S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Loadout - Easy or Difficult?

[Hav0c]

Just had a thought while watching some S.T.A.L.K.E.R. gameplay on YouTube,

Would it really be all that difficult to create a reasonably convincing loadout based on the game?

I came up with a few ideas in about 5 minutes of some super-mega-intense brainstorming! (From the head down)

• Some sort of gas mask with Airsoft lenses
• OD/Khaki Hoodied jacket
• Some sort of webbing or SA Assault Vest
• Military style backpack
• Khaki/Flecktarn combat trousers
• Some OD knee pads
• Black assault/combat boots

Also, any sort of Russian weapon with sling.

 

[skarra333]

I'd say you're close there chap. But a gas mask always seems funky to me, and SAAVs saturate Airsoft. Stick to any form of plain webbing over it if you ask me.

 

[Happy]

Remember: it's not allowed to be clean. Surplus stuff looks more authentic since it's already fairly worn down in most cases. Brand new stuff looks too clean to fit into the theme. I'd avoid flecktarn for that reason as well - doesn't really match as much. Russian, Czech or even Ukrainian patterns would be a better fit and are easily found online. Your choice though since it's your loadout, but I use a kzs1 jacket over surplus olive drab combat trousers.

Also for webbing; if you can get it then go for Russian surplus like a lifchik which fits the time period the game is set in. If not then 58 style webbing also will fit - stalkers don't use modern military kit.

With my stalker loadout I don't use my gas mask in game - I use something like this:

Doesn't look out of place with everything and also acts as fairly good face protection.

Overall you really want to avoid modern tactical kit (e.g. MOLLE) since stalkers use what they can scavenge. Part of the fun is thinking up of home made solutions to something you need, which in turn makes it look more authentic.

 

[Hav0c]

Thanks for the feedback chaps!

And on your note Happy, I've seen some people use Flecktarn in they're loadout a for this before but it had been heavily faded and it seemed to work quite well as it gave the effect of the Russian version of Flecktarn. However, in saying that any sort of Russian, Czech, Ukranian pattern can be had cheaply I seen a pair of trousers that would fit the bill nicely.

You mentioned that you have a loadout similar to this, would you mind showing me a few pics as a reference for building my own please.

I think that I'll go with some 58 webbing as it can be had on a budget and doesn't look out of place. But what jacket should I use underneath it? I've seen folk use the surplus German parka's and also Gorka jackets.

Finally, that mask pictured is pretty cool! Where could I go about getting one like it?

Thanks

 

[Happy]

Would post pictures if I had any, and since I'm not at home at the moment I can't take any till I get back in two weeks (working away at the minute).

For the jacket it's down to what you want to use. I have the kzs for summer use (since it's very thin) but for winter I use an old trench coat I brought from a charity shop. Underneath that I have my chest rig over a plain black sweater - nothing too fancy. My winter version is my favourite of the two though since it has that faded Fallout-esque look to it.

The mask I got from Homebase - they're used in painting so you can find them in pretty much any DIY shop. That mask in particular cost me around £25 since I didn't want one with orange filters.

There's no set definition for a stalker style loadout as it is tailored to each stalker. For mine I based it heavily on pictures from games and movies: the Fallout series, stalker, metro 2033/last light, zombie films, end of the world style artwork... I used all of these as an influence for mine.

As long as you steer more towards Eastern Bloc themes you shouldn't have a problem.

Edit: Used the wrong mask in my original post. I have a Moldex 8111N respirator:

 

[NickM]

I wouldn't have thought it would be too hard to rip the guts out of those respirators to increase airflow, reduce noise and reduce the sweating issue.

 

[Lozart]

Have a google for STALKER cosplay. Plenty of info there for what kit to use. Personally I'd say you have two choices. Get the right kit to get the look and potentially not be best for actually skirmishing in or get what's good for skirmishing but doesn't entirely get the look. The danger with the latter is that you'll potentially be so far off that nobody will have a clue what loadout you're trying to recreate.

