Just to be sure :

here is a picture of what has been sold for genuine 550 paracord, in a military surplus shop in Paris :


I was so sure it would be the real Mc Coy (?), that I didn't check until at home ....

Inside the sheath, there are 2 strands made of very thin (thiner than a hair...) and brittle threads.

I went back, but the saleclerck insists that this is 550 paracord.
AFAIR, genuine 550 paracord is supposed to be 7 strands.
Anybody can confirm ?

TIA

USGI parachute suspension line or 550 cord has 7 inner strands and a outer nylon covering. The picture does not look like the genuine stuff.

Alain, take that stuff, tie it to the clerks neck and throw them out a 2nd story window. I garantee it will break before strangling. As Dave said, real para has 7 strands encased in a very tight woven case. There are other diameters for cargo use etc. that will be constructed differently, but this is the standard. There are a few civilian versions that are not true 'MILSPEC' but virtually identical.

O.K., thanks.... that's what I thought ...
Next time, I will verify on the spot ....
But no longer in this shop (USMC - Paris XI°), because it's not the only pb I got.
Mainly, they don't have (and sometimes don't even know...) what they advertise in their catalog.

Frenchy,

If you do find some real 550 paracord somewhere within the EU, please let us know. I'll turn Belgium upside down in search of the genuine stuff.

BTW does anyone know if 550 paracord is used in civil parachutes? If so we could track down a "rigger" (sb who folds 2nd parachutes) and maybe such a person would know where to find these lines.

What diameter is normal 550 cord? Is it round or rather flat?

Luca

www.countycomm.com has REAL paracord, in several colors.

I actually tested it to breaking by hooking it to the trailer hitch of my Suburban and dragging a huge log out of the woods - with a SINGLE line, which did not break (but I threw out after such abuse).

I use the Orange paracod for tent lines and lanyards, it's great stuff.

Luca,

I don't know what the shipping costs might be, but ParaGear lists the slogan "Serving the world for over 44 years" on their web site. I know they have 'genuine' 550 cord because I just got some from them.

Dennis

Hi Martin

We know that countycom has real 550 Paracord. It just that countycom don't ship outside the USA.

We in europe find it difficult to source genuine gear here in europe our alternative is to source from the US ( those companies that do ship) and pay over the odds in shipping fees.

Please don't take this as a personal beef with you, my real ( yes I admit it personal) beef is with countycom. I like their stuff and would love to buy several things. But as they only ship US cont. I'm a bit <img src="/images/graemlins/mad.gif" alt="" />.

I thank you for the suggestion and the time you've taken to reply to the thread.

If you have a site that could help us poor europeans please, please, please send it.

I did a little more digging on ParaGear's web site. They definitely ship orders internationally. From the rate charts for "Global Express Mail" (airmail through the US Postal Service) it looks like a 5 pound package would cost $35 for shipping.

Dennis

Thanks for the research. Stokie is right I would also LOVE to order much more US stuff. If only we wouldn't get knocked over our heads with the surcharges. I don't think US sellers realise what it's like... <img src="/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" />

I ordered a surefire flashlight once which was about 100 EUR +15 EUR shiping by USPC (BTW good and fast service).

The customs charged me with 3% import duties over the price of the torch, 21% VAT over the torch transport and duties and added an extra 8 EUR handling costs to that. Total real cost was sth like 150 EUR. while transport was only 15 EUR. That's why we don't buy US-goods.

So maybe if we could find somebody in the US who is willing to send us these things on a now and then basis -- as a private person and as a gift with a declared value of less than 45 EUR.... we wouldn't have to pay all these surcharges, be able to sponsor the US economy and indulge our geardo yearnings <img src="/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" />.

Maybe we could start a group buy for our fellow Europeans?

Any candidates, please feel free to contact me, I'm willing to compensate your cost and effort. I&#8217;m also willing &#8211; provided we find someone to ship the items to me - to do the further distribution within the EU. (This is serious)

Luca

Hi Stokie - You and the other overseas members of ETS might want to check out candlepowerforums.com. Lots of great info, and a lot of members of ETS are also active on CPF. One of the members of CPF, going by the name ksbman, generously forwards orders to overseas members of the group. Go to the CPF site, then the buy/sell/trade section (B/S/T Lights), and the first thread listed is "Free International Forwarding." If you register on CPF, it should be easy to contact ksbman and work out the details (CPF uses the same type of software as ETS, with the same mail function).
He's been doing this for a while, and I've seen nothing but pleased responses from the folks he's done this for. Countycomm is a frequently mentioned vendor on CPF, too, and I think that would probably be your easiest solution.
Dave

Luca

I'm right behind you, when do you want my shopping list?

