22 February 2011

PSK

My PSK (Personal Survival Kit) is a bit of a system. While the heart of the kit will fit in a cargo pocket and will get me through most anything, I prefer to carry it attached to my bottle carrier. It provides a light weight fully functional system for the basic survival necessities. It'll address the requirements of shelter, water, fire, food and so on.

I want to state that I do not proclaim this set up as the best, the one the only, the perfect, the have to have or any other intarwebs mumbojumbo. This is the kit as I carry it that has worked for me and covers MY basics, that does NOT mean it will cover your basics. I don't need the chairborn commando shock troops screaming "doodz, you gots no xxxx or yyy". It's my kit that serves my needs.

Here is what the over all set up looks like.


In this image the heart of the system is separated from the bottle carrier. The sling for the carrier is a triple braid of 550 para cord. The knife is a BK 11, emergency whistle with compass and thermometer.


Inside the top of the bottle carrier I stash about 18' of 2 strand twisted 550 cord.


Pulling the Guyot 38oz bottle out, I have two stainless steel glacier cups, one nested on either end.




Inside the front pocket of the carrier I keep a brown poncho that will serve as an emergency shelter, or a ground cloth or as a *gasp* PONCHO!



Now, lets dig into the heart of the PSK.



Once opened you can see the layout, no real rhyme or reason, just the way it fits together.



Inside this white box there are a number of items, as you can see I keep a spool of 8wt with the box.


 Inside I keep fishing line, saddle stitching, sewing kit, folding scissors, ferrel-tite hot melt, a three blade "Woodsman" broadhead, fishing lures, extra leaders and hooks, flies, sinkers, a nail, snare wire, safety pin and some electrical tape. The hot melt I use to fuse the broadhead to a makeshift spear for gigging, traps, small game and so on, even used it on a fish or two in the past.



The first aid portion is pretty straight forward.


Space blanket, firesteel, piece of hacksaw blade, duct tape, small clip on LED light.


Tweezers! Damn handy actually, from pulling thorns from my hide to picking up things like eyeglass screws.


Kit put away again.



When attached to the bottle carrier it makes for a lightweight way to carry everything I might need in a last ditch sort of emergency. In addition to this I usually carry a few items directly on my person, attached to me. Knife, firesteel, compass and more often than not those are the ones I actually use. I don't break into the PSK very often but it's there if I need it.

8 comments:

  1. Nicely done. There's some really great ideas in there. Two nesting cups...so simple...yet, I would have never thought of that. Broadhead fish gig. Another great idea. I would have NEVER thought about carrying hot melt glue either. Event though I use it all the time to make arrows. Brilliant!

    Great kit!

    PJ

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  2. Thanks PJ, appreciate the comments. I started using the broadhead after trying to gig fish with a sharpened stick, even when I carved a bit of a barb on it I wasn't successful. I was when I started trying the broadhead.

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  3. I like this setup. I have used that myself, but the addition of the coiled braided 550 in the lid, and the additional cup on top are great additions. I really like that poncho that fits in the pocket also. Where did you pick that up? I could use one like that.

    Thanks.

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  4. It came with an Eberlestock pack I bought a few years ago. There are no tags or identification marks on it. The pack was a Tred Barta version of the Halftrack.

    There are a couple versions out there though. It's really not much more than a larger size pack cover with the poncho hood in the middle, no where near as wide as a USGI version though it is just as waterproof.

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  5. DOODZ!! You got no machete in that kit nor do you have any kind of shoulder fired weaponry like an RPG, what are you going to do when you are out in the bush and the zombies attack!?!?!?.............I'm sorry I just couldn't resist, please forgive me? Also, nice setup you have, I'm in the middle of putting something like this together for myself

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  6. I didn't see any moleskin in your 1st aid kit. I suppose the duct tape could be used on a blister. I never found band aids to stick that well.
    Great blog by the way

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