 

[SgtTalbert]

Still needs tweaking etc... but my S.T.A.L.K.E.R loadout is pretty much complete

 

[Chock]

You can certainly get airsoft dummy gas masks. See this thread:

http://www.airsoft-forums.co.uk/index.php/topic/23347-airsoft-ready-gas-masks/

This would be preferably to a surplus Russian one, since some of the filters in older Russian gas masks which you can buy contain asbestos, so whilst they are fun to have for collectors, I wouldn't want to be wearing one for prolonged periods!

All the rest of the gear can usually be had cheap if it is Soviet-era stuff, or even cheaper if it is Chinese knock off Soviet-era stuff, i.e. a Type 56 rather than an AK, etc.

 

[Ian_Gere]

Those GP-5 and GP-7 gas masks are 'kin horrible to wear - they fog the moment you breath out. They were supplied with some little cellulose lenses to fit over the inside, so that there's a gap between the inner and outer lens. They had a surface which resists fogging, but when you get them these days, even unopened new old stock, they are discoloured and useless - the tins they come in are well cool though! I use one to keep a survival wire saw in, for the zombie apocalypse you understand.

Unless you go modern, the only Russian respirator that you can skirmish in is the PBF:

...because they have a separate mask inside which keeps your breath off the lenses.​

There is a rumour going around that Russian gas mask lenses are ok for airsoft as they are, but I'm not convinced. Our member Blueangelical supplies ballistic lenses for S10 respirators so I'm sure he would do them for these given the correct diameter. Personally I'm going to replace them with lenses Dremmel cut from a pair of these:

...3M protective goggles 8657D £4.96 (sale price) posted​

Because, as much as we love our fellow member Blueangelical, cheap he isn't.

In case you're not au fait with all things rubber, there is a special formulation of stuff with which to clean it and keep it in good condition and to save you from things which you may wish you could unsee, here it is at the best price I can find (I bought some ages ago when it didn't come in a pump dispenser and was considerably cheaper lol). Certainly the PBF I bought was badly in need of some TLC.

BTW, the most commonly seen Russian flecktarn-esque pattern "Flecktar D" is not like faded Flecktarn, because it doesn't have the brown in it at all - it has 2 shades of green and 1 black splodges on a tan background, but according to camopedia there are locally produced variants of flecktar based more closely on the German original in use in the Russian Federation.

 

[Ian_Gere]

Oh and the rumour that there is asbestos in Russian respirator filters is like the rumour that Russian night vision gear X-rays your brain...

 

[Chock]

Oh and the rumour that there is asbestos in Russian respirator filters is like the rumour that Russian night vision gear X-rays your brain...

Nope, it's been proven to be true on a few types of Cold War era Soviet gas masks. It's also a fact that a large number of WW2 gas masks contain blue asbestos in their filters, and it is known that the mortality rate of factory workers who were making the things was indeed higher than normal; unsurprising considering they would have been present when the material was being cut, hence there would be blue asbestos particles in the atmosphere for them to inhale.

Independent test of a GP5 Cold War era Gas mask, which supposedly only has a charcoal-based filter:

http://www.mesothelioma.com/news/2013/10/popular-military-surplus-gas-mask-used-for-halloween-contains-deadly-asbestos.htm

 

[Ian_Gere]

I'm not convinced that mesothelioma.com is a peer reviewed journal.

 

[Chock]

No it isn't, but the story links to Dixon Information, where the test was performed on that mask, and since it is their business to test for asbestos content, I presume they knew what they were doing when they tested it. These guys: http://www.dixoninformation.com/index.html

Take it or leave it as far as that story is concerned, I just thought I'd put it out there so people on here were at least aware of a potential risk if they picked up some old cold war era equipment which might end up being a danger to their health.

 

[Ian_Gere]

Yeah, so we have a link to a company that deals with asbestos. So what? The test was not carried out by them as a job producing a report which could well be the subject of civil or even criminal court proceedings. It was apparently performed by some bloke who worked there on a filter of unknown provenance.

