Good Surplus Buys For Bushcrafting?

[Monk]

What is your favorite surplus buy for bushcraft-clothing or items that you have found to be a worthwhile buy?

Personally I was able to get ahold of a us military fishtail parka+hood+liner in exc shape and it is a GREAT ITEM! Word of advice- if you come across a favorite piece of gear, always try and get a spare one to put on the side as eventually the item will disappear from the market or the original quality will go downhill.

What's yours?

 

[Squidders]

M65 jacket

 

[leon-1]

Lightweight trousers, poncho's, OG shirts and there are plenty more, but you will have to dig about for them

 

[falcon]

A pair of ex - army goretex gaiters for £8 from the Midland Game Fair. Very durable and an extremely strong underfoot fastening with buckle.

Oh ....and I forgot about my surplus Goretex Bivvi bag which I picked up at a car boot sale for £5 about 10 years ago. At the time, I was hoping to find someone who could convert it into a pair of wet weather overtrousers for hillwalking but didn't get around to it. Obvoiusly I'm glad now I didn't...

 

[MartiniDave]

Not really surplus, but sort of, German Army Knife made by Victorinox, mint condition with large blade, combo tool of saw, screwdriver and bottle opener, awl & corkscrew. £4.50 from a car boot sale stall! (and its GREEN)

Also Swedish army Trangia set.

Dave

 

[bloodline]

WW11 british army entrenching tool unused new condition couple of quid (that was a lot then) worth every bit penny still got it nearly 30 years later

 

[arctic hobo]

Army lightweights and norgee shirts are the best surplus buys I have made.

 

[BlueTrain]

I constantly prowl the local surplus stores for novelties, curios and relics. Sometimes I actually find useful stuff. I see more good packs than anything else, probably, and they are mostly all at good prices. Only I end up buying so many! But anyway, that's where I got my PLCE bergan. My last pack--I mean my most recent pack--is a Swedish external frame pack. It has a relatively small green nylon sack, so you have to put your bedroll underneath. I also have two older bergan type packs, identical except one is nylon, the other canvas.

I also buy all smocks that fit that I find, or at least it seems like I do. I have about five, including an arctic windproof, plus a reproduction WWII pattern windproof smock in camouflage with matching trousers. I have also a bag full of shirts. I have found No 2 dress poplin shirts, Dutch DPM shirts and German army OG shirts. I haven't bought any but one surplus store has British blankets that are about twice as thick as an American army blanket. I can only assume it is twice as cold in the UK as it is in the US.

I have a lot of other British kit accumulated over the years but more of it was either purchased directly from British stores or from specialist militaria dealers here. However, there are things I've never seen so far that I would probably snap up if I saw any. That would include current issue fleece items and more lightweight trousers and probably another pair of battledress trousers. I'm not sure I'll live long enough to wear out the ones I have now, however.

As one contributor wrote, buy spares. So I do and then some!

Every now and then a quantity of surplus will appear then won't be seen again. At one time one of the local department stores had a lot of 1950 pattern khaki drill trousers. I had a couple but that was now close to 30 years ago! On the other hand, there are things I've never seen in a surplus store, including any British boots or OG shirts or any British wool shirts (flannel shirts) of any pattern. I have seen lots of battledress and No 2 dress trousers and, lately, DPM combat trousers but they have all been too small. Wool jerseys show up with some regularity but they are all small and in bad shape.

And that's the way it is.

 

[Kirruth]

Definitely, the current British Army entrenching tool.

 

[nickg]

Get down to the War and Peace Show at Paddock wood this weekend. Its a ww2 and later reenactors meet but there are literally hundreds of trades selling gear from ww1 to up to date. There really are loads of them so prices are MEGA competative. Just about everything you may want. Picked up a brand new webtex plce bergan with the side pouches for £80. Most traders will haggle. Only happens once a year (and a great day out watching the tanks etc do thier stuff.
http://www.thewarandpeaceshow.com/

 

[bombadil]

German army "moleskin" trousers-absolutely love 'em. Sadly have wrecked all of mine now, and I'm in Portugal where surplus shops don't really exist
Will be glad to get back to wales in a few months so I can buy some more....

 

[BlueTrain]

Some surplus stores around here have those German trousers, which they also call "moleskin," but they are consistently more expensive than most of their other trousers. So I don't buy them. They used to have those very heavy wool trousers, basically the German equivalent of battledress serge, but evidently the surplus stocks have dwindled. They still have German sweaters, which now come with a breast pocket.

 

[Brixton]

Not from an army surplus store but from Matalan
Little (size of fag packet) plastic tubs for 50p each.
I can fit 6 in my possibles web tex side pouch.
I used to use a mini dry bag to line it but whenever I rummaged around for my last bit of dry bark everything else got wet
I now don't have to cos everything else is in it's own tub.

And for those little bits like fishing hooks and lead shot my long suffering wifes used plastic vitamin / suppliment bottles for the same reason