Tricks to Organize your Daily Use MKVII bag *Pics up
Posted: Sat Oct 25, 2008 10:53 pm
I use my MKVII bag as a daily travel bag. It is an ideal size for me and I use it to carry my glasses, spare contacts, medication, small flashlight, lighter, etc. From carrying this bag on a daily basis I have worked out some organizational tricks that make it even more useful. Hopefully others will find them useful as well. If anyone has additional ideas please post them here.
I have heard a few folks complain about the inability for the bag to adequately contain smaller items such as batteries, fingernail clippers, lighters, matches, etc. What I have done is to take an ammo pouch, in my case I used a US military triple mag M16 pouch, and cut the three inner dividers out along with the two outer grenade holders. This makes for a really nice, very sturdy pouch that will fit absolutely perfectly into one of the two main divided areas in the MKVII bag. I use it to hold all of my little items that might otherwise swim around and get lost in the large compartment.
When you trim off the extra partitions, because this pouch is made of nylon, you can easily use a lighter flame to remove the frazzle from the cut edges. Also use a lighter to reduce any frayed and worn areas. These ammo pouches are extremely cheap and common. They can be purchased on Ebay for $2-3 each in excellent condition. Just do an Ebay search for US ammo pouch and organize your list for the cheapest Buy It Now.
Another pouch that fits nicely is the Israeli FAL canvas magazine pouch. No mods are needed for this. It fits very well but the canvas is thick and heavy and it will not hold as much in the same space. I would think that any similar sized magazine pouch would work well for this purpose. I have found that the modern nylon M16 ammo pouch is lightweight, thin, and holds the most, even though it may not be accurate to the time frame of the bag.
Another little trick is using the pocket clip from a name badge to hold the lanyard of a small flashlight. These clips can also be attached to a small pair of scissors. The advantage to this is the ability to clip these small items to the top edge of the inner bag pocket in order to make them more accessible.
I also use the retractable style of name badge clip to hold a very small LED flashlight: the Streamlight Nano. I keep this clipped to the top edge of the bag where it is very easy to reach. When I'm done it simply retracts back into the bag and I don't have to worry about losing it. It's also great to use to look around inside your bag in the dark.
On most models of the MKVII there is the small pocket (for antifog?) that is attached above the divider and sewn onto the two rear pockets. On the two bags that I have there is a hole sewn into the bottom of it that small items might tend to fall out of. It turns out that this small hole is the perfect size to accomodate the shaft of a AA size mini Maglite. So that is what I put there. The head of the flashlight is protected by the small pocket, and there is still room there for a small pocketknife, tube of Carmex, or whatever else fits there.
I will take some pics and post them up in a bit.
I have heard a few folks complain about the inability for the bag to adequately contain smaller items such as batteries, fingernail clippers, lighters, matches, etc. What I have done is to take an ammo pouch, in my case I used a US military triple mag M16 pouch, and cut the three inner dividers out along with the two outer grenade holders. This makes for a really nice, very sturdy pouch that will fit absolutely perfectly into one of the two main divided areas in the MKVII bag. I use it to hold all of my little items that might otherwise swim around and get lost in the large compartment.
When you trim off the extra partitions, because this pouch is made of nylon, you can easily use a lighter flame to remove the frazzle from the cut edges. Also use a lighter to reduce any frayed and worn areas. These ammo pouches are extremely cheap and common. They can be purchased on Ebay for $2-3 each in excellent condition. Just do an Ebay search for US ammo pouch and organize your list for the cheapest Buy It Now.
Another pouch that fits nicely is the Israeli FAL canvas magazine pouch. No mods are needed for this. It fits very well but the canvas is thick and heavy and it will not hold as much in the same space. I would think that any similar sized magazine pouch would work well for this purpose. I have found that the modern nylon M16 ammo pouch is lightweight, thin, and holds the most, even though it may not be accurate to the time frame of the bag.
Another little trick is using the pocket clip from a name badge to hold the lanyard of a small flashlight. These clips can also be attached to a small pair of scissors. The advantage to this is the ability to clip these small items to the top edge of the inner bag pocket in order to make them more accessible.
I also use the retractable style of name badge clip to hold a very small LED flashlight: the Streamlight Nano. I keep this clipped to the top edge of the bag where it is very easy to reach. When I'm done it simply retracts back into the bag and I don't have to worry about losing it. It's also great to use to look around inside your bag in the dark.
On most models of the MKVII there is the small pocket (for antifog?) that is attached above the divider and sewn onto the two rear pockets. On the two bags that I have there is a hole sewn into the bottom of it that small items might tend to fall out of. It turns out that this small hole is the perfect size to accomodate the shaft of a AA size mini Maglite. So that is what I put there. The head of the flashlight is protected by the small pocket, and there is still room there for a small pocketknife, tube of Carmex, or whatever else fits there.
I will take some pics and post them up in a bit.
Good ideas, mate 
All I've ever really done is kept my gloves in the right pocket closest to me, misc stuff (depending on where I'm going and for how long) in the left pocket, and that way I keep my "main compartments" availiable for "big" things like bottled water and snacks, and various other things that I don't want in my pants' pockets.
