Iron Mace Paintball
 
 

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PIMP Gear 4+5
By Bill Mills - Photos by Dawn Mills - July 2006

Iron Mace Paintball in Bonita Springs, Florida is home of the Premium Iron Mace Paintball (PIMP) gear line of soft goods, as well as Balzlistic portable concept field bunkers.

Their 4+5 pack carries some features not widely found in tournament paintball packs.

Most modern paintball packs are modeled after back support belts.  They feature a hook and loop closure, with elasticized cinch straps on the side.  This common design tends to limit the size range a pack can fit.

Obviously the belt portion must be large enough to fit around players who use the classic Doug Devin Donut Boy Defense strategy (eat enough donuts, and gut hits are more likely to bounce.)  This is a problem for skinny little front players.  A large pack usually won’t fit on a player with a thin frame, because the hook and loop materials aren’t in the right places.  The cinch strap from one side will end up stretching past where the cinch strap from the other needs to attach. 

The PIMP Gear pack’s base straps have loop fastener along their entire back surfaces, allowing them to overlap as far as needed.  The right side cinch strap also has loop fastener material on its back, so that if necessary, it can cross under the left side cinch strap.

This arrangement gives a single pack the ability to be worn by players with a very wide range of waist sizes.  In testing for review, the 4+5 pack could be soundly strapped together at sizes ranging from 28 to 46 inches.

The back section of the pack itself features a padded base, along with four main vertical pod pockets.  Each of the pod pockets has a flap to retain its pod, with a rubbery molded Iron Mace Paintball logo medallion at its end.  The flaps are also adorned with eight knobby bumps quilted into their surface, giving the look of rivets or studs. 

Nestled between the main row of pockets are additional bonus pod straps.  The bonus straps allow for an additional row of pods to be carried on the outside of the main row.  While the bonus straps can’t be easily re-loaded while the pack is worn, they work well in tournament style play where pods are simply dropped on the field after use, to be retrieved after the game.

Each of the bonus straps has its on bit of hook and loop fastener material, to allow it to be held, tucked out of the way when not in use.  Most backs which have a row of extra loops provide for one less pod than in the main row of pockets, putting their elastic pod holders only between the pockets.  The Iron Mace pack provides one more elastic holder than it does pockets (and they do the same with their smaller 3+4 pack) by placing them between the pockets and on the ends of the base row.  This gives them two more bonus holders than most packs of the same size, for another 400 paintballs to be carried onto the field.
 

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