no problem.

I begin by sawing into the log to the depth of the saw blade.

Then I begin to angle the saw at a 45 degree angle and continue to saw to the depth of the blade.

I do the same to the opposite side.

Now rather than bore your socks off, if I'm not doing that already, I'm going to speed up this clip.

But as I do this, you will notice that I continue to change the saw angle.

Essentially, I'm cutting the wood into a V shape and then sawing down horizontally to cut away the top of that V.

Rather than continue to burn calories sawing, once I'm happy with the depth I'm at, I can get the wood wedges out and hammer down on these to break the log open quicker.

In fact, when the log finally splits, you can actually see the V shape I made against this log.

Right, so now we have a gnarly looking log, let's craft it into something.

Using the saw, I score around the log half way up the length.

Again, I cut down to just over the depth of the blade of the saw.

Now I'm going to do something that will have every Swiss Army knife owner cringing.

I'm going to batten down on this log.

It's worth noting you should never batten down wood with a Swiss Army knife, or any folding knife for that matter.

Because there are a lot of components that hold these knives together, you run the risk of loosening the joints and fixings.

It's not a 5mm bushcraft blade.

However, battening can still be achieved if you go about it in the right way.

Firstly, I only open my knife blade at a 90 degree angle to the wood.

This means that as I hit down on it, it's not going to put so much stress on the components that hold it together.

So I gently batten down on the wood to the depth of the blade.

Then I continue to make these cuts all the way along the diameter of the wood.

This is marking the material that I want to cut away.

Now get the wood wedges out and place them in the cuts I just made.

Batten down and split the material away.

Once I have the majority of the material cut, I just go back to using the knife to take away the rest of it.

This is now forming the handle of a wooden mallet.

You can see that I cut slightly too deep where the handle joins the head of the mallet, but it wasn't too deep to make it break.

Once the basic handle shape is formed, I just tidy it up a bit with the knife to create a more ergonomic handle.

Now you can keep the bark on the head of the mallet, but personally I take it off as I find that once you've hammered down with it a few times,

it seems to flake away and bits of wood fly off everywhere.

And there you have it, a wooden mallet.

Now we can really start building things.

All of a sudden, that small Swiss Army knife at the beginning of the video isn't looking so small.

With a wood mallet you can do some bigger projects like building a fire reflector or windbreak.

Or if you've followed my channel over the years, you can even build an entire semi-permanent base camp.

Whilst we're on the topic of big logs, you can easily use these techniques I used to split a large log.

Make a small cut with the knife going to the middle of the log, and do exactly the same to the other side.

If you want, you can use the saw to make your cut wider, then get the trusty wood wedge out and split away.

Make sure to resharpen the wood wedges regularly so they can easily get into the cuts.

Once you've split the round, it's much easier to split the other sections of wood.

You can then use the edges of these smaller sections to make feather sticks

and expose the dry interior part of the wood that is so good for lighting fires with.

Speaking of fire, can you get a fire going with a Swiss Army knife?

Well, providing one of the tools on it has a sharp 90 degree edge on it, then you should be good to go.

The only problem is, not many of the tools on the Swiss Army knife have this sharp angle

that you need to be able to strike sparks off a ferro rod or fire steel.

Now, in an emergency, you could use the actual sharp blade of your knife, but this is not a good idea, you will soon blunt the blade.

The reamer also has a sharp angle on it, and it can throw out sparks, but again, you don't really want to be blunting this tool.

The can opener also has a sharp edge, and this can throw out a surprising amount of sparks, certainly enough to get fire going.

But one of the best methods is the saw, or more importantly, the back of the saw.

It tends to have a sharper angle on the edge, and it can throw out sparks nice and easily.

We then don't run the risk of damaging the blade itself.

Now that we're warmed up, let's craft some more items that can be used for camp.

Time for the saw.

The woodland I am in is very dense, and so many of the trees grow straight as they fight for the sunlight above.

So I'm sawing off a straight piece of wood that has a number of forked branches growing out from the side.

These can be used for camp craft projects.

I saw off all of the protruding branches except one, which I saw off at about 4 inches away from where it joins the main branch.

As there is an abundance of straight wood around, I'm going to make a number of these.

This is what they should look like once you've sawn them to size.