Dave T

I have signed up with CPF recently for other reasons than this. I didn't know that there was someone willing to do this.

Luca if you're not a member of CPF I could contact the guy Dave T mentioned to see if he's willing to help us Euro's out.

Any other europeans willing to join in?

Luca:

While on this side of the water, it is highly unlikely that anyone will get into trouble for doing that, what are the chances that someone from this side of the water that travels abroad often might be charged with violating your laws? It seems that in their zeal to control people, more governments the world over seem to be making arrests for other governments.

A perfect example was on the news tonight where they arrested Bobby Fisher in Japan on a US warrant for playing chess in Yugoslavia during the Balkan fiasco. Shipping arms, aiding the enemy, dealing in secrets, I would be willing to see him pay for those actions, but for crying out loud, he was playing chess.

I do some dealing from Italy, and the shipments have to be small not only in package size but also in value in order to save money on all the charges Europeons have to suffer from their governments.

If you can get a group of people to help forward the things you need, here is a little tip (Which is legal here.). Get your orders together for the group of you in Europe, and have one of the volunteers in the USA ship to just one of your group, and someone else in the USA to ship to another, and so on. That way it is much more believable that you have a friend that is sending you gifts. Unlike my situation from Italy where my packages are broken down into smaller lots, your situation might be better served if you had large packages coming infrequently during special Europeon holidays, your birthday, your patron Saints day, and other things like that so if it is ever questioned, you will have a reasonable response.

Good luck!

Bountyhunter

http://www.countrystore.nl/ sells 15 meter pieces of 550 paracord. They ship to other EU country too, but i recoment to sent a mail to them first.

www.tadgear.com ships internationally.

I thought 550 has 7 inner strands???

Hi Bountyhunter,
Hi all

Thanks for the tip, I was thinking of keeping it a small and very now and then thing. I don't think one could get in large trouble in the EU doing this. There could be fines of course, but seriously, financial "crimes" are punished very mildly over here. And I doubt whether they'd make a case out of some guy sending some stuff as a gift while it's worth a lot more. Customs, already understaffed as they are, have better things to do like investigating large scale drug smuggling and smuggling of illegal cigarettes.

Your idea of having a group of people sending to individuals on the other side is a good one, it's cheaper. On the downside, you'd have to find a group of people instead of just one individual. I myself was thinking of sending over 1 shipment to 1 person within the EU. Once in there, everything can travel free and relatively cheap to others. And hey, our postal services want to make a buck too.. <img src="/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

BTW do you mean you are importing things from Italy, or sending things into Italy? Does the US also have these harsh import restrictions?

Luca

Hi all,

Course I know CPF, thats how I got here... <img src="/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" /> Let's get in touch with this ksbman!

BTW found some BCB 'paracord' today. It looks quite real and claims 250 kg/550lbs of breaking strength. Only thing is it has six inner white braided strands instead of seven. <img src="/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" /> (just dissected it.) The outer weave is olive green. They sell packs of 15m. Anybody know whether this is good stuff? You can check it out over here: [img]http://www.bcbin.com/store/cat_military.asp?idproduct=38&idCategory=19[/img]

Stokie, if you get in touch with this guy, please let me know. We'll see if it's interesting to buy some goods together. Maybe he could be of service for more of us. We'll work sth out. When you hear from him, please send me a private message.

Thanks!

Luca

Luca,

I'm traveling to Puerto Rico, perhaps I'll be able to get some 100 foot (30 Meter) original! 550 paracord from Contycomm and take it with me back to the Netherlands, I don't know about postage to Puerto Rico but USPS considers it an US inland"shipment so it can't be much more then regular US mail.
Countycomm sells te paracord in different colors like Black, OD, Desert Brown, White and even Orange.

