Can 100% pure honey be used to light a fire?

L

Lilalena

Registered Senior Member
Someone told me you could use it as fuel to light a fire and it would be a very good fire, because lack of water content
means the fire lasts long.

But wont it caramelize and kill the flame?

I cannot find confirmation anywhere about this on the internet, instead I find articles on how it can help cure burns etc.
I'm sure somebody here knows about this stuff.
 
You can burn sugar, so essentially when you boil off the water in the honey it would burn, but it would be a heck of a lot easier to start a fire with wood than honey. As a bee keeper I would prefer that you ate the honey, my girls worked very hard to make that honey and throwing it in a fires seems kinda wasteful!
 
Fuel a fire would have been better phrasing. To light a fire you'd need to stir it at incredible speeds to get enough friction to make it burn. That would involve honey and a machine or a super human though, and would no longer be 100% honey involved. So NO you cannot start a fire with honey.
 
origin:
By your "girls" you mean your bees?

If so:
Do you talk to them when you tend the hive?
 
Try googling "Honey flame test"

Some Mad Honey Professor Tests.

1. Dip the head of the match stick into honey allowing it to soak for some seconds, put it in the flame, only a pure honey will produce flame.
2.Take a very small amout (pea size) put it on a small size of news paper then put the fire on the border of the news paper, a pure honey will not burn with the piece of newspaper.
3. Put a spoonful of honey on a money note, then ignite a lighter under the note, the honey will be heating, but the money will not burn; if it's pure honey...
http://olaanatural.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/home-tests-for-pure-honey.html
 
sculptor said:
origin:
By your "girls" you mean your bees?

If so:
Do you talk to them when you tend the hive?
Click to expand...

Yes, my girls are the worker bees. Do I talk to my bees? That is a really good question - I do not believe I do. I tend to be very focused when I have the hive open. I want to intrude as little as possible, so I try to get in and out as quickly as I can while still being careful and deliberate. I got about 40 pounds of honey earlier this year and am going to check the hive this weekend to see how much more I can steal from them next week. This has been a great year in upstate NY for honey!
 
Lilalena said:
Someone told me you could use it as fuel to light a fire and it would be a very good fire, because lack of water content
means the fire lasts long.

But wont it caramelize and kill the flame?

I cannot find confirmation anywhere about this on the internet, instead I find articles on how it can help cure burns etc.
I'm sure somebody here knows about this stuff.
Click to expand...
I can't help but wonder why people post questions like this. I mean, this is a very simple test... try it and see. Where is your scientific curiosity?
 
Captain Kremmen said:
Try googling "Honey flame test"

Some Mad Honey Professor Tests.

1. Dip the head of the match stick into honey allowing it to soak for some seconds, put it in the flame, only a pure honey will produce flame.
Click to expand...

I do not believe that and will try the experiment when I get some match sticks.

2.Take a very small amout (pea size) put it on a small size of news paper then put the fire on the border of the news paper, a pure honey will not burn with the piece of newspaper.
Click to expand...

Neither will ketchup, water, diluted honey or just about any other aqueous liquid.

3. Put a spoonful of honey on a money note, then ignite a lighter under the note, the honey will be heating, but the money will not burn; if it's pure honey...
Click to expand...

The same is true of ketchup, water, diluted honey or just about any other aqueous liquid.
 
If some honey burns and other honey doesn't, try adding extra sugar to the non-burning honey.
You might need to warm it up.
Let's put this burning question to bed once and for all.
 
I think honey will burn in an atmosphere of 100% pure fluorine at STP. Probably will self-ignite as well.
 
gmilam said:
Sounds like a fairly easy experiment...
Click to expand...

I wish I could but in the last few years the jars of shockingly expensive pure honey I've bought all turned out to be fakes. There's lots of complaints like this on the internet...
It seems like real honey doesn't really exist anymore because most people don't know to try putting the honey in the freezer. If it freezes into a rock, it's fake.

But anyway my post is a recent question, I didnt bother to experiment because of my bad experience with buying honey
 
Have you checked to see whether someone local bottles their own honey?
From their own bees?
It wouldn't cut down on the expense, but it would keep local bees in employment.
 
Lilalena said:
most people don't know to try putting the honey in the freezer. If it freezes into a rock, it's fake.
Click to expand...
Where does one demonstrate that freezing honey is any sort of test of its purity? Citation Required.

A shoddy frost-free freezer or refrigerator will have large temperature swings which are perfect to promote glucose crystallization.
A good freezer can get honey so viscous it will be confused with a solid.

Moisture content and sugar composition varies from honey to honey because it is a natural product and this also has a large effect on viscosity and tendency to crystalize.

The correct way to demonstrate that honey is unadulterated bee-product is to measure its sugar composition and water content and analyze its pollen content to make sure both are consistent with the alleged flower source(s). Also, if you are going out of your way only to by expensive honey with expansive health claims, you are probably a gullible person.
 
Last edited:
origin said:
You can burn sugar, so essentially when you boil off the water in the honey it would burn, but it would be a heck of a lot easier to start a fire with wood than honey. As a bee keeper I would prefer that you ate the honey, my girls worked very hard to make that honey and throwing it in a fires seems kinda wasteful!
Click to expand...

If alternatives were sought you could use Bee's Wax as a fuel source considering how candles work, however I think that tangents from the OP's question.
 
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