As I discussed >>here<< I've been enjoying waxing bags of late. I bought one of >>these<< canvas haversacks to wax into a bag for myself. I was really pleased with how it turned out, but I wasn't so happy with the strap length. Despite being 5'8" I have the trunk of a much taller man and I'm quite fat so the straps were almost ridiculously short on me. Apparently this is pretty common on military haversacks where convention dictates they're worn "high" so as to avoid swinging around while marching. I'm not in the military so I wanted a longer strap. I decided to make this bag a project for modding.
I ordered a meter of khaki canvas strapping. I doubled it over and box stitched the ends together with paracord core. I ordered some khaki buckles and ladder locks. The ladder lock acts as a stopper showing the maximum level of adjustment. The buckle now means the bag can be removed by releasing the buckle rather than lifting it over the head, as with Maxpedition bags. This is handy if you're wearing the bag underneath a jacket or poncho. To top it all off I added in a Maxpedition 1.5" shoulder pad in khaki. Total investment in this bag was £47, although by necessity I had to order more wax and buckles than I needed. Out of that initial expenditure I've got a whole bunch of buckles left over, and enough wax that I was able to do quite a bit of candle making with my kids. Actual value put into the bag was probably about £35.
I'm pretty happy with it. Through this mod I've added around 10" to the strap and it's now pretty much perfect on me. The only disappointment is the colour matching of the shades of khaki between the old and new pieces of strap. I went with canvas rather than nylon webbing as I thought it would match the rest of the bag better, but ironically the nylon shoulder pad matches perfectly. I may switch the canvas out for nylon at some point. Aside from the waxing, all of these mods are easily reversible or alterable as needs be.
I ordered a meter of khaki canvas strapping. I doubled it over and box stitched the ends together with paracord core. I ordered some khaki buckles and ladder locks. The ladder lock acts as a stopper showing the maximum level of adjustment. The buckle now means the bag can be removed by releasing the buckle rather than lifting it over the head, as with Maxpedition bags. This is handy if you're wearing the bag underneath a jacket or poncho. To top it all off I added in a Maxpedition 1.5" shoulder pad in khaki. Total investment in this bag was £47, although by necessity I had to order more wax and buckles than I needed. Out of that initial expenditure I've got a whole bunch of buckles left over, and enough wax that I was able to do quite a bit of candle making with my kids. Actual value put into the bag was probably about £35.
I'm pretty happy with it. Through this mod I've added around 10" to the strap and it's now pretty much perfect on me. The only disappointment is the colour matching of the shades of khaki between the old and new pieces of strap. I went with canvas rather than nylon webbing as I thought it would match the rest of the bag better, but ironically the nylon shoulder pad matches perfectly. I may switch the canvas out for nylon at some point. Aside from the waxing, all of these mods are easily reversible or alterable as needs be.
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