Chicom Type 56 Chest Rig, SKS, Surplus, Grade 2

Here’s a Chicom type 56 chest rig for the SKS rifle made famous by the Vietnam War. However, this isn’t a cheap repro but genuine military surplus of the People’s Liberation Army of China, most likely from the late 70s, early 80s. These have old dry mold flecks or some other crap, thus they're Grade 2 and sold cheaply. A little bit of cleaning and they should be very nice.

Features

Simple, durable, silent, low-profile, and packable. A few reasons why the Chicom chest rigs have been popular around the world. This 56-type SKS chest rig has ten equally sized pouches side by side, designed for the 7.62x39 caliber stripper clips of the semi-automatic SKS rifle. All the pouches are closed with wooden toggles. The adjustable shoulder straps cross each other at the back and the waist belt strings are tied together at the back. The distance from the tip of one of the belt strings to the tip of the other is c. 150 cm (4' 11"). If that ain’t enough, it is easy to add more string, and losing weight is apparently also trendy.

Condition

This is Chinese military surplus forgotten in a dusty old warehouse. These are all intact but they have something that looks like old dead mold flecks on them. Since they don’t smell of grandma’s scary old cellar, the mold hasn’t come back from the dead at least. Or the white spots can also be dried salt water, chalk dust, or any other crap. In any case, they can be cleaned off. However, if anything but mint condition gives you anxiety, buy a Chinese copy of the Chinese original. But that won’t be nearly as cool as this.