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Overview : RolliPak is an easy-to-install, lightweight alternative to the velcro dividers currently taking up space in your camera bag! Utilizing the same TrekPak pin system, RolliPak seamlessly integrates into any camera bag by attaching to the velcro that is already lining your bag. Simply unroll RolliPak in your bag, trim to desired length, pin in your dividers, and add your gear! Yup, it’s really that simple. It works great in ThinkTank, LowePro and most softsided, fabric lined bags. Your bag, Your way.
RolliPak 48 Kit contains:
- One • 48 inch perimeter piece
- 3 • 23 inch dividers
- Cutter Tool
- 20 pins with 20 red pull tabs
- One • 48" + One • 24" perimeter pieces
- 4 • 23 inch dividers
- Cutter Tool
- 30 pins with 30 red pull tabs.
Quality/Usability : In this review, we'll be installing the RolliPak into the ThinkTank StreetWalker Pro Backpack Bag.
Velcro's are great at holding wires/cables together, keeping a bag closed but one thing I'm not fond of is in camera bags. Yes, velcro dividers work great at separating your gear but if you need to adjust the dividers, they are a pain. I found out about TrekPak awhile back when they launched on Kickstarter. Not only was there no more velcro dividers, it made organizing a lot easier and cleaner.
The unit we're reviewing is the RolliPad 72 Kit. It includes a 48" and 24" perimeter pieces, four 23" dividers, cutter tool and 30 pins and 30 red pull tabs.
The perimeter pieces are durable and bendable to contour your bag. One side has the two velcro rows that attach to the velcro lining inside your bag and the other side is a thin layer of foam for protection.
Included with the TrekPak's is a cutting tool. This lets you cut the perimeter pieces as well as the dividers. They don't come precut since people have different sizes depending on their gear.
The anodized aluminum pins is what keeps the dividers in place. They slide into the holes of the dividers as shown below. The tabs makes pulling them out easier when you need to adjust the dividers.
For the dividers, they are 23" in length. On both sides is padded foam and in the middle is a plastic core. This provides strength as well as slots to insert the pins into. To cut the dividers, you'll need to use the cutting tool but you'll also need to make sure that its the size you want. If you cut too big, you can cut it down more but if you cut too short, there's no going back.
With a simple 3 step process, you can now upgrade your favorite bag from the supplied Velcro system!
1. Remove the Velcro dividers from your bag.Here, you can see how the ThinkTank StreetWalker Pro Backpack Bag was originally laid out with the padded velcro dividers. This layout worked well for me but as you can see, the dividers were lopsided, flimsy and to me, it didn't look as organized/as clean looking.
2. Slowly line the interior with Rolli. If there is excess perimeter pieces, use the cutter tool to cut it off and use the pins to "lock" the pieces together as shown belowWith the velcro dividers removed, I lined walls of the bag with the Rolli. Once I got it wrapped, I used the cutter tool and removed the excess Rolli.
What makes TrekPak really unique, is that you won't find any velcro with the exception of attaching the Rolli to the walls of the bag. When you try to adjust a normal gear bag while out in the field, you know how frustrating it can be. The Velcro sticks where you don't want it to, is hard to pull apart, and just looks messy and cluttered.
Once everything was lined up, I just used the pull tab as there is no need to have them since they won't be removed during adjustments. The TrekPak pin system is much easier to adjust, very secure, and straight up, it's slick.
Note: By adding the TrekPak, you lose about 1/2 an inch of interior dimension because you're wrapping it around the bag and not just swapping out the dividers. Where as with the included dividers, they velcroed directly on to the walls of the bag.
3. Re-organize your gear with TrekPak dividers and pin in placeWith TrekPak's patent pending system use of anodized aluminum pins and durable padded dividers, it offers limitless organizational options. As you can see already from the image above, it's starting to look a lot cleaner and much sturdier.
The image on the left is with the included velcro dividers from our ThinkTank StreetWalker Pro Backpack Bag review. The image on the right is with the TrekPak RolliPak. It looks a lot more cleaner and organized. If I ever add/remove gear, all I have to do is take out the pins for that divider, adjust it and put the pins back in. No more having to deal with velcro.
The most time consuming part (at least for me) was getting the size of the dividers correct. I hate wasting pieces but for one of the pieces, I ended up cutting it too short. So I ended up cutting another small strip and used a pin (with no tab) to hold it in place. Low and behold, it worked out well and is held securely in place. But once you got the right size, you can easily duplicate it since you have the correct size.
The TrekPak RolliPak doesn't come up as high as ThinkTank's divider system because with the StreetWalker, near the top of the bag, it is lower in height. So having a higher Rolli may cause the bag to not close properly. If the bag was the same height all around, I would of went higher.
But I'm glad it's lower. Now I can lay my camera strap across the top. Before, the strap would cause the front flap to slightly bulge due to the higher ThinkTank padded dividers.
Conclusion : Overall, the TrekPak RolliPak 48 72 Universal Camera Bag Divider is a must if you want to keep your bag organized, clean looking and have the flexibility to adjust the dividers on the fly. No more having to fiddle with velcro and getting frustrated.
I noticed that with the RolliPak wrapped around the bag, the interior dimension has gotten a little tighter. It is no fault of the TrekPak. It's just how it is when you're adding something to an existing product.