I then chamfer off the end of the stick, similar to how I was making the ends of the wood wedges.

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If you want to take off more material with a slice cut, you can just bring the wood into your chest and use a chest lever grip to add more power to your cut.

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Now time for the reamer tool.

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It's a funny looking tool, but it's one of the most used tools on this knife.

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If you look closely, you will find that there is a sharp blade on one side of the reamer.

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It is also slightly curved.

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This is designed for cutting holes.

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Now I make a hole in the flat section of wood that I just made.

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There are a few different ways of using the reamer to cut a hole through wood.

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You can either continuously rotate it like this, which is fairly safe, but it can be time consuming.

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The alternative method is to half rotate it anti-clockwise and then rotate it back clockwise.

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This method will cut a hole much quicker, as we are using that cutting blade much faster just doing the half crank.

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Now that I've drilled three holes in the top pieces of wood, I thread some cordage through each hole.

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Then find a tree and tie these sticks to the tree with a secure knot.

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I tend to tie them just below head height.

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And now you have yourself multiple gear hangers.

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You can use these to hang your backpack to keep it up off the ground.

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Or you can hang a coat, or a lantern, or whatever you want to hang.

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Either way, get more organised around your camp with some gear hangers.

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The great thing about these is that you can take them down easily

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and bring them with you if you're on a multi-day camping trip.

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Now here's a tip that an old teacher taught me years ago.

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The corkscrew, you could argue, is one of the most unused items on the Swiss Army knife.

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After all, what more can you do with it other than open up a bottle of wine?

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Not saying that's a bad thing.

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In fact, I use it for just that.

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But this next tip will blow your mind.

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Firstly, I'm going to need the saw… again… to cut me a straight piece of hazel.

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Hazel is fast growing, and when it's cut it can grow multiple shoots out of the same cut.

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It's an awesome natural resource, and is regularly coppiced here in Britain.

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I'm cutting a section that is about 2 inches in diameter, and as long as I can get it.

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As I already have a camp, I'm going to take it back there for this bit.

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Oh look, it's snowy.

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Using the knife, I chamfer the thin end of the long stick.

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I'm not cutting it too deep, just enough to create a flat section.

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Then screw in the corkscrew into this flat section, winding it up as tight as it will go.

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Because of the way this Swiss Army knife is designed, the saw is on the opposite side and you're able to unfold it.

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In order to make it more rigid, I'm just going to wrap some cordage around the knife to stop it from rotating away from the stick.

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Now you have a saw on a stick.

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But what's the point in this?

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Well let's take this example.

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You might have cast a fishing lure up in a tree and it's got caught.

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Let's face it, we've all been there.

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With this technique, you can cut high up branches that would normally be out of reach.

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Just remember to only do short sawing strokes, as the saw is only very short.

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It takes some time and patience, but it does work.

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You probably don't want to go any thinner on the stick diameter, otherwise there will be too much flex and the saw blade won't bite properly.

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So the corkscrew isn't so bad after all.

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If you take a stroll through a coniferous woodland, you might notice that some of the trees have a white, waxy substance that is flowing out of the bark.

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This is one of the best natural resources you can find.

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Be happy you found it.

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In my case here, I just hit the jackpot.

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This pine tree is flowing with the stuff.

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It's called resin, not to be confused with sap, which is totally different to resin.

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All trees produce sap, but only certain conifer trees produce resin.

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Sap is a more watery substance that trees use to move minimal nutrients from its trunk

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and up and down to its leaves and roots to aid with photosynthesis.

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Resin, however, is different.

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Rather than harbouring nutrients that later get transported through the tree, resin consists of compounds secreted or deposited by the tree.

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Scientists are still debating to this day as to whether resin is a waste product of the tree,

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but it is thought that it's a form of protection against infection on damaged limbs or to prevent insect attack,

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although sometimes there is a symbiotic relationship between tree resin and insects.

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Anyway, I digress.

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Here is a tree full of resin and I'm going to collect it.

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Now rather than destroy my knife blade, as the resin is very sticky and difficult to clean off, I'm going to use a stick to pull out the chunks of resin and collect it in a tin can.

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Once I have enough resin, I cut off a small piece of birch bark.

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I score the bark first with the knife blade, then begin to gently slice underneath the bark to peel it back without breaking.

