Start a Fire Using a Mobile Phone Battery

The chances of a modern geek forgetting to bring their mobile phone on a camping trip are highly unlikely, but forgetting matches or a lighter, well, that’s a little more probable. If you have some steel wool, tin foil, even foil off a pack of cigarettes, then you are in luck, you can use a mobile phone battery to start a fire.

On the other hand, you may find yourself in a survival situation with no way to make fire, but have you mobile phone to hand, you can make a fire using a mobile phone battery a number of different ways, including the above method which I will explain more below.

Please note: If in a survival situation, and you phone works, it is best to call for help – if you phone is broken, then using it to make fire may be the best option.

Make Fire With a Mobile Phone Battery

The first thing you are going to want to do is remove the cover from you phone and access the battery. This may not be that easy on some phones, especially an iPhone, which has a non-removable case. You may have to break it off, be careful not to damage the battery if this is the case.

Method 1 – Shorting the Battery

In order to start a fire with a cell phone battery by shorting it, you are going to need something to conduct the current from the positive terminal to the negative terminal of the battery. Items such as tin foil, wire (with the casing stripped off part), wire wool, chewing gum wrapper… can all be used to conduct the current and generate a glowing hot fire starter.

Get your conductor, attach it to the positive, then attach the other end to the negative terminal of the battery, and place your tinder on the conductor to start a fire using a cell phone battery.

Method 2 – Puncturing the Battery

The second method to starting a fire with a cell phone battery will render your battery useless, and is really only a one time fire starter, so you need to make sure you have all your tinder, and small sticks and bigger firewood gathered before actually beginning with this method.

If your mobile phone battery is lithium, like most modern phone batteries in todays age, you can pierce the battery with a knife or other sharp item, the chemical reaction caused when the lithium seeps out and reacts with the oxygen will create sparks and heat to which tinder can be applied, and a fire can be started. Be cautious, there can be quite a reaction!