Nothing screams rough and tough survivalist guy like carrying a good old fashion manly sewing kit!
Alright, so that may be pushing it a little far, but seriously, you really should consider adding one to your survival supplies.
While some people may get a good old laugh out of the thought of a grown man carrying a sewing kit for survival, who gives a crap, they’re just mad that they didn’t think of it first. While it’s not as cool as a bushcraft knife or take-down rifle, a sewing kit is a valuable piece of gear that shouldn’t be overlooked.
In my opinion, having a sewing kit is an essential part of being prepared, and it serves as a multipurpose tool that has a number of useful wilderness applications.
What should be in a good Survival Sewing Kit?
To begin with, your kit should be able to:
- Repair
- Fix a ripped tent or tarp.
- Mend backpacks, sleeping bags, and gear.
- And in an extreme emergency, stitch up a wound.
A survival sewing kit is usually pretty small and often contains items that might not be in an ordinary run of the mill kit. For instance, instead of regular sewing thread, I like to pack dental floss or braided fishing line in my kit. The reason I do this is because of its ability to then be useful in more circumstances, and I just turned my sewing kit into a multipurpose survival tool.
Braided fishing line is a lot stronger than thread, and is a far better option when putting together a survival sewing kit.
Here are a couple of things that you may want to add to your survival sewing kit:
- Buttons
- Various Size Needles
- Thimble to push needles through heavy tarps or animal hides.
- Self-cutting grommets for tarps and tents
- Duct Tape – To add strength to torn fabric before sewing.
- Thick rubber, plastic, and canvas patches
- Small scissors
- Braided fishing line, Nylon Thread or dental floss – Much stronger than regular thread.
- Shoe Goo – This stuff is great for repairing shoes, waders, rubber boots, and torn backpacks or tents.
Best Commercial Emergency Sewing Kits:
While I always prefer putting together my own kits, there are a couple of good emergency kits on the market for those who don’t have the time.
Vigilant Trails Pocket/Survival Sewing Kit
The Vigilant Trails is one of the best prepackaged emergency sewing kits I’ve seen. While it doesn’t include everything, the kit gives you more than enough room to add specific sewing gear to fit your needs.
The Kit comes stock with:
- 1 – Metal container
- 1 – All purpose metal awl
- 1 – Metal thimble
- 1 – Heavy duty, water proof, adhesive patch (3”X4”)
- 2 – Heavy duty zip ties
- 3 – Pre-spooled thread (Black x2, White x1), 2 – Black buttons
- 4 – White buttons (large and small)
- 2 – Tan buttons
- 2 – Curved needles (large and small
- 4 – Straight needles (various sizes)
- 7 – Safety pins.
Best Glide Adventurer Series Survival Sewing and Repair Kit
The Best Glide Adventurer Series kit is another top quality kit that will provide you with the basics, plus some gear that you won’t find in your average travel sewing kit. Going beyond just the basics, the kit includes Kevlar Thread, Brass Wire, Type 1A Utility Cord, and some Duct Tape.
Fishing line is an excellent idea, never thought of that, it will be in my sewing kit from now on. A great alternative to fishing line, is NYLON thread. it is does not rott in wet weather and has much better strength than cotton thread. My wife intorduced me to the Nylon thread, when she was repairing some of my Army combat trousers. But the fishing line is definitley going in my sewing kit in my Bug out Bag.
Dyneema thread is an even better choice. I have very thin thread that is 130lb test strength on a small spool in my kit. Very good stuff and not at all expensive.
I do some sewing as a hobby and I found I can put a nice length of monofilament onto a sewing machine bobbin that fits in a sewing kit quite nicely. Plus the small spool makes using the line for actually fishing with a handline a bit more manageable.
Nice site very good information, well presented. Thanks.
Forgot to say…Use the sewing machine to spin the line onto the bobbin.
You can also yous an anchor to finger spin together I
Often spun together Just watch out for Kinks wind on to
Large Bobbin.
Kevlar thread is Real strong and comes in different colors, that’s an item worth having in any kit
All good stuff! I’m adding a needle to my fishing kit!
A great way to make a sewing kit is to use a TALL used medicine bottle. Room enough to put buttons in the bottom, bobbins of thread(different sorts), needles, fold-up sissors, thimble, etc. Exactly holds a LOT.