Next Project

I recently joined the Gearsoc.com forum, which incidentally, is a great forum, much friendlier, if not as frequently updated as Wannabe and is based in Sweden. If you're a regular on the UK gear and airsoft boards, there's a few screen-names that you'll recognise there.

All that aside, I saw on this forum that one of their members had modified a PLCE yoke as the load-bearing element for a custom Swedish chest rig. I thought that this was a great idea, and could see no reason why this should not work with other modular chest rigs such as the Tactical Tailor MAV or, in my case, the SOTech Tomcat.

First problem I ran into was sourcing the buckles. The Hellcat has female side-release buckles sewn to the chest rig, with the adjustable male section attached to the shoulder straps. Without wishing to take anything away from the modularity of the rig, and not wanting to ruin it in the event that my experiment with the yoke fails, I don't want to unstitch the buckles so I needed to find some more exactly the same. Fortunately, the buckles have 'Lock Monster' embossed on the back, so I started my Google search with that. Google did not fail me, and I found a couple of distributers that handled 50mm Lock Monster buckles. After sending several emails out (including one to SOTech thamselves), I have so far got two back:

Response 1

We have a $100.00 minimum order and 200 piece minimum on our stock
items. Listed below is the name and web address of a company that sells
plastic hardware wholesale in small quantities; please contact them for
your requirements.

Adventure 16
Website: www.adventure16.com

Thank you,

Toni Lopez
Sales & Purchasing Assistant
JOHN HOWARD COMPANY, INC.

Helpful enough, I hear you say.

Response 2

Please tell me if the female protion is adjustable or not?
Also give me your address and I will mail them to you.

Best Regards,

Ann Parrino
Customer Service Manager

How about that ? Ann Natmo has surprised the hell out of me by offering to ship me some buckles without even asking for payment. Is this too good to be true ? We'll have to wait and see.

Stay posted.