Belgium Rucksack

[Keith_Beef]

You might see that both sidepacks have attachmentpoints on the top and the bottom. You need to find a spare set of shoulderstraps which you can feed in the slots. The one on the picture is about the closest thing to the real deal I could find. Hope that makes any sense, my native language is dutch.
View attachment 53773

Dank je wel, Ruud.

I stopped off at the mercer's shop on the way home and picked up 3 metres of 25mm wide nylon webbing and four side-release buckles to play a bit... It sits too far of my back, with that makeshift set-up. I'll see if the shoulder straps from my little Maxpedition daysack will fit better.

Well, the Maxpedition straps are permanently sewn onto the rucksack, but I've got a British yoke on its way to me...

 

[Keith_Beef]

So, my YOKE, POUCH, SIDE, RUCKSACK, DPM IRR, NSN 8465-99-132-1561 has arrived.

But while the British kit seems to use 20mm side release buckles to attach the pouches to the yoke, the Belgian pouches have attachments for 25mm webbing straps...

I have four 25mm side-release buckles as well as the webbing. I'll see what I can rig up with the 25mm webbing and buckles, and I have some 20mm webbing and buckles on order.

I downloaded some instructions from the Defence Clothing and Textiles Agency; it looks like I could also attach side pouches to the other kind of yoke, YOKE, MAIN, DPM IRR, NSN 8465-99-132-1560, but I think I would have also needed a BELT, WAIST, O/D, IRR, LARGE, NSN 8465-99-132-1565.

The document looks like it was scanned from a printed paper copy. The pictures are not always very helpful.

Well, I cut some short lengths of 25mm webbing and tried three configurations:

• one pouch,
• two pouches,
• two pouches plus panel, with a tent pushed into the space.

It took me about an hour to work out a way to attach the bits together, and I was reasonably pleased, though I didn't have complete confidence in the 20mm side release buckles. Several times, I bumped one of them and it came loose... And then the male half of one of them snapped.

The pouches were filled with only very light stuff (a merino wool blanket in one, and a synthetic fleece blanket in the other, just to fill out the volume), and the tent is not really heavy.

Oh, well, maybe I won't bother with the 20mm webbing and buckles; I'll stick with the 25mm size.

 

[Keith_Beef]

I managed to cobble together something that looks vaguely like a small rucksack.

The 20mm side-lock buckles on the British Army yoke seem a bit weak, and each side pocket from the Belgian rucksack has two 25mm fittings at the top, and another two at the bottom.

So I took a length of 25mm webbing, folded it in half and slipped the female half of a 25mm side-lock buckle on the webbing. Then pushed the free ends under webbing loops on the shoulder straps of the yoke, bottom to top, then through the 25mm fittings on the pocket. Repeated on the other pocket.

At the bottom, I put a length of webbing across from a fitting on one pocket to the corresponding fitting on the other pocket; this stops the tent from falling through.

Then I took a length of webbing with the male half of a buckle and attached the free end through the other fitting on the bottom of a pocket. Repeated on the other pocket.

I hope this will become clearer with the photos.

It's still rough, and I don't know if I'l ever use it in the field, but it was interesting trying to get the things to fit together.

 

[Keith_Beef]

..snip..
I can't for the life of me remember the French term either (it's not "joug", that's just for the agricultural term or as a figure of speech)... I have a niggling feeling that the word starts "bre...".

w00t

A couple of days ago, I managed to track down the word: brelage.