This week: Ukraine; Backpack Stuff; and random shit I bought because I had an excuse to buy it.
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Year: 2022
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Hogue Deka (gen2)
I had managed to sleep through the first version of this knife coming out, but not this version as it was posted in the member Discord — a dangerous place to be most days. As soon as I saw this, I struggled to pick the color and blade I would want. But ended up getting the fully blacked out Hogue Deka (gen 2) with the wharncliffe blade.
This is one of my favorite pocket knives.
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Zebralight SC64w Hi
Roam around the flashlight world long enough and you see people express a lot of love for Zebralight flashlights. I never gravitated towards them, as I don’t find them to look particularly good — but when you own enough flashlights you get to a point where you know you need to try one. You know you need to find out why this matters.
I hit that point.
I grabbed the SC64w HI, and have been using it for a bit now. I get it. I see why people like these lights. They are far from perfect, but they do a lot really well.
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New Rucker Day
GORUCK released ‘reservations’ for the new Rucker 4.0, and Rucker Long Range.
The Rucker 4.0 appears to have a few changes: extra padding on the top of the plate, velcro closures on the internal flap pockets, extra d-rings inside the bag, and no slant pocket on the front. This is all done to make for less breakage when slamming the bag around — everything else seems to be the same as the 3.0 model. The Multicam Tropic model does come with a matching hip belt, and appears to be running the camo pattern horizontal — which would be great if it proves true during shipping.
The Rucker Long Range is completely new. It’s a Rucker 3.0 design, on the GR2 platform (so you still get zipper pockets and the front pocket, no extra d-rings, but the sleeve does seem more padded). These come in 33L and 39L for $245/$255 — that’s a hell of a deal for the GR2 platform. They have the slick material against your body and the lumbar support — I bet they feel killer to ruck with, or use in general. GORUCK has been talking about this model for a while now, and it should be great for those who find the 25L stuffed with a plate and hydration bladder (which it is tight).
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Beyond Clothing VIP Sale
For readers here, use code
BEYOND25VIPfor 25% most items. I grabbed the Sherpa fleece, looks great. I love the Todra t-shirts for working out, btw. -
Emergency Bags Update Start of 2022
I put this post idea down last August, little did I know then that the weather this winter would be insane, a major volcano would erupt in the Pacific causing many tsunami warnings, and oh tornados — doesn’t bode well for the summer fire/hurricane seasons if you ask me to extrapolate from unrelated events. Anyways, this isn’t a listing of gear in my bags, but rather updates to my thinking about each bag, the needs for the bags, as well as other odds and ends of that nature.
The big thing heading into 2022 is my shifting focus and thinking around which bag I prioritize, and focusing more directly on the most likely, instead of the most terrifying needs. Which is surprisingly hard for me personally to do.
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Two Bags for the Office
I’ve managed to standardize on two bags I rotate between for heading to the office day to day. Back in October of 2021 I told members about this setup, and it’s still my setup, so it’s time to go a little deeper on this, why these two bags, why two bags, and how I shift between them.
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Emisar D4V2 Tint Ramp Champ
I wrote about the Emisar D4SV2 recently, and the channel switching setup I have on that light. Shortly after that light came out, the smaller D4V2 had tint ramping / channel switching added to it — I quickly purchased a setup to provide a massive tint range: 2000k to 5000k.
This light is amazing, and one of my favorites.
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WE Knife Co. Arsenal
This isn’t my typical knife. When I go looking at knives I tend to focus on what I think I would use, and what I am likely to like the best — which means I buy a lot of knives that are increasingly similar to each other. Not a bad thing if you know what you like.
This knife, the WE Knife Co. Arsenal Frame Lock Knife in Gray Titanium/Green G-10 was a holiday gift from my parents and I have to say — not what I would have bought myself, but I am very glad to have it. This knife surprised me a lot.
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MaraSpec Glow Tape Roll
A few people might notice in some pictures of my flashlights that there’s spots of a green-white-yellow colored thing in different spots. This is the Glow Tape — which is a roll of glow in the dark tape. It’s really great stuff, and has an unreal amount of glow from just a little bit of light and a little bit of the tape itself.
You need this, but in case you need more convincing for $8, here’s how I use it.
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Emisar D4SV2 (With Channel Switching)
I am a big fan of the Emisar D4V2, but it has a larger sibling, the D4SV2 which is a chonky beast of a light that takes a beastly battery. I grabbed one as it was among the first ‘hank light’ to get the new channel switching / tint ramping version of Anduril in it. Let’s talk about both this light (it’s great) and the new tint/channel switching setups (it’s even greater).
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Stuff I Like The Best, Based on Use in 2021
At the end of January last year, I started tracking the gear I used the most. Flashlights, knives, bags, and watches. And shortly thereafter I added in tracking my wears of different clothing. And throughout the year I’ve done a good job of logging all this stuff everyday.
I did this all in Numbers, as it presented an easy way to record the data, as well as to chart/analyze the data. There’s other tools for this, but this is what I went with. The downside of this is that I am recording raw counts, and nothing with dates associated with things. There’s also the issue that I don’t record the things I wear to work out in, or my clothes I wear when I head to bed at the end of the day.
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2021 Summary of My Baggage
A quick end of the year round up of the bags I have, and what I use them for:
