Tap’mups Mk. 2

After carrying around the Tap’mups (Mk. 1) for about ¾ of a year, I noticed the plastic sleeve was starting to crack.

More disturbingly, the bottom was cracking to the point where I feared the cards would fall out.

But before I could even make a trip to Toronto to buy a replacement pouch, something worse happened.

One afternoon after work, getting on the bus, I noticed that the card pouch was loose in my hand. Given that I made that particular version of the Swipe’mups in 2007, and carried it for quite a long time, I’m a bit surprised it lasted this long before the thread broke.

I went on a trip to Lee Vally with the idea I would buy one of these. I stopped into a Staples next door and found a (possibly ?) better solution. Certainly cheaper than the retractable lanyard at LV, and (possibly) a trip to Toronto to get a replacement pouch would have been. A Merangue Silicone ID Badge Holder and Klip-N-Pull Retractable Keycard Badge Holder.

Unscrewed the belt clip off the back of the “Klip-N-Pull Retractable Keycard Badge Holder”.

Now on to making a pouch for it. Tubular webbing wouldn’t work this time, as it was too wide to fit. Just took some 2" webbing and folded and sewed it to form a pocket and belt loop.

The one notable thing I did was to put tabs along the sides that I could put some bunjee cord through. I didn’t like how the card hung down. Wanting to avoid it catching on things, I added this feature so I could put it out of the way when needed.

After using it for a while, I noticed that the cards had a tendency to pop out from behind the clear plastic cover.

You can see here that the card itself isn’t much bigger than the slot it sits behind.

Made a pouch from some 20 mil marine vinyl, which so far, has done a great job of keeping the cards contained within the silicone pouch.

The Presto card doesn’t show at all, but it really doesn’t need to. Only the library card needs to have the bar code scanned.

(And a quick update on this. About three weeks after completing this, I was about to get on the bus, felt around, felt around some more, looked - the stainless steel wire, which I figured would be way more durable than the cord of the previous retractable lanyard, had broken. Library card and Presto pass – gone. I should have checked the reviews, because everyone seems to have the same experience – give it a few weeks and the wire breaks. Worthless piece of shit. Do not trust this. Your keys, cards, etc. are too valuable.

And Staples hasn’t posted my bad review of it more than a month after submitting it. Maybe they have a limit on how many bad reviews they’ll post. Lame.)

Gerber Shard

Gerber may have made good stuff at one time. Now they, like so many other US firms, are little more than a marketing department with a warehouse. And all the Bare Grills branded stuff? I’m not even going to go there.

They tried their hand at a one piece multi-tool, the Artifact (that I don’t think is offered any more), which was panned across the board. Being a long time user and fan of the X-Acto #11 blade, I thought it looked intriguing. Never did get one, mainly because the reviews I read dissuaded me.

This little gadget however has received more favourable press.

It was originally released as a give-away at...SHOT Show I think....but not as something to sell to the public. When photos of it emerged, people started asking for it, but they steadfastly refused to sell it. Finally, after months of badgering by consumers, they relented. 

This gives a sense of the size. Some kind of stainless steel and a TiNi coating. Not super high tech, but it should be fine for this application.

A few different angles. A pry bar, nail puller, two different sized slot screw drivers, a bottle opener (that also makes for an okay O2 tank wrench in a pinch) and Phillips screw driver.

Not very big at all. 7 cm long (2¾") by 2.5 cm wide (1") and not even 3 mm thick (less than ⅛"). Weighs about 17 grams (0.6 oz.)

2 1" pieces of webbing and a 1" space between them, to give another sense of the size. And also demonstrates how the hole is big enough for a carabiner to fit.

Close ups.

I wouldn’t want to use this for an entire night of opening hundreds of bottles of beer, but for a bottle or two? Just fine.

And I also wouldn’t want to use the nail puller for a day of framing, or the pry bar for a whole day of renovating. But for one or two things? Sure. Like so many multi-tools, they’re not the ideal tool for the job, but compared to not having anything, they are a more than serviceable option.

I got it for $15 Cdn at a retail store. All in all, handy little gizmo. I like it.

Not sure if Gerber has entirely redeemed themselves with this, but it’s definitely not a total turd.

Tap’mups Mk. 1

I’ve been using a Presto pass for a while now, and for the most part it’s a good thing. The fact that I can use it on any transit system in the GTHA area is undeniably handy.

What I haven’t been so keen on is that with GO Transit, I need to tap on when I enter the bus and tap off when I exit. When getting off, I’m usually up and moving down the aisle as the bus is still moving. I don’t want to have my wallet in my hand as I do. Also that aisle is narrow and trying to swing a bag forward to get at a wallet or dig it out of my pocket with everyone else behind me having to wait while I do, didn’t suit me. I wanted to be able to quickly tap off, without having to access a bag or wallet.

I wanted some way of getting at both of them without much fuss. Figured the Swipe’mups was the best approach.

