An illustrated guide to harness construction by Keith Lawrence.
| Threading It |
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| Get together all the bits you need, things like
D rings, clips, a couple of weight retainers and about 4m of webbing |
Lay the backplate down front (concave) side up.
Start by threading what will become the right shoulder strap down through
the inner of the slots.. |
Turn the backplate over and thread the waist
strap back through the plate via a weight retainer. When the harness is
finished you adjust the shoulder strap lengths by feeding the waist strap
through these weight retainers. |
Turn the backplate front up again. Not
forgetting to thread on any D rings etc. first (we've all done it...) the
shoulder strap goes over the top of the backplate, through the top slot
(from the back to the front), then down (from the front to the back)
through the lower slanted slot. Make sure that you get the twist in the
shoulder strap correct, look at the later picture of the left shoulder
strap and follow one edge of the webbing to see how it should go. |
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| The webbing now runs across the back of the
backplate (yes, it covers the hole - see later) and threads through to
form the top of the left shoulder strap. |
Thread the left shoulder strap as a mirror
image of the right, not forgetting any D rings of course! At the bottom of
the backplate thread it through to form the left waist strap, via another
weight retainer. |
Finish off the waist strap with a buckle,
knife, D rings and anything else you want. Don't start cutting webbing
yet, feed the waist strap through the weight retainers to get both
shoulder straps the same length and the right fit. |
To cut webbing use something like a putty knife
heated in a gas flame. When suitably hot the knife will slice through and
seal the webbing. |
| Finishing Off |
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| You've just covered the upper backplate hole
with webbing! |
From camping suppliers, outdoor pursuits or
some DIY shops you can get a brass eyelet kit (the one shown here is
antique!). You'll also need a hammer. |
I use a heated 6" nail held in some Mole
Grips to make the initial hole in the webbing using the backplate hole as
the guide. |
Loosen the webbing and enlarge the hole with a
heated nail, the hole needs to be big enough to get the brass eyelet
through. |
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| Tidy up any excess webbing plastic due to
making the hole with a craft knife. |
The eyelet should now go through the hole... |
...put the eyelet jig together (they vary in
design) and hit it with the hammer! |
You should end up with a nice neat brass eyelet
in the webbing that lines up with the backplate hole. |
| Rigging It |
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| I use a Dive Rite Classic air cell, you may
want to use a smaller wing for a single cylinder. |
The finished backplate and harness is a
separate unit. |
The twin set with its stainless steel bands is
also a separate unit. |
The threaded studding that clamps the SS
bands in place will probably need adjusting for the spacing of the
backplate holes (11" is standard) and the amount of thread poking out
of the "inside" of the cylinder assembly. |
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| Lay the cylinders down and place the wing over
the protruding studding. |
The backplate then goes on top of this so that
the wing is the "sandwich filling" between the cylinders and the
backplate. |
A couple of wing nuts and washers secure the
whole assembly together, adjust the studding thread length so that just
two or three threads poke through the wing nut and they don't dig in your
back. |
Now spend at least a month trying to work out
your hose routing on the set :-) |
Single Tank Adaptor |
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| For diving with a single cylinder you will need
a Single Tank Adaptor. This adaptor takes the place of the twin set in the
assembly and your single cylinder goes into the tank bands as normal. |
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