Upgrade Your Pelican Case With a Backpack Attachment For (Almost) Free

When it comes to carrying gear in a safe manner, Pelican earned quite a name for themselves. They earned the name of being the safest, sturdiest, toughest case in the market. Sadly they have also earned the name of the most cumbersome, bang-your-knees, hard-to-carry bags in the market. At least with the 1510 unit.

Photographer Mate Kiss came up with a pretty clever way to convert any Pelican into a backpack for almost no cost at all.

Now B&H does carry a back pack conversion kit, but some reviewers mention that it is hard to wheel the case once the kit. Mate will not have that and his solution keeps the  wheels working (albeit, I would say that his Back Support system is not as fancy).

The solution that Mate found was to bolt a 2″ ratchet strap to the top of the handle and the bottom of  the case:

[the hack involves cutting] 2 pieces off of a 2″ wide infinite ratchet strap, and attach it to the top of the sliding handles with some bolts and nuts, and to the bottom screws of the case. This way when the handle is extended, the case can just roll, and the strap is out of the way, but when the handle is retracted. It immediately turns into a backpack and I can just pick it up and throw it on my back

As Mate mentions, while this solution is not optimal, it is certainly better than carrying a Pelican case over sand or gravel.