Quieting Kifaru shoulder straps

[sivart]

Sorry for the mug shot. I had the wife pick me up some felt at the hobby store. Need to figure out a way to permanently mount to the straps. The felt takes care of the obnoxious shoulder strap noise.
Would be awesome if a pack maker would offer some type of felt cover as an option. Maybe Velcro? It basically completely silenced the pack frame which is what I’ve been trying to do for years

 

[mt100gr.]

Can you describe the noise you were experiencing? I've had squeaky buckles and squeaky dry straps but nothing I couldn't quiet with wax.

Looks like you could have a velcro overlap that lines up with the shoulder strap webbing. At the same time you stitch the velcro, you could attach some binding ribbon to thread thru buckles or shock cord to keep the felt sleeves in place.

 

[sivart]

Good ideas. The noise is just the cordura fabric on the strap rubbing on your shoulders. All frame packs that I’ve tried make this noise. The only one I’ve found that doesn’t is the old kifaru long hunter which had soft felt like shoulder straps.

 

[BASSFAN07]

How about some wool tube socks or something of that nature. Run the straps through and out a hole in the toe.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[sivart]

Another good idea.

 

[Vaultman]

I like the tube sock idea!

 

[dingle]

It can be tough to isolate the source of the squeaking without tearing down and reassembling the pack. Usually it's due to dirt, pine needles, other organic detritus getting lodged between webbing and pack fabric where they're compressed, so a thorough cleaning should help.

But I also had a recurring squeak on my 2016-era Duplex Hunter that would pop up a few times per hunt, usually coming from one side of the pack but not the other, light load or heavy, I couldn't repeat it reliably. Drove me nuts. This fall I finally had enough and took apart the frame to clean out all the organic crap from the velcro attachments I couldn't see and play around with the rest. Turns out the squeak was coming from the black ribbon-looking things that hold the arm straps in place at the frame. When the arm strap rubbed against the ribbon in just the right way, I'd get some noise. I solved it with a single layer of hockey tape wrapped around each ribbon to give the arm straps a softer fabric to rub against and haven't heard a thing since.

Hope this helps.

 

[sivart]

For those with OCD like myself this is what I came up with. Added a couple of arm guards to the shoulder straps. Quieted it up considerably

 

[sivart]

I should also state, I'm not saying Kifaru frames are loud. Every frame I have, SG and EXO also have noise from the shoulder straps. This is just a way of muffling the sound.