Gear

I've got an Osprey Tallon 33, and love it to bits, but found there wasn't enough places on the front to hang things off , just so I can get to them quickly - so I've added a couple of D rings near the top of each shoulder strap (using triglides), and it got me thinging about what is the easiest way of adding additional webbing...

then I reckoned that a lot of you will have played around with your kit at one time or another, so what imaginative bits and bobs have you come up with to adjust your kit to your liking (or even just to your body!)

webbing for what purpose wpgb?

i have a number of shock cord loops about my packs, mini krabs and para cord loops/bits. i've added some grip clips in places to act as pole holders too ( team io sell the small ones)

forgive me. what is/are triglides (i think i know but...) 

I wanted the extra webbing to hang things off, the talon is great, got loads of hangy-on things round the back, but its pretty clean round the front, so wanted to add some places to hold an anemeter, altimeter, camera bag (now I'm thinking of a camera bag where benco is showing the OMM chest pouch!), etc...

the triglide is exactly what you probably think it is,

I'll try to put some pictures up tonight of how I thread the D ring through them (probably not the best way, but its how I used to do it on my dive harness), would be interested to see pics of how others have added more storage devices, particularly those grip clips, and also what you use the cord loops for (got some shock cord and toggles at home that I could use).

As I said I will try to put them up tonight, but I'm out for a bike ride first thing in the morning and I need to fit new grips to my bike (just bought some hairspray to fix them and the till girl looked at my bald patch with a grin!  )

ah. those things. ta.

an unattractive picture to start. i'll take a few more.

gps and compass in shock loops. hat dangling from a mini-krab.

grip clips with a pole - bottom one is inside the side pocket, shown outside for illustration

bottle holder on strap - mini-krab onto paracord loop and held in place by a shock cord loop.

nearly all my packs have shock cord loops scattered about them (those that haven't i just haven't got round to yet).

roll map up and into a loop on the strap - printed tracklogs in a zipper plastic bag.

virtually any odds and sods you want to hand can be attached with mini-krabs, shock cord and paracord/dyneema. the grip clips can give you an anchor point where one doesn't exist - a small one is handy fixed inside the lid and with a mini-krab you can attach keys, torch, knife to it so the important things can't fall out when you undo the lid.

Easy way to improve a lot of stuff is just the opposite: take the scissors to stuff you don't need.

When I'm walking along through gale-driven driech on a ridge it's really good to have an absolute minimum of stuff out to catch the wind and water, so I rather prefer relatively clean setups with stuff inside.   I've experimented with "everything to hand" in the past, and it actually hindered me more than it helped!

Pete.

I'm keen on the OMM chest pouch in winter, but not so much in summer as a touch sweaty, and don't need to stash as much (hat gloves etc).

I have my camara bag on my waist belt, which is a bit of a sod every time i take it off. On my old backpack it fixed on the waist belt padding, but cos on a villian you have pockets the camara pouch has to go on the waist belt and has a habit of sliding off. Need to improve that.

gps is on its own garmin clip/clamp? that just clips onto the shoulder straps when needed, but lives in the pack most of the time.

Also used to use an old bigish camara pouch on the waist belt webbing that fitted Sigg water bottles perfectly as the side pockets on that pack were arm dislocating to use on the move. Villain I can get to, so no probs any more

I usually thread a dog clip onto each of the top tension straps so that I can attach a a camera pouch. I usually add a couple of shockcord loops which come in handy for a variety of things. e.g. holding drink system feedtube

I've never liked having bits of kit dangling from a rucksack; it looks scruffy (think of the cliche of the hiker with a tin mug hanging off his pack), can damage said items, can make the pack unstable and be noisy.

Hanging heavy stuff (by heavy I mean anything heavier than a compass) from rucksack straps makes it more difficult to shoulder and un-shoulder a pack as the straps are more likely to get twisted in the process.

Most modern packs have more than enough attachment points already; R_Mac, why bother with a dog clip and shockcord loop in your second pic (OMM Villain, isn't it?) to hold the hydration tube when there is a perfectly good elastic strap already there?  Ditto for the Z55 in the first pic.

