The MOLLE II (hence fourth just MOLLE) backpack I use which is army issue is killing me. It’s damn near impossible to balance, adjust, maneuver with, enter transport while wearing, load, put on, stow, remove and find anything in. I snag on doors, public transit turnstiles and trains. I can just barely get on a bus with it, some of the older buses are ordeals. And I only have one sustainment pouch, if I had both I’d have to get on sideways, or use the wheel chair gate at the train station! The lids for each bag just suck. The main ruck’s simple flap won’t adequately cover the top opening if you have the bag stuffed out to the top, let alone if you have the internal rain collar stuffed full edge to edge. The more fitted lid on the sleep carrier won’t cover properly if you have the carrier stuffed out either, and slides around when it’s under loaded. Walking or riding a bike is plain dangerous, with the whole MOLLE or just the load shifting. Having to tighten the straps holding the shoulder straps and hip belt on three times a day is maddening. Having to remove the shoulder straps and hip belt to adjust it is maddening. Getting them centered is almost impossible. Strap management is a nightmare, the manual says to use tape, which I quickly found out turns the bag into a sticky mess in hot weather. And it would mean carrying a roll of tape since i change my load so often (ITW web Dominators are the preferred solution, but I can’t afford them). The hip belt buckle broke, making proper adjustment impossible. Until I find another 2″ buckle the whole rig rides on my ass, which is increasing my discomfort and adding to my extent back pain, and hence to my insomnia.
The tripartite system-frame and dual bag is inefficient and adds weight. Whether your storing your sleeping bag or your clothes in the sleep carrier it makes the MOLLE top heavy and impossible to stand up on it’s own. This makes it harder to load and access things in the main rucksack. You have to lay the MOLLE on the ground to access anything in the sleep carrier bag. Since there is two bags, you have the added weight of two rain collars (neither of which are water proof). You have the added weight of attachment systems and two flaps and associated webbing. The whole thing ends up bigger then it needs to be, and ungainly. More importantly for it’s intended use, more so then mine, if the frame breaks there is no easy way to use the shoulder straps and hip belt with the main ruck alone, you could hack them together but it would be a real kludge. And ride much higher on your back. then there is the relative lack of PALS webbing for pouch attachment, and the poor choice of outer pocket placement.
In short it’s way to modular the wrong ways, not modular enough in the right ways, fiddly in and in constant need of adjustment (the manual says it’s a 2 person job too). It’s way to easy to set up wrong. And as the webbing wear and stretch it becomes harder, and needs adjustment more often. This despite my not carrying the load the Army reports most soldiers carrying in the field.
This isn’t just any pissy civilan whining: I wear this rig 8 plus hours a day, and walk miles in it. And I grew up on surplus, for both cost factors and because if it was made to survive combat it would survive me. I carried my books and cameras in WW2 backpacks and surplus haversacks from elementary school until adulthood when I could afford Domke bags and Timbuk2. I’m also not biased against external frame backpacks, My camping rig until the late eighties was built around a external frame melded onto a succession of surplus haversacks. Eventually the frame died, (it took 15 years) and I got a Jansport backpack. After a camping trip in the early nineties with Ben showed the Jansport to be too small for anything other then everyday carry, I went back to surplus. I got a large ALICE pack with the steel frame. I served me well for years, hell, I moved into an apartment using it and public transport.
(I should also point out that I am fat enough that the straps barely go around me. This shouldn’t effect balance or adjustment though.)
Now granted this is a MOLLE II rig. There have been constant improvements to the frame, it’s now on it’s fourth generation. It’s stronger and much more flexible, so your body doesn’t work against it as much when it’s properly adjusted.The one i handled seamed lighter then my generation 2 frame. And I don’t have the new large ruck, which has much more PALS webbing. It’s also much larger, because it integrates the sleep carrier for a one bag solution. But this photo says it all. It shows the CEO of Down East Inc wearing the current MOLLE rig with their 4th generation frame and new large ruck. It was meant to show off a compression strap rig they made to mount heavy objects to the system, but it shows the bag canting (look at the rows of horizontal PALS webbing on the ruck and his left side).
For the time being I’m still going to have to use it. I’m going to try and get the surplus bergen pack listed in the sidebar. And hope I win the lottery so I can buy a Kifaru.
