Off Duty, Technology - Navy Times

Spec.-Ops Brand offers simple, durable ruck

For all the room it offers, your standard-issue combat rucksack sometimes isn’t quite enough to haul all your gear to the field.

As a secondary ruck for short field operations, Spec.-Ops Brand’s T.H.E. Pack is a solid option for those who like their gear durable and simple.

We put one through a garrison-style test this winter, using it to haul gym gear for after-work cardio sessions. At the same time, we sent one out for field duty with an Army major serving as a battalion executive officer with 2nd Brigade, 3rd Infantry Division, at Fort Stewart, Ga., which was gearing up for an accelerated Iraq deployment.

After a few weeks of rough-and-tumble duty around the Lifelines base camp and in the field, we came to the consensus that T.H.E. Pack doesn’t come with a lot of the bells and whistles seen in other rucksacks, but is built tough and ready for heavy use.

With 2,550 cubic inches of cargo space split between one main compartment (1,730 ci) and two secondary compartments (250 ci and 570 ci), there’s enough room for a spare uniform and dry boots, along with a couple of field-stripped MREs, with enough room left over for the extra odds and ends required for a few days in the field.

Built from durable 1,000 denier Cordura nylon and outfitted with heavy-duty zippers, this ruck can handle a lot of punishment.

“You can see and feel the quality construction,” the major wrote in his critique of the ruck after coming out of the field. “I’ve had a lot of packs that I’ve overloaded that have the stitching attaching the top of the shoulder straps to the pack body come apart under all the stress. This one hasn’t done that yet, and doesn’t look like it’s going to.”

The basic ruck sells for $149.95, but an add-on frame board is available separately for $29.95, bringing the total price to about $180.

Adding the after-market frame helps stiffen the back, but it lacked instructions on how to adjust the aluminum stiffener rods to the wearer’s body profile as advertised. It’s also tough to get the board into the pouch at the back of the ruck.

We talked to Jeff Wemmer, the president and chief designer at Spec.-Ops Brand, about his ruck, and he notes that the difficulty with the frame board is intentional. The tight fit stops the board from moving around once it’s in place inside the ruck. Wemmer also explained that while there’s no sure-fire way to adjust the aluminum rods, it’s probably not necessary, since the ruck is designed to be worn over body armor and doesn’t need to fit the wearer’s back the same way a mountaineering pack would.

Durability over comfort

Missing from T.H.E. Pack is the thick, channeled padding found on higher-end packs, both in the back and along the waist belt. Here, Spec.-Ops Brand traded comfort for durability; Wemmer said the padding his company uses is “exponentially more durable” than what’s used in other packs. “This thing has to hold up like a .50-caliber ammo can every day,” he said.

As for the waist belt, which is made from unpadded nylon, Wemmer said the three-day ruck isn’t designed to carry the kind of heavy load that makes an elaborate, padded waist belt necessary. Many troops, he said, will find after a few uses that they probably don’t need the belt.

Inside the ruck, the interior pouches and yellow lining are nice touches, the major said.

“I also like the yellow interior to allow contrast when you’re looking for things in the dark,” he wrote. “Right before I got this pack, I went through that scenario on a field exercise, looking for an item that I had thrown into the pack I was using then. ... Didn’t find the item till I emptied the sack out in the daylight.”

A few design updates that we’d welcome on T.H.E. Pack: A side-mounted drag handle, Velcro on a portion of the ruck’s MOLLE weave to attach name tapes, and an integrated hydration system.

We raised those points with Wemmer, who was receptive to the idea of a side drag handle and Velcro; he suggested that an add-on Velcro panel might make more sense, giving the user the option to tailor the ruck to fit his needs.

As for the hydration system, he said an integrated hydration system would add $25 to $30 to the price of the ruck for troops who by and large are already carrying military-issued hydration systems. Spec.-Ops Brand sells an add-on bladder carrier — the H.U.M.P. ($34.95 retail) — and will debut a rigid Nalgene bottle-compatible pouch in June.

For more information, see http://www.specopsbrand.com.