I reviewed the Kuiu Guide Gloves on ITS Tactical. Check it out. Or just go straight to Kuiu and buy a pair. They’re that good.
At 2.6 ounces (74 grams), the Guide Glove weighs only 0.3 ounces more than a pair of Mechanix Original Gloves of the same size – an impressive feat, considering that the Guide Glove is made of much more substantial materials. In every way, the gloves have exceeded my expectations. They are more breathable, more water repellent, and provide a higher dexterity than I expected.
Many outdoor gear brands sell thin webbing belts. These belts aren’t meant to hold much gear. They simply hold your pants up. The thin, pliable webbing makes for a svelte belt that can be comfortably worn under a pack hip belt or a climbing harness. The webbing also tends to be of a low quality, and the belts are often priced ridiculously high. Why pay $15 for something that you can make yourself at little cost, if not for free?
I had worn a Frequent Flyer Belt from The Wilderness Tactical on a daily basis for a number of years. It is an excellent belt, but I occasionally found the wide and thick webbing, which is appropriate for some uses, to be uncomfortable and cause chafing under the heavy hip belt of my pack. As an experiment, I purchased a Patagonia Friction Belt when it was heavily discounted during a sale. That worked well for a while – it was more comfortable under my pack – but the webbing used was very low quality. It was also still a bit stiff. I thought, why should there be any stiffness at all to the belt? It serves no purpose in the backcountry.
I made my first belt in early March. Initially I intended for it be used only when backpacking, but it proved functional enough that I soon made three more and wear them on a daily basis. The webbing is stiff enough to hold a multi-tool and a knife, which is the most that I carry on my belt these days, both in wilderness environments and urban.
The webbing I used is simple tubular webbing. It is strong, and yet softer and more pliable than most flat webbing, making for a comfortable belt. Any climber most likely has yards of the stuff laying around. I happen to use BlueWater 1” webbing, which exceeds the strength of military-spec webbing, but, in a belt, this is irrelevant. My stitching will certainly blow long before the webbing.
After sewing, I cut the webbing so that the total length of the belt is about 39”. That provides plenty of length to use the belt as improvised lashing, if I ever need it.
I first began using ladderlocs as the buckles. This worked, but I later experimented with using two D-rings. I now prefer the smoother operation of the D-ring buckle. I have experienced no slippage with either type of buckle. Both the ladderlocs and the D-rings I had laying around from previous projects, or from old gear (I always salvage the hardware from old, ratty gear before throwing the rest away).
The total cost to me for all of these belts was zero. If you had to buy the webbing and hardware, you may be looking at around $2. A far cry cheaper than any similar belt you’d find in a store! The total weight of a single belt is 50 grams (1.76 oz).
On our last morning in the Red Buttes Wilderness, Avagdu and I woke up to a very wet camp. We wanted fire, but neither of us had brought any dry wood into our shelters the night before. Everything was soaked.
We gathered what we could – branches from dead fall that were up off the ground, as well as dead lower branches from standing trees – but the trees were so sparse in the area that, even after splitting, much of this wood was still wet. (I should mention that we wanted a fire, but did not need one. I, at least, was not hugely motivated to put a large amount of energy into batoning. So a small amount of our failure ought to be attributed to laziness.)
After failing to get a blaze going with the wet wood, even after using a bit of inner tube to extend the flame, I hit on the idea of using the Inferno.
I’ve had my Trail Designs Ti-Tri for two and a half years now. It’s been my primary stove system for all of that time. Last Fall, I contacted Trail Designs and had them send me an Inferno insert for the system. The Inferno consists of a second, inverted cone and a grate. The grate raises the base of the fire up off of the ground, allowing for an improved air flow, and the second cone creates a double-walled stove. This turns the Ti-Tri into a wood gassifier, similar to the Four Dogs Bushcooker or the ever-popular Bushbuddy.
So, back at camp, I thought the Inferno might help. I had never used it before solely to start a camp fire, but I knew from previous experience using it to cook my dinner that it was efficient enough to burn damp wood. It would give us a raised platform, allowing us to build the fire up off of the saturated ground, and the cone would provide a wall to keep the heat in and help dry the wood.
It was a success.
We split a bit more wood, and did a bit more feathering. It was all still as damp as before, but shortly we achieved a small blaze inside the Inferno. From there, it was simply a matter of building the fire up and around the Inferno. With the heat put out by the cone, even the wet, unprocessed wood would dry and burn. As the fire built up, the Inferno could be pulled out with a multi-tool or a couple sticks, and packed away with the rest of the Ti-Tri, ready to cook the next meal.
