Designed to be compatible with our Brain Bag backpack, the Brain Bag Padded Hip Belt allows you to carry some of the weight of a loaded Brain Bag on your hips rather than just your shoulders.

Sold as a matching left and right pair, the pads attach via Gatekeeper clips to the 1-1/2″ / 38mm webbing loops which normally accept the simple webbing waist belt (the one that comes standard with the Brain Bag). Made of .375″ / 10mm EVA closed cell foam with a protective laminated cover of heavy duty polyester knit, the set of two pads joins front and center with a sturdy, dual adjust side release buckle. The pads are contoured and when attached to the Brain Bag, form a slight conical shape, encouraging the belt to ride on top of your hip bones.

The Brain Bag Padded Hip Belt is available in one size that adjusts to fits hips measuring between 33″ / 84cm and 50″ / 125cm.

Good things to know: adding a Padded Hip Belt to the Brain Bag will help many folks carry heavier loads with more comfort, just like most things in life, it likely won’t make things better for everyone. Taller people (those 6’2″ and taller) in particular may find that the overall length of the Brain Bag does not predispose it to fully utilizing the weight carrying abilities of a padded belt. And though we want to go backpacking as much as you do, the Brain Bag is decisively not an internal frame backpacking pack, and adding the Padded Hip Belt will not turn it into one. (Note that people do use the Brain Bag as a day hiking pack.)

The Brain Bag Padded Hip Belt is designed to be compatible only with TOM BIHN backpacks that have loops to attach a 1-1/2″ / 38mm webbing waist belt. If you have an older Brain Bag with 2″ / 50mm loops, you could probably still use the Brain Bag Padded Hip Belt, but you’ll need to scrunch the 2″ / 50mm webbing on to the 1-1/2″ / 38mm Gatekeeper. If you have a very old Brain Bag with a permanently attached 2″ / 50mm waist belt, you’re out of luck on this one. And though you could attach this Padded Hip Belt to any of our packs which have 1″ / 25mm webbing loops (Synapse, Daylight, Aeronaut, etc.), you’re likely not find this arrangement satisfactory (we recommend against it) as the off-sized Gatekeeper/webbing connection is prone to twist and slip.