canoe maker

Refurbished Woods No. 200 Pack: Flap & Tump Straps

A different feature of the Woods Pack compared to the Duluth style is the use of a single leather anchor for both the top flap straps as well as the tump strap buckles. Less stitching and more simple design. On this pack the leather anchors were still quite sound (top rivet hole compromised), but I thought it was still salvageable if a new rivet was simply inserted a little lower. The worn original straps were replaced with 36" long x 1" wide latigo.


Original leather anchor; New flap strap inserted
In front of this strap would be the tumpline buckle. With a folded strip of thin leather (slightly different colour) and a brass buckles (doesn't match the faded steel of the original), the tump buckle was created. A bit tricky to get all the holes lined up for the rivet. After pounding and setting the rivets in with an additional piece of backing leather on the inside (not shown), I realized I made the strap a bit too long and the buckle kept slipping down too much. Another hole was punched and a brass Chicago screw was mounted to secure the buckle into place. Bit of a mistake, but at least the screw matches the brass buckle so the whole thing doesn't clash too much. For symmetry, I ended up doing the same thing for the other buckle strap.


Tump buckle material; Rivetted into place
Buckle holes were punched in the flap strap at 1" intervals and a test run was done by stuffing the pack up with mounds of dirty laundry. The beauty about this design is that the straps can be placed over the topflap parallel (useful to secure a sleeping pad or other gear to the top of the pack) or cross ways to pack akward shaped items. Here are the two configurations below.

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Parallel straps; Cross over closure
The project is nearly done. All that is needed is the making of a tump for the pack, which should be easy given that I made one already for the canoe. This one will be rivetted however.

Dec 13/09 Update - Pack is now complete. See last stage pics here