Jump to content

1999 SPEAR, ELCS bag with gear


P-59A
 Share

Recommended Posts

This is out of my wheel house. I picked this up at the swap meet today. I understand what the booklet says, but who got these? It looks complete and its made by Safariland. What is the ball park on it?

DSC00368.JPG

DSC00367.JPG

DSC00366.JPG

DSC00365.JPG

Link to comment
Share on other sites

milsurp_scout_14

As I've been told, these were issued to various special forces units (SEALS being one) in the very late 1990s-mid 2000s. Each man could customize his rig to his own preferences, with wide range of pouches. The DCU camo sets seem to be a lot scarcer than the woodland sets. Realistically (disregarding the $250-$500 sets on eBay), a complete woodland set sells for around $100; I'd guess it'd be closer to $150/175 for the DCU. Your set appears complete as far as I can tell. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thanks Milsurp! I was able to find some information...kind of. The government paid 1,195.00 to Safariland per kit. The bag shown looks to have been made in 2004, assuming I read the code correctly. I guess for their time they were cutting edge. I found out the white pads (not shown) were flotation pads inserted in the vest. Yes this is complete according to the booklet that came with it. It looks like the three markets for this are 1) collectors of Spec Op gear used in the middle east. 2) Reenactors portraying Spec Ops operators in that place and time frame and 3) Survivalist and hunters look for this gear in woodland. I took this to a local surplus store I go to quite a bit and back in the day when these would pop up they would break them down and part them out. You are correct that woodland is still around. It makes sense the 3 color desert was used up in the middle east and that could be why fewer are found. I only found one kit desert kit for sale and a handful of parts from the kit.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

 Member

The tri-color systems are very rare and as I recall only 5th Group was supposed to get them. I am not sure if that even actually happened. We tried to get them for 21 STS but we were slated for woodland and that is what was issued.

Paraclete never built ELCS although they do make a version of that vest. They have a different kit for a different set of customers.        The above is from another site as are the photo.

spearelcs1.jpg

spearelcs.jpg

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

There was also other accessories to these that could be added both in woodland and desert.  There was a 40mm grenade pocket set, a 9mm pistolmans pocket set and then what was called the Navy Option Kit.  That had 2 3mag M-14 pouches,  I think pouched for the MP-5 SMG and a couple misc pouches I believe.  Those kits are pretty hard to find.  I found 1 lonely woodland M14 pouch in a surplus store a few years ago.  Wish I found 2 of them.   Ive seen all those kits in woodland, but the only 1 of those I saw in DCU was the USN kit.   Never saw the grenade or pistol kit in DCU

Link to comment
Share on other sites

22 hours ago, mohawkALSE said:

There was also other accessories to these that could be added both in woodland and desert.  There was a 40mm grenade pocket set, a 9mm pistolmans pocket set and then what was called the Navy Option Kit.  That had 2 3mag M-14 pouches,  I think pouched for the MP-5 SMG and a couple misc pouches I believe.  Those kits are pretty hard to find.  I found 1 lonely woodland M14 pouch in a surplus store a few years ago.  Wish I found 2 of them.   Ive seen all those kits in woodland, but the only 1 of those I saw in DCU was the USN kit.   Never saw the grenade or pistol kit in DCU

That is interesting. I wonder what the production run was.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Was doing some organizing so I took these out.  Have 1 M14 pouch from the Navy Kit and 1 M9 pouch from the pistol set.  Can see both are Safariland, The M14 pouch at first looks like a usual 100rnd/Utility pouch, and then the M9 one looks like a normal MOLLE II pouch except the snap is hidden in the flap and non exposed.  Also has 2 drain holes at the bottom (not shown).    Edit: never noticed before but can be seen here, the M14 pocket has 2 small drain holes as well.  Must be a thing with the ELCS pouches.

Special Pouch 1.jpg

Special Pouch 2.jpg

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I found this odd canteen cover in woodland with the Safariland markings. Never seen another like it. All the others I've seen with the Safariland tags have had the plastic clip cover.

Tim

 

20200711_170401a.jpg

20200711_170409a.jpg

20200711_170434a.jpg

20200711_170444a.jpg

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thats pretty cool,  never actually saw the 1qt covers from the ELCS kits to know the closure types, but I know it came with 2 and I think 1 2qt cover.  Who ever surplussed that crossed out the wrong number.  I believe the contract number is what is usually crossed out, not the NSN.   Maybe the first few runs of them pre 2001 or so had snaps then went to the fastex buckle.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, mohawkALSE said:

Thats pretty cool,  never actually saw the 1qt covers from the ELCS kits to know the closure types, but I know it came with 2 and I think 1 2qt cover.  Who ever surplussed that crossed out the wrong number.  I believe the contract number is what is usually crossed out, not the NSN.   Maybe the first few runs of them pre 2001 or so had snaps then went to the fastex buckle.

Those are very cool!!!!!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

milsurp_scout_14

Wow! That's a whole lot more than I've ever been able to find out about these sets! As an aside, I've had a few of the woodland MP5 mag pouches, before I sold my whole lot of the woodland gear. Here's a photo.

Set-of-2-USGI-MP5-double-magazine-pouch.jpg

Link to comment
Share on other sites

17 hours ago, milsurp_scout_14 said:

Wow! That's a whole lot more than I've ever been able to find out about these sets! As an aside, I've had a few of the woodland MP5 mag pouches, before I sold my whole lot of the woodland gear. Here's a photo.

Set-of-2-USGI-MP5-double-magazine-pouch.jpg

I think those are the regular MOLLE II MP-5 pouches that SDS made.  I think the Safariland Navy Kit pouches are 3 mag pockets.   Id have to find one again to be sure though, but for some reason 3 sticks out in my mind.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Agreed, those are the ones made by SDS and are a completely different design from the SPEAR version

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

this is the Safariland/SPEAR version. Oddly enough, I bought some from a guy that had been in the Air Force.

1998-Safariland-SPEAR-MP-5-pouch-MOLLE-HK-BALCS.jpg

Link to comment
Share on other sites

12 hours ago, saxecoburg said:

this is the Safariland/SPEAR version. Oddly enough, I bought some from a guy that had been in the Air Force.

1998-Safariland-SPEAR-MP-5-pouch-MOLLE-HK-BALCS.jpg

Thanks for confirming my memory still functions decently.   Do you know if that kit was really called a Navy Kit? or was that just a nickname given to it?  I mean M-14s and MP-5s really weren't Navy only specific weapon systems.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
 Share

×
×
  • Create New...