Best Scouting wishes from Holland,

Bagheera

Luca:

I may not have been clear on my last post. What I am saying is have your EU group get an order together and have someone over here ship everything to just one of you, and that person then distributes it to everyone who ordered something. The next time your EU group puts together an order, have the volunteer from the USA ship everything to a different member of your EU group and that person would then distribute to everyone that ordered something; and so on, and so on. In this manner, you don't have one person in the EU group always receiving packages and always having to send them out to members of the EU group. If you have 7 people in the EU group, the 7 of you would all be contacted when any 1 of you wants to order something. The other 6 could add to the order or pass on that order. The order gets shipped to 1 of the 7 in a rotating order on who takes the shipment each time. That way, if you have 7 orders in one month, they are not all coming to the same address, and none of you in the group is excessively burdened by being the only one having to reship to all the participants in the EU group.

I import Italian stiletto knives with an accessary spring kit. It is against USA law to import switchblade knives (Stupid facist law.) into the United States. I have found a supplier (After about 12 years of searching.) who makes the style & QUALITY of knives I have been looking for. The knives are sent to me with the handle portion assembled and with a plastic comb attached to the handle by an unpeened compression style pivot pin. The bayonet style blades are shipped seperately as are the blade springs and spring retaining pins.

When the knives reach me, I knock out the comb pivot pin, remove and throw away the plastic comb, insert the blade, insert the blade pivot pin and peen the pin on an anvil to hold the blade and bolsters in place. I take the springs and their pivot pins out of the cheap plastic bag that they come in and encase them in heavy 2" wide shipping tape. I put them in shipping tape for two reasons, one is so that some dummy inspecting the knife does not try to put the spring in the knife, "just to see if it works" and thereby create a switchblade while the ownership of the knife is still mine, and the other reason is because the parts are easily lost and the cheap bag they come in is not safe for storing the parts until I sell them.

The biggest factor in the legality of the knives I import is that the blades have a fingernail groove in them, and therefore can be opened like any folding knife which is what I sell them as. The spring kit is included, and once the person buys them, what they do with them is not my concern. Everything is legal under USA law and the laws of the State of Wisconsin.

Two things have changed since I started doing this and one is I sell only to 21 year old and older individuals, whereas I used to sell to 18 year old and older individuals. I do it this way now in order to avoid having anyone trying to entrap me on a small technicality about the 4" blade length. The other thing is that I have raised my prices from $45.00 on the black & white handled knives and $60.00 on the stag handled ones to $50.00 & $65.00 respectively. They sell the DIY 9" knives at the SKM site for $60.00 & $80.00 for the same knives, and SKM charges $20.00+ shipping charge for one knife sent to the USA.

Because I jump through all the legal hoops properly, I advertise in the police stations and Federal government facilities and have not encountered any problems thus far. Of course with all the anal explosive legislators we have in the states, one of these days even this source may be eliminated.

Good luck!

Bountyhunter <img src="/images/graemlins/ooo.gif" alt="" />

Hi Bountyhunter,

Great idea to change the receiving party within the EU. The customs may be understaffed, but they are not stupid either. With too many shipments to one person they'd eventually put two and two together. <img src="/images/graemlins/shocked.gif" alt="" />

Now I understand your operation. Looks like you've got everything covered. Before you complain about the severity of knife laws on your side of the pond (in some areas): it's a LOT worse over here. Out here carriyng a screwdriver without a good explanation could get you into trouble. Anything but an SAK can be considered an illegal arm, it's up to the arresting officer's opinion.

Good luck with your business!

Luca

Hi Luca.

Just sent email to ksbman, hope to get a response soon.

When should we put our shopping lists together? <img src="/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

According to http://www.onestopknifeshop.com/store/550.html, the military specification in question is MIL-C-5040H.

I understand that the cord should have two numbers (e.g. 550/220 - though I don't recall offhand if the second number is correct.) The first number is the breaking strength, the second number is the Safe Working Load (SWL). I'm going by memory and I'm sure someone more knowledgeable will correct me.

Basically, if it's dyed Olive Drab and meets the military requirements for Olive Drab colouring, then there is no actual falsity in advertising it as "milspec" as long as they don't specify *which* military specification it meets. Local laws may vary, of course, but I suspect that the word "milspec" may be one of those advertising catchphrases that actually has no meaning in law. It's like advertising something as "extremely tasty" - how could you possibly prove it wasn't?