The weight of the Inferno insert varies. It is dependent on the size of the outer Caldera cone, which in turns varies based on the size of the pot. For my system, which is built around a 900mL pot from Titanium Goat, the pieces that comprise the Inferno weigh in at a collective 38 grams (1.34 ounces). Given that it not only increases the Ti-Tri’s efficiency as a wood burning stove, but also functions as an emergency fire starter, I’m happy to haul the extra weight.
About a month ago I gave my Izula a cosmetic make-over, inspired by Widerstand‘s similar mods to his Becker knives.
Originally the knife had a light tan powder coating on it, which protected the blade from rust and other wear, but did nothing for style. The first step I made in the modification process was to spend a couple hours with a piece of sandpaper, scraping off the coating until I was down to bare metal. That gave the knife a nice, raw look. But it also made it susceptible to rusting. The solution: a patina!
The last time I talked about patinas I achieved it with moldy potatoes and citrus fruit. This time around I went the easier route and dumped the Izula into a bowl of vinegar over night. I thought it looked great when it came out, and I was pleasantly surprised that I could still see the RAT logo and Izula ant. To finish off the coating I rubbed a little mustard on a few spots on either side of the blade.
The way the knife comes from the factory, the gimping is nice and rounded, providing a comfortable grip for the thumb. I almost never place my thumb on the back of the spine, so gimping doesn’t do much for me. And because it was rounded, it couldn’t throw any sparks off a ferro rod. To make the whole affair a bit more useful I took a Dremel tool and redid the gimping. It’s much more rough and sharp now, less ideal for thumbs but great for throwing sparks.
After that all that was left was to re-wrap the handle with a new piece of paracord – black this time – and the job was done. My favorite EDC knife: even better than before.
Last week I noticed that the top right compression strap on my Triple Aught Design FAST Pack EDC had begun to rip off from the pack. This is the first failure I’ve experienced on the pack, which has been in regular use since Fall 2007.
I’m surprised that it was this particular strap that failed first. I don’t often carry heavy items in the Transporter Tail, so the strap does not have a lot of stress placed on it. Still, I feel better about sewing it back down than I would about repairing a load-bearing strap.
Now: A needle, a length of #69 nylon thread, and a bit of time.
For the past few years I have been using a cheap headlight from Cateye on the front of my bike. When turned on to the blink setting, it did an acceptable job of making me seen, but it did very little to light up the road. Last January I decided that I wanted to replace or supplement it with a better light.
I looked at the lights carried by various bike shops for a while, but none of them impressed me. The high end bike-specific lights are bright, to be sure, but they tend to be much more expensive than a hand-held light of comparable output.
I thought it would be neat if I could somehow attach a normal light to my handlebars. Not only would this be cheaper than purchasing the equivalent bike headlight, but the light would be multifunctional: appropriate either for my bike or my belt. None of my own hackish attempts to mount a normal light on the handlebars satisfied me, so it was with relief that I heard about a company called Twofish.
The Lockblock is a piece of rubber with perpendicular “U”s on either side. Each side fastens to an object with a small piece of hook-and-loop webbing. The Bikeblock is similar, but the two “U”s are parallel, and each side fastens to its respective object with a single continuous piece of hook-and-loop webbing. Lockblocks are to be used when you want to mount an object perpendicular to something else, such as a light on handlebars. Bikeblocks are appropriate when you want to mount the object parallel to something else, such as a pump to a frame. I bought three of each.
My first use of the Lockblock was to replace the Cateye headlight with my old Novatac 120T. The difference was immediately noticeable on my first night-ride. The 120T lights up the road, both bringing me to the attention of motorists and bringing potholes to the attention of me.
But I still thought it could be better. I wanted a second light.
Research showed that the Fenix LD20 was a popular choice to use in conjunction with Lockblocks. It blasts out a fair number of lumens and I liked that it ran on AA batteries rather than CR123s, so I picked one up.
The combination of the Fenix LD20 and Novatac 120T really light up the road. The Lockblocks hold both lights securely, and they make for a safe commute on long winter nights.
Although I was happy with this setup, I wanted to try using the parallel mount of the Bikeblock to add a helmet light into the mix. The Bikeblock fastens easily and securely across the vents of my Giro Stylus. Between my two lights, the shorter profile of the Novatac 120T made it more appropriate for a helmet mount.
I’ve been running the 120T on my helmet for about a week now. It’s nice to have the light point wherever I’m looking – and the ability to flash inattentive drivers is appreciated – but the light does add a noticeable weight. It’s annoying enough that I don’t keep the light on my helmet during the day, but so far I’ve been steadily putting it back after the sun sets. I haven’t decided if I’ll keep it up there, or if I’ll ditch the helmet light idea. I think that as winter turns to spring and the days lengthen, the Bikeblock will come off of my helmet.
