The P.I.G. Plate Carrier
The P.I.G. or Patrol Incident Gear is a series of gear that SKD puts out on their website. Today I will focus on the P.I.G. plate carrier. While not a revolutionary design it makes some great improvements on older designs. If you like the old school style but want to try something different definitely check out this gear.
The Rear Panal
I am separating the carrier into two portions, partially for ease and partially because the back of the carrier can completely separate from the front. The materials are tough and rugged like you would expect from a great piece of gear. The shoulder straps are moderately, but adequately padded and continue down the back of the carrier to the bottom creating a channel down the middle of you back. There is graduating pals webbing along the shoulder straps for the G hook strap that gives a huge range of adjustment on how long or short the straps are desired. There are also heavy elastic straps to attach tournys, radios, or run hydration tubes through. The attachment devices for the actual straps to the front portion vary from buckles to double D rings.
The back side of the rear portion is completely covered in pals webbing from top to bottom with the top two rows being covered in loop. This gives you a total of about 4 inches of loop at the top portion of the rear panel. The bottom portion is open on the sides so that the cummerbund can go underneath. With the Molle cummerbund you have the ability to instantly adjust the tightness without touching he front panel by pulling on a shock cord loop that hangs out the back with a cinching lock. The shock cord can be trimmed or left long as it doesn’t get in the way too much.
The two most notable features on the rear panel is the drag handle and the rear panel pocket. The drag handle features a hard, but flexible, rubber cylinder that fills your hand, and makes dragging the wearer easier. The rear panel pocket is lined with hook and loop along the edges so that a small or medium plate will ride in the center of the pocket without sliding around. A large flap secures the plate inside the rear panel pocket and is easily accessed if needed. A thinner pocket is behind the main pocket and takes proprietary soft armor panels.
The Front Panel
If buckles are used the two straps in the front are looped through them and secured to the generous loop on the front of the carrier. If the double D rings are used the strap loop through the rings and are secured to the loop. The upper portion or the front panel has three rows of pals webbing without spaces in between with two rows of regular pals underneath with no room in between as well. This allows for a maximum of adjustment of pouches or items on the upper portion.
The unique thing about the front flap is that it is split into two parts. This allows the user to only remove on side of the cummerbund without having to pull up the whole flap. There are three rows and four columns of pals on each flap. Both flaps are attached with hook and loop, but also feature a snap that allows you to add extra security. Both flaps also open at the top and are lined with loop and a small line of hook at the top to secure if not used. Like the rear panel pocket the front panel pocket mirrors it in use.
The Cummerbund
There are two Cummerbunds available for the P.I.G. carrier. The first one is a slick elastic cummerbund that can still have an attachment of side plates. The Molle cummerbund has three rows of pals webbing along the length and has side plate pockets that tie into the pals webbing. They can accommodate almost any size of side plate. The original side plate pockets had an inferior attachment system and were prone to falling off when donning an doffing the carrier.
Also one of the great features of this gear is how high it rides on your chest. Used in combination with a battle belt one can maximize the space available on one’s chest area. In short this is gear designed by operators, for operators and comes in at a great price right over 300 bucks. It is offered in most colors including multicam.
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