Foam-Lined Equipment Cases

Factual Questions
1
      • I suddenly have a telescope and related small pieces, and need a -something- to carry the small pieces in. For various reasons I don’t like any of the typical solutions sold–the aluminum cases are too bulky for what they carry, and the soft cases sold are too small and don’t have enough room to hold everything I want. So I expect to get a shooting range bag and get some blocks of the grey foam stuff to put inside it, and cut holes for my equipment myself.
  • Where can I buy this stuff separate from any case? I have only seen it sold already pre-cut, inside cases. Or alternately, where can I find some sort of FIRM foam cheap that can substitute?
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2

Pelican is a very popular name in these types of cases. They come with scored gray foam that one cuts out to fit equipment.

3

What 'scope ya got?

4

I’ll second jnglmassiv’s recommendation of Pelican cases. We use them almost exclusively where I work for all kinds of equipment. We really put those cases through the wringer, and I can’t think of a time where we’ve had equipment damage while using them.

5

Try a fabric store, where this stuff is sold for making upholstery.

6

I’ll third the Pelican recommendation. As soon as I read the thread title, that’s what I thought of.

We started using them to protect certain things on river trips, but found that they are just as handy on land.

7
      • I don’t want a whole hard case though, I just want the foam inside. Wal-Mart sells a cheapie Pelican-type case that I already have for some firearms.

…I have seen some of the stuff sold for doing upholstry, but the problem with whatever I was was that it was much softer than what you’d want for this use. I didn’t look real good though.
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8

At the risk of becoming repetitive, I say Pelican. :wink:

You can buy the scored foam separately; since you pull out thin squares to form the outline of your equipment, they call it ‘pick-n-pluck foam’. (While it would seem easy, I have yet to come up with a satisfactory obcene sound-alike for it). I’m not sure if they sell un-scored foam.

We ship out laptops and printers to oil rig guys in those things, and if you don’t count that one time the guy rolled his truck with the laptop loose in the cab, icky rig-dust is the only reason I’ve seen our hardware come back broken.

9
  • I just don’t think the cases are really the best method. Ideally you would have a smaller bag with a shoulder strap that you could wear. The case… you have to PUT DOWN SOMEWHERE and then open. Even though there may not really be a lot of stuff inside, there’s no way you can carry it around and keep its contents handy.

…And (what really bothers me is) when you close that case and carry it, the contents are shifted 90-degrees. If the eyepieces are stored on their ends in one layer, they won’t hit each other if the type of bag [that I want] is dropped–they fall straight down into the foam at the bottom. In one of those cases, they don’t fall down into the foam, they fall sideways, into each other. So you either have to leave a lot of foam in-between each item (which wastes space) or accept that the padding may not protect them as well as it could.

I may have to ditch the idea of having a pair of binos in there however, I think now that would drive the size requirement up too much to be really handy.
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