Wednesday, August 19, 2009

Off-Road Kit Item Veiw


The featured picture here is a posterized view of the kit in it's and photos of each piece. The kit bag is heavy duty cordura with D rings and velcro straps for attachment. A highlight of the contents going clockwise starting at upper left:

Victorinoix Swiss Army Knife Camper/Hiker series - 11 features, including 2 blades, wood saw, drill/reamer/awl, can opener, and tweezers. Has a lifetime warranty.

GSI stainless steel cup - with folding handles, 16 oz, tough enough to take much abuse. Start a small fire and slide it right into the fire or onto the coals, works great.

The Wilderness Innovation FireStarter Kit - We have described this in detail in earlier posts, but briefly it is a Doan magesium fire starter bar with integrated ferrocerium spark rod, attached to the bar is a stretch lanyard (our exclusive) holding the striker blade, 20 feet of wax paper for scraping the shavings into, wax cord for extending burn time, and all contained in a cordura case with 2 pockets, belt loop and D ring.

LED light - compact flat design, bright, 16 - 20 hour burn time

550 Parachute Cord - Military spec, nylon jacket, 7 strands inside that are removable for other uses, 25 foot. Use for making shelter, lures, snares, lashings

Tabs - 4 tabs with see through stretch fabric containing all the small items in the kit in an organized manner, first aid kit, bandages, gauze, antibiotic ointments, pain relievers, cleansers, itch relief, moleskin, sewing kit, pins, etc. The tabs make it easy to retrieve and store the small items.

Lip Balm - avoid cracked bleeding lips, ears, and nose

Plastic sheet - for making a solar still, or a catch basin for rainwater, or extracting moisture from leaves and other green matter.

Duck tape - 8 feet of this versatile material, its uses limited only by your imagination. Use for reinforcing or repairing tarp, poncho or clothing, shoes etc.

Whistle/compass/magnifier - the first one of these I had was from Silva, now they are marketed under many names. durable sturdy design, loud whistle.

Nalgene bottle - 32 oz HDPE, tough design I have some of these bottles from the early 80's still working fine.

Poncho - light weight, reasonable for protecting against rain soaking you. can be slit open to use in waterproofing a roof, can be used as a catch basin.

Space Blanket - reasonably sturdy for use reflecting body heat back into you, also can be used as a tarp by reinforcing attachment points with Duck Tape, also makes a great heat reflector for a fire.

Fish hooks with leader - use is obvious for fishing, attach to inner strand of Para Cord to make longer line. can also be baited and used to snare ground animals or fowl.


Saturday, August 15, 2009

Poster Draft Copy


---Rough Draft poster----


I'm working on poster style page that will highlight the ways the Off-Road Kit can be carried, which is one of the nice features of that kit. The photo illustrates what I am working towards, but I need some additional pictures showing it in use, and with other people besides me. I want to show the kit attached to various things with carabiners, strapped to things such as snowmobile, ATV, dirt bike; personal carry with shoulder strap; and perhaps some kind of creative other idea, I'm open to suggestions....

Jacob and Angie are in Guatamala on a humanitarian aid trip and will have some photos of the kit when they return. Jen has volunteered, as soon as I get her a kit, she has a proto 1 of the RealSurvival Kit currently.

I have to learn how to do photoshop type stuff to illustrate all I want to on these kits, I'm not too saavy with that currently, I just want to go, click, click, click and it's done, haha, but that's not the way it works!! I did this poster with Picassa Collage, saved that as a photo, then used Paintshop Pro to add arrows and text, kinda crude now, but I'll learn it :)

More fun in the works...

I'm getting ready to start teaching survival classes soon, I will have several different classes, and not just wilderness type survival, but urban. Also I am going to incorporate Emergency Preparedness into training, since that is something there is a lot of interest in. I'm soon going to be teaching a class on that in Springville.


More Info on the Off-Road Survival Kit



Well after about 6 weeks of crazyness, vacations, family reunions, marriage and all, we're getting back into the groove and getting ready for marketing the kit. I'm working on some brochures and a good way to easily see what's in the kit and compare that with recommendations from such places as the military, and other survival experts.

I think we are going to market the kit and other accessories on our own website with a paypal checkout. This way we have more control over how the site is structured. I want to be able to provide lots of information about the products, and most of the canned sites are limited in this regard. There is also another survival website interested in carrying the kits, where we will drop ship for them.

In the long term scheme of things the Off-Road Survival Kit, the RealSurvival Kit, the FireStarter Kit are just the beginning of our efforts, these are all part of layer 1 in a 3 layer survival kit. Layer 1 is what you carry on your person or with you in or on your vehicle, ie. Car, truck, boat, airplane, snowmobile, ATV, mountain bike, dirt bike, etc. Layer 2 is an expansion of Layer 1, adding more First Aid components, some additional tools such as a folding saw, a heavy duty fixed blade knife. Layer 3 adds even more capability in added First Aid, tarp, food and water gathering, etc. Layer 1 is the lighter weight personal items that are considered essential, the RealSurvival Kit contains these items, the Off-Road Kit adds a little bit more to this with the cooking cup and water bottle.