Rational Pi
The Spark to Flame app icon: an ink campfire, orange flames over three logs, on cream

Spark to Flame

A pocket field guide to building a campfire, from the first spark to a steady flame.

For scouts, their leaders and anyone who camps. Works with no signal.

Ink drawings, left to right: a ferro rod, a roll of birch bark, a bundle of pencil-thick sticks, and a teepee campfire burning inside a ring of stones

Coming soon to the App Store for iPhone and iPad

a Rational Pi app

A field guide that fits in a pocket.

Picture cards for every stage of a fire: ignition, tinder, kindling, fuel and fire lays. Narrow the guide to what grows in your part of the US, using your approximate location or a region you pick.

The Field Guide: picture cards of matches, storm matches, a mini lighter and a long-reach lighter, under Ignition, for the Northeast

Flip a card for how to use it.

The back of each card says how to use it, what to watch out for, how hard it is, where to find it and what it works best with.

The front of the Ferrocerium rod card: an ink drawing of a ferro rod and striker, and "Makes sparks"The back of the Ferrocerium rod card: three steps, a "Watch out" note, medium difficulty, and the tinders it works best with

Step by step, on one screen.

Short how-tos, from a tinder bundle to a teepee lay, each with "How do you know it’s done?" checks to tick off at camp. Finding dry wood after rain has a drawing for every step.

The Finding dry wood after rain how-to, with drawings of wet sticks in fallen leaves and a dead branch held off the ground

Red at night.

The same card at night. Night mode turns every screen red on black, to keep your night vision around the fire. One tap on the moon, or let it come on at sunset, worked out on your phone.

The same Ferrocerium rod card in night mode: the drawing and text in red on black

Safety, always free.

Choosing a fire site, putting the fire out, tool safety and Leave No Trace, plus a separate Emergency Only page.

The Safety tab: choosing a fire site, putting the fire out, tool safety, Leave No Trace, and Emergency Only kept separate

Challenges for the whole patrol.

With the full version: check off what the troop brought, let "Assign me a method" pick a whole fire, from ignition and tinder to kindling, fuel and the lay, at the difficulty you choose, and race patrols in a timed string-burn contest.

The Challenges tab: Assign me a method with Easy, Medium and Hard, a patrol contest, and the troop inventory

What it costs

Free

$0

  • 55 picture cards
  • 10 how-tos
  • All of Safety
  • Night mode and the region filter

Everything you need to start a fire.

Full version

$4.99

  • All 73 cards, adding bow drill, hand drill and more
  • All 19 how-tos, adding flint and steel, char cloth, feather sticks and more
  • Challenges: troop inventory, Assign me a method, the patrol contest

One-time purchase, in the US. No subscription. Family Sharing included.

  • Works with no signal
  • No account or sign-in
  • No ads
  • No analytics or tracking
  • Your location stays on your phone
The Spark to Flame app icon: an ink campfire, orange flames over three logs, on cream

Light it right.

Coming soon to the App Store

a Rational Pi app