DBT mag pouch/ Eagle Rhodesian. Initial review.

[Lightning_Man]

Do you ever have the feeling that you have made a big mistake? I do.

After much furious shifting from foot to foot I decided to buy the Eagle Rhodesian (http://www.eagleindustries.com/mainprod.asp?scv=0). I purchased it from an ebay store that advertised it as being renger green. Guess what, it isn't. Since it was already payed for I thought I would give it a try.

I then whent to DBT and picked up 4 of their tiered double mag pouches (http://store1.yimg.com/I/diamondback_1835_1285819) and strapped them to the front of the rig.

Last night I loaded the rig withmagazines to give the pouches a little breaking in time. Then today I loaded up on magazines and ammo (real stuff) and went out to a place I like to go to shoot and practice.


   I found the rhodesian to be very comfortable once I got it all adjusted and was immediately impressed by the gererosity of spirit that it embodies, coming with planty of extra rangerbands and some extra straps that I am told are for attaching an assault pack of some sort.
I spent some time doing dry drills to retrain my hand for where to look for the magazines whithout taking my eyes off the target. I also rolled the magazine covers back, a feature I find most appealing. I did a little bit of light stretching and ran around a bit, and was pleased at how easy it was to get my knees up during these tests.
   Before I continue, I think I should say, I am not gear bashing, just saying why I don't think it is for me. This is why there are like 700,000,000,000 different kinds of gear on the market.
   My pleasure ended there. After countless attempts to do a reasonably speedy magazine change, I had an epiphony; There is such a thing as too much magazine retention. I am not scrawny and in fact am in I would say pretty good condition for a guy my age, but I just couldn't get the magazines to come free with any degree of reliability or speed. That seemingly very cool rubbery stuff inside was killing me. I don't know if it is the sort of thing that will wear in or not but right now it is intolerable. The only solution I could see, was some kind of belt loop attachments to keep the rig from coming up when I pulled on the magazines. something like this (http://www.optactical.com/richha.html). Hard to say how much those belt attachments would restrict movement but they would at least keep the rig down and give some leverage to remove the magazines. I can also see where having poches that hold two magazines per would work better since neither of the magazines would have that grippy stuff all the way around them.
   I also found the inability to really prone out very bothersome. I know it isn't too common, especially these days where we are fighting the highly mobile and urban fights, but prone definitely still has it's place and being able to get down is a good thing.
   When it is all said and done, I think this would be a great arrangement for a vehicle crew member, and maybe with 13lbs of SAPI in it the riding up wouldn't be an issue, but for a guy who travels mostly in LPCs, I don't think it's going to work for me.
   I spoke to a friend (at 2nd Ranger Bat.) about this since they have their racks and I wanted some advice. He said that the magazine pouches are about as loose on theirs as the old LC2 magazine pouches so it's not an issue. He also said they generally don't use the bib for much, so that when they need to prone they can puch the rig up under their chast/chin a bit. They also wear the back strap a bit loose for that same reason.
   Anyway, looking like I am probably going to be making some returns, just wanted to share.

[busta_cap]

I and overs have had the same problem with the "DETLOC" system from DBT at first. Let those pouches loosen up with use, not letting mags sit in it, and they will be just fine. Also, if you are only using this rig for airsoft, trust me, the pouches are fast enough.

I think Christian and Anthony should butt in here too because AFAIK they are one of the only few who have these pouches, and had success with loosening them up.

[azsarge]

Jeff, they will lose some of that grip when you use them more.

To speed up the process, throw some talcum powder in there and blow out the excess.  No, really, it works great.  Your gear will smell like a freshly bathed baby for a few days, but the scent dies.

I understand where you're coming from, though.  When I tried to change my mag for the first time with those pouches, I came up empty handed!  Took some getting used-to, but I got the hang of it.

I also put some 1-inch 3M grip tape on my mags at the lower front, so my thumb catches it on the way up, providing positive grip.  Works great!  Doesn't kill the gloves OR the fingers like you might think, either.

[Firehead]

Just give it some time, and your gear will be good to go. If you really dislike them that much, then you can get rid of them.

[Lightning_Man]

Well, for now I think I will hold on to the mag pouches. I am reluctant to talc them because once I do that IO doub't I would be able to return them outright.

The Eagle rig is going back though. I only chose the eagle one over the BHI one because I thought I was getting RG. Eagle told me they anticipate offering RG to the public again in a few months. I am not a soldier anymore (almost) so the quality difference between Eagle and BHI doesn't matter as much to me as the prices.

All in all though, I think I am too comfortable with the "traditional" layout like the LC2 and Issak. DBT actually has a molle platform that has that shape and they also anticipate getting them in RG in about a month or two. I looked at it while I was up there and it looked like more the shape I am used to.

Next time you see me though I will probably be using my good old fashioned heavily modified LC2 setup. Try not to laugh.