You see the thing is that we don't read Cyrillic, let alone Russian*, and neither do the majority of people who will read this thread. So even if we were inclined to look into it further, we would find it very difficult. In the meantime what may be a baseless rumour, and at any rate is definitely not very specific considering that "the cold war" was a long time and the Warsaw Pact was a big place, with many different factories which, despite the west's stereotype of faceless uniformity, produced a wide variety of specs of any given item and the specs of items were updated in line with research. But hey, why bother changing the shape of the stamped steel filter, or the thread, when backwards compatibility is such a major issue for such a massive population without access to the west's banking system, whereby a govt needing to supply gas masks to 450 million people would just get a loan? So even if it is true, identifying which filters is not an easy task unless you read Russian.

So why not just avoid them all? And if we believe it, naturally we must avoid any gear which has been stored with such filters, unless we can be 100% certain that their rubber plugs remained stoppered and the lids screwed down tightly on their threads. Of course if we believe it, then we must also believe that the Soviets cared so little for their people that they would intentionally supply them with equipment which could very well cause a horrible death just by training with it - civilians as well as military, as asbestosis (as it was called) was diagnosed as early as the 60's - this plays very well into the western stereotyped view of the Warsaw Pact, but the reality was quite different, after all the very people who would be in a position to make the decisions within any given region would be equipped with those gas masks themselves - there is no evidence whatsoever of gucci respirators for the party apparatchiks. But nonetheless, why not avoid all that gear? Push any old dodgy rumour and add to the difficulties for anyone selling Soviet surplus... all it does it make such gear more expensive for those of us who would like to collect it.

FFS!

*Actually I'm getting reasonably good at reading Cyrillic and recognising some Russian words, but by no means well enough to perform historical research.

 

[Chock]

Well, as someone who visited the Soviet Union when it was still the Soviet Union, i.e. in the late Seventies when I went to Moscow, I'm well aware of what it was like there during the Cold War, and whilst it was indeed a bit grim for the people, I'm not about to suggest that they were the 'baddies' and we were the 'goodies', because that's overly-simplistic cobblers, and to suggest that I am saying that, is a straw man. Nor am I saying that only the Soviet Union used asbestos all over the place - every nation did so. Thus it was used all over the place in the UK too, notably in WW2 Gas masks handed out to the populace at large, but more famously in many prefabricated buildings put up as quick-build housing after the devastation of Luftwaffe bombing on UK population centres.

Witness the most famous case of someone dying from asbestosis, that being Steve McQueen, who was tasked with removing asbestos pipe lagging from an old WW2 troop ship in the late 1940s when he was serving in the USMC. There were suggestions at the time of his diagnosis that he'd got the disease from fire retardent clothes he wore during his racing days (which it's since been shown were actually nomex, not asbestos), but he thought it more likely it was as a result of him removing the lagging on that old troop ship, which seems more probable as it would have been damaged and disturbed during the process of removing it and put asbestos dust into the air in the confined and poorly ventilated space below decks. Anyone who was at school in the UK in the Seventies, as I was, will probably remember many schools being closed down for a while, whilst asbestos was removed from old buildings put up in the 40s, 50s and 60s, and may recall that this was a very specialised task, with the workers using breathing apparatus and the buildings being shrouded in polythene and having vast vaccum devices sucking up the air to prevent the escape of dust. But even today there are tons of old garages throughout the UK which are made of asbestos cement prefabricated corrugated panels.

As you say, Asbestosis was identified a long time ago, but it was waaaay earlier than the 1960s, in fact the first case of it being documented and diagnosed as an industrial injury, was in the 1920s. Moreover, some regulations concerning its use in the UK were promulgated as early as 1931, which is almost decade prior to the manufacture of gas masks for use in WW2. So it has been used on numerous occasions even well after its effects were known and in fact its use in construction in the UK was actually only completely outlawed in 1999, which is almost exactly 100 years after it was first identified as a potential health hazard. The fact is, asbestos was used a lot, all over the world, and it was used in many gas masks. This is not a rumour, it is a fact.

