The Author’s favorite pair of canoe pants, which tore twenty minutes into my trek through the William C. Whitney Wilderness Area in the southwestern Adirondacks, after field repairs. Photograph by the Author.
All
good things die, and you know it is going to be one of those treks, when your favorite
pair of canoe pants rip twenty minutes after getting onto the water on day one
of your trek. What a bummer!
Duck Tape® or Gorilla Tape® both work well. Gorilla Tape is a heavy-duty duct tape made with double thick adhesive, and a strong reinforced backing, however Duct Tape comes in bright colors which makes it easier to find your roll of tape if it falls on the forest floor, photograph by the Author.
All
of you Fifty-somethings and Gen-Xers will remember how when you were a kid and
you tore through the knees of your pants, your mother would glue the edges back
together with an iron-on patch? Well,
that is kind of how I fixed the rip in my pants, by making my own self-sticking
patch. Now obviously, I didn’t have an
electric iron, glue on patches or electricity, so I used duct tape instead!
The field repair I made on day one of my trek, photograph by the Author.
So,
I taped the rip back together with Duct Tape® brand duct tape when we stopped
for lunch and went about the day. But by
dinner time the duct tape that I had used to hold the rip together when we
stopped for lunch, was starting to peel up at the corners, so that evening, I
made a more permanent field repair while sitting around the Kelly Kettle® in
our camp on an island in the middle of Rock Pond and I broke out my handy,
dandy 15-pound test, braided nylon line, which I keep in my possible kit as
heavy sewing thread, and stitched the patch down. And voila, I had a patch almost as good as
the iron-on patches that Mom used to use!
This patch lasted the rest of the week without any problems.
However,
if I had to do it again, I would take the advice of Philip Werner, who when
writing about using Tenacious Tape™ by Gear Aid® to repair hiking pants, stated
that when he cut a piece of tape as a patch, he would round the corners to
prevent it from peeling off. He also
said that he puts a piece of patching tape on both side of the pants, both the
inside and the outside, to create a stronger patch and that this works
particularly well for large tears or holes because the inside patch will stick
to the outside patch in those places where the original fabric is missing1.
The
corners of my duct tape patch began to peel up quickly after I first stuck it
to my pants during our lunch break, that is why I had to break out the thread
and needle to stitch it down. Next time
I will go for the rounded corner double side patch and maybe, it won’t peeled
up so quickly and require stitching to reinforce it.
I like to keep 24 inches (60 cm) of duct tape wound around my lighters. That way it is always with me when I need it. Some people wrap duct tape around their water bottle, for the very same reason. Also, a couple of inches (about 5 cm) of duct tape when crumpled into a ball and lit on fire will burn for a minute or two and help your tinder catch fire on those rainy, drippy days. Photograph by the Author.
“So, What’s In Your
Possible Kit!?”
My
possible kit only weighs 8 ounces (227 grams) and here is what I keep in it.
 |
| The Author’s possible kit, enumerated, photograph by the Author. |
2)
A LED flashlight, a spare in addition
to the one in my survival kit and first aid kit.
3) 3 spare AAA batteries for my headlamp and
the flashlights in my first aid kit, survival kit and possible kit.
4) A Swiss+Tech®, multi-tool, with needle nose
pliers, a saw, a Philips head screwdriver, can opener and knife.
5) A flat head and a Philips head screwdriver
for repairing eyeglasses.
6) An eye glass repair kit: screws, spacers,
nose pads and a cleaning cloth
7) 16 feet (almost 5 meters) of 15-pound test,
braided nylon line, for use as heavy sewing thread.
8) 2 feet (.6 meters) of 22 gauge (.73 mm) galvanized
steel wire. I have used wire like this
in the past to reattach the sole of a water shoe to its upper. Wire can be used for repairing just about
anything.
9) 2 large eyed, heavy duty sewing needles:
the smaller one is a # 17 carpet needle that is 2 inches (52 mm) long and the
other one is a #14 darning needle that is 3 inches long (78 mm). Both are stuck into a piece of heavy-duty
nylon patch cloth. The large, elongated
eyes on the needles make threading them, much simpler.
10) 4 large safety pins stuck into another piece
of heavy-duty nylon patch cloth.
11) A pencil.
12) A pencil sharpener. This is also very useful for making fine
tinder to help you get your fire started.
13) A file to sharpen my axe with, an axe without
something to sharpen it, is just an oddly shaped hammer
14) A whetstone to sharpen my knives.
15) A 5 foot (1.5 meter) long tape measure. I have used this to measure and diagram an
old logging blaze on a stump on the shore of Lake Louisa, Algonquin Provincial
Park (for pictures of the stump and my drawing, see “The Madawaska River Loop:
Whitefish, to Pen, to Harry and Louisa…And Back Again! Part One ©”, HERE)
16) A thermometer, emergency whistle,
magnifying-glass, pocket compass, all in one all-purpose tool.
17) 5 mini-zip ties. When I reattached the sole of the water shoe
to its upper, I also used some small zip ties to complete the repair.
18) 3 heavy-duty rubber bands. These originally came wrapped around celery
stalks from the grocery store, they have literally 1,001 uses.
For the full article read
So, What’s in Your Possible Kit!? ©, HERE.
Don’t forget to come back next week and read “Fire Burns Up! ©”, where
we will talk about the number one most common error people make when trying to
light a fire.
I
hope that you continue to enjoy The Woodsman’s Journal Online and look for me
on YouTube at Bandanaman Productions for other related videos, HERE. Don’t forget to follow me on both The
Woodsman’s Journal Online, HERE,
and subscribe to BandanaMan Productions on YouTube. If you have questions, as always, feel free
to leave a comment on either site. I
announce new articles on Facebook at Eric Reynolds, on Instagram at
bandanamanaproductions, and on VK at Eric Reynolds, so watch for me.
That
is all for now, and as always, until next time, Happy Trails!
Notes
1 “How
to Repair Hiking Pants with Tenacious Tape”, by Philip Werner
Tenacious
Tape™ by Gear Aid® can be found online at REI and Amazon and also at Walmart. This tape is backed by an ultra-aggressive
adhesive will quickly fix tents, ski pants, puffy coats, or anything else made
of technical fabrics including nylon and vinyl.
No sewing skills or heat is required; simply remove the backing and
apply to surface with pressure; after 24 hours it’s washable and its
waterproof. More information on Tenacious
Tape™ can be found HERE.
Sources
Werner,
Philip; “How to Repair Hiking Pants with Tenacious Tape”, September
24, 2015, [© Copyright 2007-2021, SectionHiker.com and Fells Press LLC], https://sectionhiker.com/how-to-repair-hiking-pants-with-tenancious-tape/, July 28, 2021
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