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I then cut off a small piece of the branch of the birch tree.

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This is going to form the base that the resin will sit on top of.

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The bigger you make this, the more resin you will need.

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I'm keeping it small.

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You don't have to peel the bark off, but I'm going to anyway to make the outer bark sit more firmly against the edge.

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Now I'm going to need something to keep it all together.

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For this I'm going to use Scott's pine tree roots, as they are easy to harvest and process, and they work well as cordage straight away.

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I use the back of the knife blade to take off the outer layer of the roots.

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It just helps to make them more pliable and easier to bend.

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Clear off any chunks of inner bark so that it will sit flush.

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And I'm also cutting off a thin strip of bark to act as a wick.

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Then I carefully wrap the birch bark around the base stick and tie it together with the tree roots.

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Now the candle holder is made.

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I empty out the contents of the resin and mould together the softer parts.

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Some of the resin is very hard, but some can be really soft.

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Stuff this into the candle and compress it down.

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Place the wick in and mould the resin around the wick to keep it straight.

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I then use the scissors on the Swiss Army knife to trim the wick down.

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Important safety note folks, these candles are very flammable.

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And once you have lit them, be sure they are on a stable surface and not on the forest floor.

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You won't really be able to touch them once you've lit them, as the hot liquid resin can bubble out and it will burn you.

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Once they're lit, they're awesome.

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They burn a bright flame, but the resin tends to burn with a pungent black smoke, so keep an eye on where the wind is blowing.

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This particular candle burnt for nearly an hour before it burnt out.

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I've made bigger ones which have burnt for well over an hour.

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If you want, you can secure them to longer sticks in the ground

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and they can act as a lantern and a bug repellent for your camp.

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Whilst on the topic of fire, here's a quick little tip that you can do.

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Use the saw to cut off thin peaches of a branch.

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I cut them about 3 inches in length.

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Then make a point on the ends of the stick with your knife.

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Place these in a tin can and put the can on the fire.

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The key here is to starve the sticks of oxygen.

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So you could either fill the tin can with sand, bury it, or in the case here I put another tin can on top to act as a lid.

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Leave this to burn for about half an hour to 40 minutes.

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While you are waiting for them to char, why not spend some time carving that piece of firewood that you split earlier?

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Then take it off the fire and let it cool down.

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Once they have cooled down, you will notice that the outer bark can be peeled straight off, and underneath is a perfectly charred stick with a point.

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Now you have yourself a charcoal pencil.

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Use this to mark out a carving on a piece of wood.

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In this case, I'm going to use it to carve a spoon on this piece of firewood that I split.

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Which leads me onto the next project.

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Use the knife to carve out a rough spoon shape.

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Remember, the bevel on this knife is only small, so this can be a time-consuming process.

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Once you have carved out a rough shape, use the point of your knife to dig a small hole in the centre of the spoon,

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then rotate it round to carve away some of the material.

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Normally you would do this with a specialist spoon carving knife like a crook knife, but as you've just had a fire going and you don't have this specialist tool,

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you can grab yourself a piece of hot charcoal and use this to burn a hollow inside the spoon.

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I use another stick on top to keep the pressure on the charcoal burning downwards.

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You need to regularly add oxygen in order to keep it burning through the wood.

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The trick is to use long and slow breaths to keep that charcoal hot.

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It's more effective on a windy day.

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After a couple of minutes, you will notice the charcoal burning out the hollow shape of the spoon.

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All you then need to do is work on shaping the rest of the spoon, gently taking away a little bit of material each time.

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And there you have it folks, 10 simple survival tips that you can do with a Swiss Army knife.

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Well little knife, we've come a long way since the beginning of this video.

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I hope the folks out there on YouTube enjoyed watching you work your magic.

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Hopefully they will subscribe and you can show them more of your skills.

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And if the folks out there are looking into some more Swiss Army Knife inspiration, I highly recommend they check out the master of the Swiss Army Knife, Felix Imler.

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Not only does he have some incredibly in-depth videos on the Swiss Army Knife, but he's added some insane modifications to his.

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Oh, and he's also written an incredible book full of awesome Swiss Army Knife skills.

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I've left a link to it in the video description below for you to check out.

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In the meantime, from me I'm a Swiss Army Knife, see you in the next episode.

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