I work in the defense industry, and there are "milspecs" for EVERYTHING! I can well believe that an unscrupulous retailer would market a product that meets an utterly useless military spec (such as the colour of OD dye used) and market it as "Milspec" paracord.

Can anyone confirm whether MIL-C-5040H is, in fact, the relevant mil spec (i.e. with regard to breaking strength)?

Alain, everyone else--

Check this web site & see if it meets your needs for 550 paracord.

I posted this link some months (years?) back, & it took me a few minutes to find it again.

Look under Raw materials/Suspension Line for cord. It's available in several colors, & by the yard (3 ft, or approx. 0.9 meters), or 100 yard (approx 90 meters) spool.

They even have a version with 11 inner strands.

Their home page says they've shipped to 150 countries, so getting their product to Europe should not be an issue. Now, shipping costs and the additonal taxes are another matter entirely!!!

Hope this helps.

David

Hi all,

Finally got a pic online of the BCB-stuff. Check it out! (ruler is in cm)



The pic is not that clear online, but there are 6 strands instead of seven. Is this stuff any good?

Luca

That is correct for USGI 550 cord, what other countries use/issue is beyond me. Try Brigade Quartermaster at BQ.com, they sell the real deal.

Nice Pic, Luca. The outer covering looks a lot coarser than the USGI stuff. 7 inner strands is what you want.

Hey, Thanks to everybody !

I went away from my ADSL connection and PC for two weeks.
Back home, I see many forum members have provided links. I will check them.

Thanks again.

their description is as follow :
- "paracorde 550" , US-Army regulation, resistance 250kg. Its strands can be used for sewing or fishing .......

I don't see how I could use this to sew or fish....

Frenchy
I hope no-one else has posted this link, if so my apologies...
This paracord is the genuine article, so I'm lead to believe. Its not cheap, but I would imagine cheaper than importing it from the States.

http://woodlandorganics.com/shop/misc/index.htm

Hope this helps.

The inner strands can be sepparated into smaller diameter threads. Don't take the following figures for gospel, this is off the top of my head and it's been a while since I've seen it in print, but I believe the seven separate inner strands are about 60 lbs "test" and each of those can be sepparated into finer strands of about 12 lb "test". Again, I'm not willing to bet a paycheck on the numbers, but I KNOW that they (the inner strands) can be (easily) unraveled into finer threads for sewing/fishing/etc. uses. Hope this explanation helps. Get a sample, strip it down, and this becomes obvious when you see what you've got to work with.

Troy

Thanks for your explanation.
What I mean is the cord I have bought cannot be used that way, as the 2 inner strands are made of some fluffy material ....
What they sold me is not what they advertise in their catalog.

Thanks for the heads-up. Those looking for "the real thing" know where NOT to order from. Sorry to hear you got stuck, at least (hopefully) it wasn't for a large sum of $$ <img src="/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" />

Troy

Hi everyone,

Finally got the real stuff from countycomm. So I hope this comparison photo comes through alright on screen:


The orange paracord feels a lot stiffer and the webbing is a much finer weave. The 7 inner strands feel stronger than the 6 in the BCB counterpart. Just for the lark of it I added the accessory line. There are no inner strands in it, it's just a woven bunch of fibres.

The ruler is still in cm's <img src="/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

Luca

Thanks for telling me about the 11 strand version...

Just ordered 120' of it(type IV) and 60' of 14(!!!)strand(typeV)

thanks for the link.
Will check....

I really appreciate the information provided in this thread. I went and checked the 100ft of cord that I bought from botac.com and it was only 6 strand. Not exactly the Mil-Spec 550 chute cord they advertized, or that I ordered. Now I have to ship it back to get the realy stuff. Thanks again. <img src="/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

Have just spoken to Chris ( electronically!) and ask for his permission to
post a reply to you all about the Para Cord that we stock here, in the UK.

We have had a lot of enquiries from you guys, from this thread so I am here
to perhaps help you out with some answers.

We know the frustration that some are having in finding the real 550 Para
Cord here in the UK so that is why we decided to stock it . With have it in
the following colours, Black, Desert Tan and Olive Drab.In comes in 100'
packs and of wonderful quality and we send awful lot across to mainland
Europe, so no problems if any of you guys over their are looking for some as
we can just pop it in the post!

If I can be of any further help, then please just drop me a line, I am more
than happy to answer any of your questions.

Best wishes.

Jack.