I thought of just cutting a rectangular slot in the top of the card. The problem with that is that the Presto pass, when I put cash on it, needs to be handed to the attendant. Given that the Swipe’mups is firmly attached to the belt, often on the left side, having to undo my belt to get it off would be a total nuisance. I needed to have it firmly attached to me, and still be removable if need be.

I looked all over for a credit card / business card sized holder for months. And one that wouldn’t be a huge pain to get the card out of if need be. Finally found one at Europe Bound in Toronto.

Since I use my library card a lot, I figured I may as well use the side opposite to the Presto pass for it. While I don’t currently need a work related swipe pass, if at some point I do, I’m hoping I can put it between the other two cards. Might cause interference, but we’ll see.

Reinforced the hole with a grommet. Thought of all kinds of fancy knots to attach and in the end just mashed something unfancy together with Spectra line.

I can slip it in my pocket if I need to do any high speed ninja manoeuvres.

Messenge’mups Bag Dump

While I’ve posted up the bag I’ve made, I don’t know if I have ever shown what I carry in it.

This is more that I usually carry in it on an ordinary day, but this is what was in it the day I opted to dump it out to photograph it all.

 The bag itself from a few different angles.

1. Smoke kit
2. Packet of tissues
3. Sigg 0.6L oval bottle with cup
4. MECEDCFAK
5. Batuca Battery Case (AA, AAA and CR123)
6. 18GB USB Key
7. 256 GB LaCie External Hard Drive
8. Extra Battery for Cell Phone
9. Apple iBook G3 20 GB
10. Motorola Q cell phone
11. Head phones
12. 40 GB iPod
13. Charger for phone and various USB adapters and retractable cable
14. Cash’mups
15. Mesh shopping bag 
16. Monocular
17. Eagle Creek sunglasses case
18. Toiletries pouch
19. Spyderco Tenacious (carried in right front pants pocket)
20. Lighter (refillable) (carried in left front pants pocket)
21. Fenix T1
22. Leatherman WAVE 98
23. Book (usually always have one with me. Changes often.)
24. Light My Fire mess kit
25. Snow Peak titanium spork
26. small plastic spork (came in a fruit cup)
27. GSI N-Case 840 with Samsung ES70 camera
28. Rite in the Rain 3"x5" note book
29. Zebra F-701 Pen
30. Sharpie Steel Marker (piece of crap)  
31. Bic 4 Colour Pen
32. Maxpedition Micro Wallet with business cards 
33. A. G. Russell Woods Walker
34. TTC tokens
35. Notebook/Sketch Book/Day Planner/Address Book
36. NyfFyrLyt (carried on my belt)
37. Clip’mups (carried on my belt/in right front pocket)

And a larger, unlabelled version if you want a closer look at anything. (Right click and scroll down to ‘open image in new tab’ and that will allow you to zoom in.)

The electronics are a bit dated, but hey - it works.

Under the Shoulder Gold & Folder Holder

I’ve been carrying around this Maxpedition Manta for a while now. Ultimately quite content with it, but being the geardo that I am I decided to try out an idea I’ve been mulling over for a while now.

Namely to take the two Maxpedition Medium Tac-Tiles off, and turn them into sort of a shoulder holster set up. I was inspired by the offerings of Civilian Lab, namely their Gear Harness Bags. They look pretty neat, but they also look like something I would actually want to eyeball and fingertip before I plunk down the money for them. Not that I even have any money to plunk down at the moment. :-(

So I don’t actually have any gold in there, but that is just a reference to my wallet, so that covers the gold, and I guess the Leatherman Wave qualifies as a folding knife, so that covers the folder.

Ultimately it was just exploring an idea. I was thinking of it in terms of something a little more low key, maybe something I could wear under a coat. That I found out very quickly wasn’t so feasible. It was like I had transformed into the Hulk and zipping my coat back up again proved difficult. It’s also difficult to get at things comfortably. A bit looser and it might work better. 

All I used was some 1" nylon webbing, some 4 1" tri-glides, and a 1½" tri-glide in the back where they cross. Maybe having some hooks on the front D-rings might help with access. Unhook it to make it easier to pull the pouch forward. Might work, might not.

Another thought I had was to weave a few inches of 1" elastic into the tri-glides, and then end that like I have the webbing through the D-ring, either at the front or the back. That way I would have some give, and it might be enough to allow the pouch to be pulled forward when getting something out. Might work, might not.

If you want to see what’s in each pouch, I did a writeup on them in my Manta report.

The right module. A monocular at the back, the cell phone and a Fenix T1 in the front.

The back side of it. 

Left module. Leatherman Wave at the front, and a Petzl Tikka at the back.

The back side of it.

Don’t know that I’ll keep this set up; I might play around with it some more, try some variations. Worth investigating, but I reckon that in a while I will go back to my usual Manta set up.

To me it’s just fun to try out some different ideas, to explore and experiment. Oh wait, I guess that would be an exploriment! :-)