1" Bra G-Hooks rather than ITW G-Hooks (pt.2)

Thought I should do a follow-up on this, and report my findings.

Regrettably, I fear these aren’t as ideal as I had wished.

As you can see, several months of tightening and being under tension has deformed them. I’ve sewn a few of these with two g-hooks, but doubt that will really be any better. Just not sure it’s meant to withstand the rigours I’ve been subjecting it to.

Bummer.

And, amusingly enough, I managed to bust a ladder lock. Something I scrounged from Canadian army surplus, so this could well be 20 or more years old. Weak plastic to begin with, years of abuse on a piece of issued gear before I got a hold of it, my being too hard on it - who knows.

1" Bra G-Hooks rather than ITW G-Hooks (pt.1)

A while back I mentioned Woo-Jin Tension Hooks as an alternative to the expensive and scarce ITW G-Hooks. Only problem....the Tension Hooks I’ve found pretty well impossible to get my mitts on. So I’m right back to square one.

I was down on Ottawa Street yesterday and searching for nylon edge tape. Futile, but I decided to check in to the bra supply store there. Worth a try. I had never been in before, even though my pal Yolanda shops there all the time for corsetry supplies. While they didn’t have any nylon edge tape, I browsed through their hardware, and came across these. 

1" bra hooks. I had only ever seen them in ¼" and ½" sizes. And usually in plastic. I wasn’t even aware these existed. In metal no less. (I’m guessing these are for the lasses with the really big boosums.) For 50¢ no less. Decided to give them a try. Now they might not be as rugged as the ITW variant, but I’m not doing HALO jumps or crawling through urban battlefields. I did my best to wrench one of these apart and didn’t have much luck. For my purposes these should do fine.

I copied the example of Kifaru’s K-Connector.

A scrap of webbing, a needle and thread and a few minutes of work to put in a bartack. I call them Bra’mups.

Made a few more.

Ouch’mups on the YakBakDekPak, front and rear. 

Release the tension on the buckle and detach.

Closeup. These are not nearly as beefy as the G-Hooks, but likely just fine for my needs. I’m still curious whether reefing down on the webbing will cause these to deform. But that is part of the whole design process. Figure out what does and doesn’t work. For the cost, I’m willing to give these a try and see what happens over time.

Ouch’mups and Slurp’mups on the sides of the YakBakDekPak, with the Map’mups on the front.

If you’re interested in these, the store I got these from has them (although they don’t list these on the site, but do feature other metal 1" ones, or the plastic version), or try SewSassy or FabricDepot.

And, a follow-up report.

Woo-Jin Tension Hooks rather than ITW G-Hooks

I’ve been contemplating replacing the side release buckles I use to attach and detach pouches to packs. If I want to attach the pouch somewhere else, I need corresponding female buckles on the receiving rig/pack/pouch. I really want to avoid that extra weight expense. One option that I have considered are ITW G-Hooks.

The only problem with them is that they are expensive (buy them in small quantities and they run $2.50 per) and their scarcity. Mil-Spec Monkey is one of the few places that has them (and sell them in lots of 100 - where the price is a more reasonable $1.20), but they have them very sporadically. Another problem with G-Hooks is that webbing tends to slip in them. There is a straight version in which it is worse and also a waved version which tries to remedy that slippage. Even with that, keeping tension on is a problem. Kifaru uses them but added a ladder-loc to it to counter slippage, and called it the K-Connector.

Now it appears Woo-Jin has something that might give it a run for its money.

Called a Tension Hook, it comes in a few different sizes (15 mm {½"}, 20 mm {¾"}, 25 mm {1") and 38 mm {1½"}). Made from Acetal, which isn’t as strong as metal, but plenty strong enough for my needs. Likely most anyone else too. And, they have a better webbing slider molded right in. Oh and it comes in a right and left version. Admittedly not as convenient as the G-Hooks ability to mount on either side, but an acceptable trade off.

The Slurp’mups attached to the YakBakDekPak.

(There is also a Single Tension Hook, but it only comes in the 15 mm {½"} size. Not sure why only that size, but I do hope they decide to make it in more sizes.)

The question that arises is....now that I have found them intriguing and want to get a bunch more....where do I then order several dozen? All of them, Woo-Jin, National Molding, ITW-Nexus - why it is so damn hard to buy two dozen of this, and 8 of that, and a dozen of this, and 50 of that, and two of this and one of that? Some of them sell some of their things to guys like me, but then the other three quarters of their selection seems to exist solely for the purposes of dangling in front of my nose and taunting me with. “Not for you little man.” I get that they want to sell skids worth of stuff, truck loads at a time, to big manufacturers. But there must be some sort of market in selling to small makers, designers, tinkerers, fixers? Finding anything by National Molding is particularly tough. I really wish there was a place that sold all of their offerings in one place, in smallish quantities. Why can’t there be a place that offers all the groovy hardware to the average modder/maker? How the heck does the cottage industry/hobbyist maker get anything beyond a cord lock/side release buckle/tri glide/ladder lock in reasonably small quantities?