So it's not a case of me scaremongering or suggesting things without any basis in fact, or trying to make out that the Soviets were unfeeling gits who cared little for their populace, or attempting to claim that all Soviet era relics are the bogey man which should be avoided at all costs - I've got loads of them myself because they are cool - I'm merely pointing out that there is a strong possibility that old Soviet gas masks could have asbestos in the filters, which almost certainly will be fine if they are on a shelf on display in your collection, ensuriung the filter does not get smashed up and its debris made airborne, in just the same way as your old asbestos garage is not about to kill you unless you start taking a jack hammer to it and not wearing a respirator. But if there is no threat of a gas attack, then it's probably not a great idea to go around wearing an old gas mask, since you don't actually need to do so, because as you say, the Cold War was over a long time ago.

 

[Ian_Gere]

^^A well reasoned argument, Chock, but as you say, all we know for sure is that some gas mask filters did contain asbestos and that, despite known dangers, complete eradication was not given a priority until relatively recently. However that does not mean that whomever had it within their power to decide what went into Soviet filters ignored what was known about asbestos causing respiratory illness when deciding what went into a breathing aid. Without doing any proper research I'm aware of at least 2 distinct broad types of filter produced by the Soviets for the GP-5 and GP-7 masks. This one "from my own collection"...

...can be immediately identified by the distinctive recessed shape of the shoulder of the tin.​

The newer broad type does not have this recess, but both have small painted symbols on the underside, next to the rubber plug and/or next to the rim, on the upper side next to the thread and/or next to the shoulder, and a legend on the side, which identify them further into sub-types (even the rubber plug of mine has "11" moulded into the centre).

As you can see, this is a GP-7, which is a more modern mask than the ubiquitous GP-5 full rubber hood type. It was produced for the military with straps at the rear as it is easier to use with a helmet, but despite being more modern uses the same 40mm thread to ensure backwards compatibility (that is a GP-5 filter). I found it interesting that what info i've read states that these GP types of Soviet respirator can use NATO 40mm thread filters, but NATO masks somehow will not accept Soviet filters - by testing my own S10 vs GP-7 I've discovered that this is bollocks: both masks accept either filter and do up tightly enough to create a seal.

I do remember the 70's and the corrugated asbestos coming off schools and factories. That tells us that although 'asbestosis' the miners' disease was known early in the 20th century, the modern understanding of granuloma cancers (i think that's the correct term) was suddenly deemed important enough that the public purse had to be tapped to remove the stuff and in such a way as to minimise the potential for particulates to become airborne... before the vast majority of GP-5 filters which are becoming available as new old stock from the former Soviet Union were manufactured.

 

[Ian_Gere]

OK then, a bit more empirical testing. The question: is the rumour that Russian gas mask lenses are good to go for airsoft true?

...at least for these PBF ones, no.​

This shot was taken from about 1 inch at approx 375FPS with a 0.25g BB (1.6J CO2 pistol), but the result is not quite as simple as it appears at first glance. Because, although the lens is obviously cracked...

...it is not a simple lens, but rather something like a mini double glazing unit.​

In this pic you can just about see that the interior layer is not broken at all...

...but who knows whether a 2.3J shot (0.2g @500FPS) would have made it through both layers.​

​

Something else I tested today was how easy it is to breath through with both the 'orangutan cheek' filters fitted - it is very easy, far easier than through an S10 or GP-7.

 

[Chock]

Nice test. I'd suggest layering thick perspex disks over the lens with some rubber gasketing around their edges to make it a snug fit and give it a bit of shock resistance play. That'd probably make it tough enough to withstand the hit if you wanted to use it for skirmishing.

 

[jcheeseright]

or just replace the lenses entirely with lexan, it's less prone to fogging than glass too!