I also use a Bikeblock for its intended purpose – to hold a pump to the bike frame. This is much more secure than my previous method, which consisted only of two pieces of hook-and-loop webbing.
Twofish’s mounts offer a serious challenge to the standard bike-light market. I’m pleased with both the Lockblock and Bikeblock and cannot see any reason to move back to a bicycle-specific headlight.
Lanolin is a kind of wax that sheep and other wool-bearing animals produce to protect their coats. It is, in fact, a waterproofing agent. Any lanolin that remains in the wool after shearing is generally stripped out during the process of turning the hair into clothing, thus reducing the wool’s ability to shed water.
Commercially, lanolin is often used as a skin treatment product for humans. Lansinoh, in particular, makes a pure-lanolin nipple cream for breast-feeding mothers.
I first learned about lanolin from a comment on my review of West German wool pants. Jenne, the commenter, recommended washing wool products using something called Eucalan. Eucalan is a natural wash that deposits lanolin in the wool. Rinsing isn’t necessary with Eucalan, so much of the hassle (and danger of felting) that is usually associated with washing wool can be avoided.
For an extra treatment, Jenne recommended dissolving a small amount of Lansinoh’s pure lanolin in hot water before adding the Eucalan.
I was intrigued by this method. The no-rinse aspect made it simpler than carefully washing wool with Dr. Bronner’s, which was my previous choice. And increasing the health and functionality of my wool by restoring the natural oils made good sense – the same thing must be done to leather. I bought both the Eucalan and the nipple cream.
Eucalan comes in a few different scents. I first bought the unscented version, which seemed most appropriate for outdoor wear. Later I bought a jug of the Eucalyptus version. Eucalyptus oil is a deterrent to moths and fleas, so Eucalan recommends using this version before storing wool garments for a while. (The eucalyptus scent is very subtle after the wool has been dried – you’re not going to go around smelling like flowers.)
I’ve since washed my West German wool pants, West German wool knickers, Italian wool knickers, and two Pendleton wool shirts – the majority of my non-merino wool clothing – in Eucalan with added Lansinoh and have been pleased with the results. I recommend giving it a shot if you wear wool in wilderness settings.
The Process
Dissolve a small amount (about one inch) of Lansinoh HPA Lanolin in hot water
Add enough room-temperature water to cover the garment to be washed
Add about two cap-fulls of Eucalan and mix it in
Add the wool to be washed
Let soak for 15 – 30 minutes
Pull out the wool, hold it up, and let the water drip out for a minute or two
When I first bought my scale, I started a spreadsheet containing the weights of various pieces of gear. It seemed like a good idea – I knew I wanted some sort of database to store my measured weights and other notes in – but I never got around to updating it. Data in a spreadsheet is too static. You can’t do much with it. I think that characteristic contributed to my disinterest with the spreadsheet.
So for a while now I’ve had the idea of writing a web application to track my gear. Over the past week, I finally got around to doing it.
Gear Tracker is built on Django, a web application framework. (If you’re not familiar with Django, and you have anything to do with making websites, it’s probably worth your time to learn a thing or two.)
Gear
Gear Tracker’s primary purpose is to track gear.
Each item has a weight and acquisition date associated with it. It can be categorized, tagged, and related to other items. There are fields to input size, a link to the manufacturer’s page, a link to a review, and to upload an image. A text area allows the user to store any notes related to the item.
Items can be archived. This provides a way to not list gear that the user no longer owns, but to keep it in the database for future reference of its weight or other attributes.
Weights
Weights are always input in grams.
The metric system makes the most sense and is the easiest to work with. An item’s weight can be displayed in grams or, if the item weighs more than 1,000 grams, kilograms. But because some of us are crippled and still like to see imperial weights, Gear Tracker can also display the item’s weight in ounces or pounds.
Gear Lists
Gear Tracker can also generate gear lists.
One of the things that has prevented me from doing many gear lists in the past is that they’re a pain in the rear to create. It takes a while to manually write out every item of gear that I take on a trip. If I want to add the weight of each item – well, that’s asking too much! It’s not worth it.
Now, making gear lists is easy. Gear Tracker already has detailed knowledge about each piece of gear. All it takes to create a gear list is to select the item, specify how many of that item I took, and whether the item was packed or carried. The result is an organized, detailed gear list for every trip. Total weights are calculated, of course, and can be output in either metric or imperial units.
Private Gear Lists
Gear lists can be made private.
I generally create gear lists when I’m packing before a trip. But I don’t like to publish the lists until I actually return from the trip and also have a report and photos for people to peruse. So, Gear Tracker allows a gear list to be marked as private.
Download It, Hack It, Use It
I’m running Gear Tracker at /gear, but if you want to grab your own copy and run it yourself, you can! I’ve open-sourced the code under a BSD-license. You can find it at GitHub.
