Whats In That Stuff Sack ?

[gunner76]

Once you start to accumulate some gear it can be a pain having to open up the stuff sacks to see what piece of gear is inside. You can solve this problem by using a silver Sharpie pen. The silver Sharpie works very nicely on all ripstop nylon fabrics, light and dark, and I have also used it on tarps and even Cuban Fiber.

It does not go thru the nylon being written on so you do not have to remove what is inside the stuff sack before writing on it. You can also use it to write your name on your hammock ( in a hidden spot if needed ) to help ID the hammock.

I have several pieces of gear that I have bough and had the manufacture get every one who worked on the item to autograph the item.

Sharpies does have some other other colors but I have found the silver color works best.

[ElMard]

Great tip. Thanks for posting.

[cmc4free]

Love the silver Sharpie. Too many uses to count.

[Baka Dasai]

I do the same.

For storage of all those stuff sacks, I tied alpine butterfly loops every few centimetres in a piece of cord, hung that cord in my wardrobe, and tied each stuff sack drawcord to one of the loops with a slippery sheet bend.

Maybe just an excuse to practice some knots, but it pleases me.

[hutzelbein]

Works as long as you don't want to re-sell that gear I tie paper tags to the draw cords of the stuff sacks because they can be removed without leaving a trace.

[scrope]

I've been meaning to get (or make) some heavy duty tags to attach to each bag (maybe with clips so they can be removed when in use). I know what gear I have on the trail so I don't need it labeled in my pack but in storage, it's getting difficult to tell a lot of my gear apart. I suppose that means I have to much stuff but it would be nice to just look at the tags and know at a glance which sack has my 0 degree UQ and which has my 40 degree UQ.

I like the idea of the silver sharpie though, that's a great idea if you never switch bags and think it's more of an advantage if you want to sell your gear. I use a silver finepoint sharpie to mark fabric when cutting (that and rotary chalk markers).

[OneClick]

I write on the cord locks with a silver sharpie, because I'm too vain to ruin the sack

But...I'm also the guy that forgot my hammock because I took two tarps. But that was before the sharpie. I check every time now!

[cmc4free]

This might only be useful for distinguishing between multiple hammocks (and not other gear like tarps, socks, etc) and only if the hammocks are not all the same color, but I've taken to storing mine in the sacks the same way Dutchware ships them - with about an inch of the hammock's gathered end protruding out of the stuff sack. This way, I can tell which one is which at a quick glance. But none of my hammocks are the same color, so YMMV.

[Rouskof]

I have a separate paper featuring several columns: a list of all the gear, its weight and in which sack each thing is.
I also wrote some common attribute on the stuff sacks, like "20F", "0F"...
First I had just written "Spring/Fall", "Summer", and "Winter", but that was not precise enough... I would eventually get the sacks mixed up if I just relied on what was written on them.
I know, the whole system is just vaguely logical, but I thought I could always alter easily a separate list.
Now where to store the list is still something to determine. It just lies around for now...

[gunner76]

We each have to devise a system that works for you. No right or wrong.