This is a fire starter with a magnesium rod that is 6.5cm long and 0.9cm in diameter. It comes with a 2.7m paracord (1.6m and 1.1m lengths heat-sealed) connecting the magnesium rod and blade. I own the same item and am selling a new, unused one. The trick to creating sparks is to scrape off the black coating before sliding the blade, then build up force and slide the blade to generate a large amount of sparks.