Bison Airlighter Review
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Bison Airlighter
I’m a firestarter, twisted firestarter, you’re the firestarter, twisted firestarter! The second I pulled out my Bison Airlighter I found myself singing the lyrics to Prodigy’s Firestarter. I’m not a Prodigy fan, but when you see this firestarter I bet you’ll be singing it too! Bison pulled out the big guns with the Airlighter. It is every pyro maniacs dream to have a torch like this. The Bison Airlighter isn’t just a torch, it’s a torch on steroids!
Initial Thoughts Out Of The Box
When I first took my Bison Airlighter out of the box I thought this is big! You will not be backpacking with this piece of equipment, but it is perfect for car camping, tailgating, grilling, and outdoor fire pits! Even though it is large in size, it isn’t very heavy at all. The Bison Airlighter has 3 body parts: The silver barrel, the main body, and the handle.
Out of the box, the Bison Airlighter needs to be charged. It comes with a USB charger cable. It doesn’t come with the charger, but will fit into any standard USB charger. A red light indicates that you have a connection and are charging. When it turns green, which took about 4 1/2 hours, you are fully charged and ready to go. After it’s all charged up you have to fill up the Airlighter with butane. A small 1.5 fl oz bottle of butane fuel came in the box, other bottles must be purchased separately. At the end of the handle is a small circular refill valve. You need to align the refill canister’s nozzle with the refill valve of the Airlighter and push firmly downwards for about 5 seconds until fuel starts spitting out from the refill valve. It was really easy to fill up and filled quicker than I expected. I am now ready to start my fire!
USB inlet
Refill Valve
Butane Fuel connected to Refill Valve
Function
The Bison Airlighter has so many more functions and features than a plain torch or matches that one would typically use while starting a fire. Bison incorporated a patented F3 technology: Flame, Fan, Fire. The large flame the Airlighter produces heats up to 2,600 degrees F! Wow that’s some serious heat! One of my favorite features the Bison Airlight offers is a propagating fan. Gone is the time where my face was at the base of the fire blowing my face off trying to get the fire started. The fan blows strong enough to help get the fire started without me burning my eyebrows. The combination of the intense flame and propagating fan you will be able to start your fire in seconds!
Bison Airlighter Igniting
Safety
Safety is always my number one priority. First off, it is long enough that I don’t have to be close to the fire to get it started. I can stay at a comfortable and safe distance. There is a long silver barrel where the flame comes from. The barrel always is cool to the touch. Even right after using it, the barrel never felt hot enough to burn me. I wouldn’t recommend holding it by the barrel though just to be safe! There is a red child safety lock on top of the handle which is very important to have if you have little ones running around!
Red: Child Safety Lock & Main Control Switch Black: Handle Release & Continuous Button
Features
The Bison Airlighter is packed full of features. There is a round black push button at the top/middle of the lighter. Pushing that button will move the gripped handle in 3 different positions. This way you can hold your Airlighter in a position that’s comfortable to you. The handle moves from straight, to approximately a 45 degree angle, than a 90 degree angle.
3 Handle Positions
On the left side there is another black push button.This button is for the LED flashlight that is located on the body portion of the Airlighter in the front. I was impressed with the brightness of the flashlight. The flashlight is a great feature for finding wood or trying to light a fire in the dark.
LED Flashlight
LED Flashlight in use
Bison was thinking of it all when they doubled their storage hook as a bottle opener. The bottle opener is on the bottom of the main body part. Beer and Fire always go together’ right!?!
Storage Hook/ Bottle Opener
There is a continuous mode button on the upper left hand side of the main body. The continuous mode helps your fingers to not become fatigued if you are using the flame or fan for a period of time. I never really had to use the continuous mode because the Bison Airlighter worked so well, but it’s good to have if needed!
Bison Airlighter Performance
The Bison Airlighter is extremely easy to use and will light any fire with ease! I used mine in our backyard making bon fires and while starting our grill. To ignite the Bison Airlighter you simply slide the red child safety lock to the right while pushing the red main control switch forward. Every time I’ve ignited the Airlight it lit within seconds. It is so quick and easy! The flame will come out of the barrel blue in color. Simply touch the blue flame to your wood or coals.
Blue Flame
After you have your wood or coals burning, pull the main control switch back to start the fan. I aimed the fan airflow at the ignited spot to spread the heat to disperse the flames. Starting a fire is as easy as 1, 2, 3! Fire starting for dummy’s I like to call it. The Bison Airlighter out performed every time I used it. If my firewood was slightly damp or the fire started to dwindle the fan really helped to disperse the flames and keep the fire going. I can’t praise the performance of the Bison Airlighter more, it truly has made making a fire quick and easy!
Making a Bon Fire
Enjoying my fire!
Final Thoughts
I have to say I’ve enjoyed making fires SO much more with my Bison Airlighter. The Airlighter is perfect for camping, grilling, tailgating, fire pits & fireplaces. I love that I can start a fire safer, cleaner, and faster than ever before! It’s a little bulky but it packs a lot of punch. On average I was able to get a good bon fire going in about 1-2 minutes. Bison states that the Airlighter has 15 minutes of burn time per refill. I haven’t had to refill it yet, and I’ve started at least 7 fires with it, not to mention just playing with it! The Airlighter also has 30 minutes of fan time per recharge. I haven’t had to charge it yet either so I’m very impressed with the charge. The only con I would say is that you can’t see the level of butane fuel you have or the charge left. It would be nice to be able to gauge how much fuel you still have in the Airlighter before you have to refill it. You just have to use it until it stops working.
No more lighter fluid or wasting 100 matches trying to light a fire. With the Bison Airlighter you can efficiently make a fire fast, clean, and safe! With a MSRP of $79.95 plus the price of the Butane Fuel it is a little pricey, however, if you are making fires all year round it really is more convenient to have the Bison Airlighter take the hard work out of making a fire.
For more information visit www.amazon.com/thebisoncompany.
Fire Starter!
