If you’ve never been there, Countycomm.com has an odd and eclectic mix of goodies that definitely have some merit for those who share our rarefied interests. I’ve never ordered from them before but I finally got around to picking up a few things and thought I’d mention at least one of ‘em here.

From their website:

We have a limited overrun of “waterproof Delrin® battery lockers”. The battery locker fits CR123 batteries perfectly. Brand new, never used overrun from government contract. Possible uses include: geo-caching, pet identification, emergency cash stash, water purification tablets, pill storage.

• Delrin® is a lightweight, extremely stable space age polymer.

• Overall length: 47.50 mm or 1.87″

• External diameter: 21.10 mm or .83″

• Internal opening: 16.80 mm or .66″

• Internal depth: 33.30 mm or 1.30″

• Weight 10.20 grams

• Lid is secured via flange to cap seal internal o-ring)

• U.S. Made / U.S. Issue Item

I dunno about you, but too much of my gear takes the CR123 batteries. Usually these batteries are limited to things like SureFire flashlights and weaponlights, but those are pretty much the high-end pieces of gear that you do not want to have crapping out on you when you need them.

Ideally, I want a battery carrier that is bombproof. Something that keeps things dry, protected, and free from accidental shorting. SureFire makes a Spares Carrier that is quite nice, but a bit bulky for some of my needs. There was, to me, a need for a method to carry just one or two CR123 batts in an absolutely secure manner. So, I ordered up a few of these battery carriers and figured I’d give my impression.

They’re pretty much exactly what I wanted. They are knurled at one end for a solid grip as you grasp the other end and unscrew them. Once open you can see the o-ring in the cap that contributes to the waterproof seal. A CR123 battery fits in there quite nicely with minimal room to rattle. I’ll wind up stuffing a tiny piece of gasket material or something into the bottom of the container to completely eliminate any noise. The cap the container is not captive, so there is a chance you could lose it. There’s a hole in the cap for a lanyard and I’ll wind up putting two of these on a loop of paracord and keeping them with my support gear for my 870, since I got the new SureFire forend for it and want to keep spare batts handy.

Construction is from hard plastic and short of stomping on one they look like they’d hold up quite nicely to the rough-n-tumble of being bounced around in my bag. These things are offered in AAA and AA batt size and I’ll be picking up a few of the AA sized ones as well.

Biggest drawback is that these things are about nine bucks a throw. There just isnt any way a plastic geegaw from a military contract overrun should cost that much. But…if it does what I want then I guess price isn’t worth complaining about.

A very good question to ask would be “Why do you need one of these?”. I don’t know about you, but my bag is loaded with all sortsa gear…lotsa little odds and ends that might come in handy. Things like zip ties, large paper clips (sometimes a small piece of wire is exactly what you need), spare ammo, pocket knives, lanyards, radios, etc, etc, etc. Throw a handful of AA or CR123 batts into that mix and at some point theyre going to contact something and short themselves..in the case of the CR123, possibly in a conflagatory way. Most of the time I segregate my batteries in the Maxpedition battery carrier (MAXPEDITION VOLTA Battery Pouch). As much as I like the Maxpedition carrier, it isn’t 100% waterproof and airtight. For stuff that is ‘mission critical’ (GPS and radio spring to mind) you absolutely do not want even the slightest chance of having you spare batteries being crapped out when you need them. So, most of the time my spares are in the Maxpedition carrier, but in my little survival kit that I take with me hunting and fishing, the extra batts go in these battery lockers from CC.

Too expensive for all-around use, but for those pieces of gear that absolutely, positively need to have the spare batteries kept in perfect condition these things would be hard to beat.

Originally published at Notes From The Bunker. You can comment here or there.

Okay, time to play “Find the multicam hunting pack”. Ready? Go!

Ok, now lets try it with the marker panel in place.

Cool, huh? That’s the marker panel that was mentioned a few posts back. Here’s a comparison picture. Obviously, any object that is a bright day-glo orange is going to jump out at you. What I’m liking about this is that theres a velcro patch on either sidfe for glint tape for night/IR visibility, theres paracord loops at the corners for easy attachment, and the whole thing weighs less than an ounce and folds up to about the same space as a matchbook. When hunting season gets here I’ll definitely have this on my pack to keep my visibility high. And, as I said, it’s also handy for just marking where you left the dang camo gear that has a tendency to disappear into the background when you put it down and get about fifty yards away from it. I’m curious to see how long the color lasts before it fades away into a pale tangerine color. Given its use during the brief hunting season and the infrequent wilderness emergency, it shouldnt be spending enough time out in the sun for it to fade, but you never know. Like what I see so far, though. Definitely gonna stuff this into my hunting bag this fall.

Source: Battle Systems

Originally published at Notes From The Bunker. You can comment here or there.

I was fairly taken with the compact version of the Sidewinder but after playing with it a bit, I found it good but lacking. My biggest complaint was that when clipped to a piece of gear it would be unstable and sway around, unbalanced by it’s size and weight. I liked the features, I just wasn’t a fan of the physical envelope that contained these features. So…I bit the bullet and ordered the larger, but still fairly compact, full sized version. Big difference in my satisfaction.

The larger version (Streamlight 14032 Sidewinder) arrived just before I left for Glacier last week.

My biggest complaint about the Compact was that when you clipped it to a bit of webbing or what have you, it would sway about wildly. Let me try to describe it. Imagine you take a paperback novel and affix it to your shoulder strap so that the spine of the book is against you. The rest of the book juts out there and sways unsteadily as you move. Same thing.

This larger version of the Sidewinder, because of its large battery compartment, is  far more stable. A few other features separate it from the Compact:

• It runs on AA batts, as opposed to the CR123 used in the Compact, so my logistics are streamlined a bit.
• Has a lanyard attachment point.
• The metal clip that you use to clip the light to your gear is removable. This is important because it you think the clip isn’t providing enough force to keep it from sliding off whatever you clip it to, you can remove the clip, bend it as necessary, and then put it back the way was. Couldn’t really do that with the compact.
• Battery compartment lid is captive. No losing it in the dark or when your sitting somewhere changing batteries when the cover falls between your legs and into the tall grass. Nice touch.

I’m going to go ahead and give the non-Compact version of the Sidewinder a better rating than the compact version. Price isn’t too terribly different, and although it is a bit bigger I believe you will get better use out of it than the Compact.

Note that the SIdewinder series are available in different color-combinations…you can get, for example, one that has white, green, red and blue emitters. I went with white, red, blue and IR. I don’t have anything that let’s me take advantage of the IR (at the moment) but that doesn’t mean that someday I won’t.

As I said, only real drawback is price. There’s plenty of LED lights out there for less, but the features on this thing (clip, lanyard, flash mode, adjustable brightness, swivel head, subdued color, hands-free operation, waterproof, etc, etc.) pretty much fill all the requirments I wanted in a light that could be affixed to a vest or webbing strap (also darn near perfect for clipping to a vehicle visor for use within the vehicle cab). So, yes it’s expensive but to me it seems worth the money.