HSGI Suregrip Belt and Taco Magazine Pouch Review.

I recently started shooting some more “tactical” styled matches, and I am planning on taking some training courses this year, so I wanted to put together a padded belt system to use for matches, and training so I could keep everything together, and in the same place for all the shooting I do.

I have a couple friends who are running the VTAC Brokos belt, and they are fantastic belt systems, especially with the ability to loop the inner belt out to place a regular holster onto the belt, without any sort of MOLLE attachment. One friend complained about not being able to bridge the sections with a MOLLE item, and the other said it was not a problem on his belt. My reason for not going with the VTAC belt, is that I do not have hips, and I was concerned with the belts ability to stay in place when moving around, shooting in different positions. I began to look for a MOLLE belt with some sort of grippy material on the inside of the belt, to help keep it in place.

I found the HSGI Suregrip belt, and I knew that it would be a winner. I also liked the fact that HSGI (As well as Viking Tactics mentioned above) is a North Carolina based company, and I like to do what I can to support local businesses. The Suregrip belt is lined with a neoprene material, which helps to keep it in place when moving around. I placed an order for an HSGI Suregrip belt, two pistol, and two rifle Taco magazine pouches, and received them in just a couple days.

My initial observation of the Suregrip belt, and Taco pouches was great. All items appeared to be of great quality, and manufactured with great attemtion to detail. A lot of MOLLE gear I have handled has a lot of little strings hanging off, and ugly stitching. This is not the case with the HSGI gear. Very nice looking stitching, quality materials, and I didn’t have to trim any strings hanging off of the gear.

Installing the Taco pouches on the belt was frustrating to say the least. I ended up hopping on YouTube, and found a video that showed how to stretch the webbing a little to get the MALICE clips on, which helped considerably. After some cursing, and a couple beers, I ended up getting everything installed on the belt, and I was very happy with the pouches once installed. Once installed, the Taco pouches are great. Good magazine retention, easy to get mags in and out. I don’t foresee any issues, but I’m going to pick-up some extra shock cord, and toss it in my range bag just in case.

I then needed a way to attach my pistol holster to the MOLLE webbing on the belt. My holster choice for most games is the Safariland ALS 6377 for a Glock 17, so I ordered up a Safariland MLS-15 MOLLE fork to attach the holster to the belt. Initially I was not impressed with how high the holster road on the belt, as the MLS-15 mounted the holster above the MOLLE webbing, on the belt that I already wear just above my waist. I ended up grabbing some kydex scraps that I had in the garage, and made a little adapter that  drops the holster about 2″, and puts the holster right in the sweet spot when wearing the belt. I really with Safariland would come out with a modified MLS-15 specifically for the MOLLE belts, that drops the holster to the correct place. In the pictures below you can see the adapter piece I made to drop the holster, and the holster mounted to the belt with the adapter installed.

Safariland ALS Holster with MLS-15 attachment, and my “custom” drop adapter, as well as a few shots of the Belt, and Taco pouches themselves.

All in all, great pieces of gear, and I recommend them highly.