Multi-tools are awesome, but the usefulness of every fold-out tool in a pocket knife has always been questionable. How many times do you really use the file, wire stripper, or corkscrew on your pocket multi-tool? The FireAnt turns the corkscrew on your Swiss Army Knife into something much more useful.
Designed to add a fire starter to your pocket multi-tool, the contraption uses the corkscrew as a mounting spot for its components, giving you easy access to critical fire-making tools on a rig you already carry as part of your EDC kit. That way, you can use your pocket knife to quickly get a fire going without having to make any complicated changes.
The FireAnt consists of two parts: a sparking steel fire starter and a short length of Helix tinder, both of which are designed to mount flush right on the corkscrew tool of a standard multi-tool. It mounts in a pretty straightforward manner, so you simply deploy the corkscrew tool and insert the kit into its inner section. Because it fits flush into the corkscrew, it adds no extra bulk to the multi-tool, ensuring it will still fit in any pocket you carry it in, whether that be one of your pants’ pockets, a pouch on your backpack, or a slot on your EDC pouch.
Do note, the outfit designed it for the standard corkscrew found on Victorinox Swiss Army Knives, so it may or may not be compatible if you use a different multi-tool brand. Based on the different corkscrew tools we’ve seen among pocket knives, though, we imagine it will work just fine for most, since they mostly follow similar dimensions.
The FireAnt’s fire steel tool is a tiny fire starter with a fluted handle that increases grip, which is important when handling small tools. To use, simply hold it between your fingers, strike it on the knife blade (or saw) of your multi-tool, and wait for sparks to come out. The outfit claims they use a proprietary formula for the flint, which is supposedly much easier to spark compared to ordinary sparking steel. That means, you are likely to get sparks in seconds, all while putting much less wear and tear on your multi-tool’s blade. The handle, by the way, comes in three glowing colors, which, the outfit claims, should make it easier to see at night, which could prove helpful when spending evenings at camp.
The included tinder, on the other hand, is an extruded waxed cotton that’s completely waterproof, so you can use it for starting fire even in wet conditions, all while being custom-shaped to integrate into a multi-tool’s corkscrew. You can use the whole thing in one session, which should get you a burn time of around two minutes. If you’d rather stretch your fire-making provisions, though, you can also cut the tinder into four separate pieces, each of which will provide you with one minute of burn time each.
A Kickstarter campaign is currently running for the FireAnt. You can reserve a three-pack for pledges starting at $12.