Each to his own as always but I think some people are tweaking for tweaking's sake

Jake wrote (see)

Hanging heavy stuff (by heavy I mean anything heavier than a compass) from rucksack straps makes it more difficult to shoulder and un-shoulder a pack as the straps are more likely to get twisted in the process.

I agree with making the pack more difficult to shoulder/drop in the case of a front mounted pouch but simply there's no other way to attach the camera pouch. The waist belt on the rucksack is too wide, I don't like a separate camera pouch shoulder strap as the pouch swings around too much.

Jake wrote (see)

R_Mac, why bother with a dog clip and shockcord loop in your second pic (OMM Villain, isn't it?) to hold the hydration tube when there is a perfectly good elastic strap already there?  Ditto for the Z55 in the first pic.

  

The clips are primarily for the camera pouch  but I'll concede I could just stick the feed tube through the elastic loop, I just like the clips better (the shockcord stays on the feed tube) It's a LIM 45.

Jake wrote (see)

Each to his own as always but I think some people are tweaking for tweaking's sake

  

Guilty
 

I can't imagine anything as uncomfortable (well, maybe I can...) as hanging a camera off the chest strap.

I use climbing sacs as a rule and clip the CCS bag with my SLR off the gear loop on the hip belt. On me, this means that it hangs to the side of my hip, out of the way of my leg, and on the odd occasion e.g. while scrambling, that I need that bit of me camera-free, the carabiners are long enough to allow the bag to swing up or forwards out of the way of my leg. Because the camera weight, which isn't much but adds up over the day, hangs on the hip belt, it doesn't make any difference to the shoulder straps. The only thing I hang on the shoulder straps - besides the rucksac of course - is a small neoprene sleeve which precisely holds a lip salve, so I always have it to hand and don't get burnt lips

"to hold the hydration tube when there is a perfectly good elastic strap already there" depends where your tube comes from. r_mac uses a convertube, as do i, so the tube could be coming from a side pocket.

i think this thread just demonstrates that with a bit of imagination, like using a convertube, you can have virtually anything anywhere you want it, whether your pack has attachment points or not and many do not. some packs have "extras" just because they can as a percieved "bonus" and aren't always where they should be when the pack is full or a pocket/pouch actually has something in it.

tweaking is done for personal preference and correcting design as much as because you can. osprey's pole stash, hip belt pockets and properly angled side pockets spring to mind

"makes it more difficult to shoulder and un-shoulder a pack " agreed but only if you have to take the pack off. if it's to hand you don't need to.

some people like a clean pack some don't. and jake, "it looks scruffy". get outta here.  i only need to look in the mirror (any surviving ones) to see scruffy .

and a tweak for the most flexible water system.

using a convertube in a liquitainer. any pet bottle will do.

 

with an added aquaguard in-line filter so the choice of water is your own.

store it wherever you like in/on your pack.

Fiona N wrote (see)

I can't imagine anything as uncomfortable (well, maybe I can...) as hanging a camera off the chest strap.

I can, a camera pouch banging against my leg/hip all day  

Actually I used to carry 2 CCS pouches (as pictured) on a Troll climbing belt, one each side but being skinny the belt kept slipping down which was extremely aggravating. I wouldn't use the pouch chest mounted when climbing, I'd use the straps that attach the pouch to the dogclips to hang it from the hip belt towards the rear.

Parky Again wrote (see)

"to hold the hydration tube when there is a perfectly good elastic strap already there" depends where your tube comes from. r_mac uses a convertube, as do i, so the tube could be coming from a side pocket.

Indeed I do, I didn't mention it previously but I also have a shockcord running through the top loops on the LIM 45 in crossover style to hold the filter/tube. In this case I'm using a flexible bladder in the dedicated compartment but often use a PET bottle in the side pockets.

oooooh! i never thought of that. thanks r_mac.

i'm hoping that fiona has different bumpy bits to you and so it may well be less convenient

Parky Again wrote (see)

i'm hoping that fiona has different bumpy bits to you and so it may well be less convenient