Ask a serious rifle shooter what sling to buy and the answer comes back fast: a Vickers. That sling is a Blue Force Gear product, and it is the design most other two-point combat slings are measured against. From a single sewing machine in Georgia, Blue Force Gear grew into one of the most respected American makers of slings and tactical nylon — the Vickers Combat Applications Sling, the ultralight Ten-Speed pouches, and the patented Helium Whisper attachment system. Here is who they are, what they make, and what is worth buying.

Who Blue Force Gear is

Blue Force Gear is a Georgia maker of slings and tactical nylon, best known for the Vickers sling that most two-point combat slings are measured against. It grew from a single sewing machine into a top American gear brand.

Blue Force Gear was founded in January 2004 in Pooler, Georgia, by Savannah native Ashley Burnsed. The origin story is almost too on-the-nose: the company started with five employees and a single sewing machine nicknamed “Old Betsy.” From that one machine grew a manufacturer of slings, MOLLE gear, pouches, and load-bearing equipment trusted by civilians, police, and the U.S. military.

The product that put them on the map was the Vickers Combat Applications Sling (VCAS), designed together with Larry Vickers — a retired U.S. Army 1st SFOD-Delta (Delta Force) combat veteran. A quick-adjust two-point sling that lets you cinch the rifle tight to your body or loosen it instantly, the Vickers sling became the standard the entire category now copies. That credibility — real special-operations input, refined into a simple, bombproof design — is the heart of the brand.

Blue Force Gear sits in the premium, made-in-USA tier. Everything is manufactured at the Pooler, Georgia facility using American materials and labor, and the products are Berry Compliant, meaning they meet the standard for U.S. military procurement. You pay more than you would for imported nylon, and in return you get gear engineered to be lighter, stronger, and longer-lived.

What Blue Force Gear makes

Slings — the flagship

Slings are what built the company. The Vickers Combat Applications Sling is the benchmark two-point, available padded or unpadded with various adjusters and attachment hardware. The Vickers 221 converts between two-point and one-point, the UDC Padded Bungee is a comfortable single-point, and there are purpose-built versions for everything from carbines to belt-fed machine guns.

Ten-Speed pouches

The Ten-Speed line is the other signature. These pouches are made from elastic laminate that lies nearly flat when empty and stretches to grip a magazine, saving bulk and weight on a plate carrier or chest rig. The Ten-Speed M4, pistol, and multi-mag pouches are favorites of shooters chasing a minimalist, low-profile loadout.

Helium Whisper and MOLLE gear

The patented Helium Whisper attachment system uses Blue Force Gear’s proprietary ULTRAcomp laminate to mount pouches with far less weight, bulk, and snag potential than traditional sewn MOLLE. It anchors a deep line of admin, utility, and medical pouches.

Chest rigs, belts, and medical

The lineup rounds out with lightweight chest rigs like the RACKMINUS, Cobra-buckle belts, dump pouches, and the well-regarded Micro Trauma Kit NOW! for keeping a compact medical kit on your gear.

Build quality and where it is made

Everything is sewn in Pooler, Georgia, from American materials, to a standard built for hard professional use. The ULTRAcomp laminate behind the Ten-Speed pouches and Helium Whisper system is the engineering centerpiece — it lets Blue Force Gear cut weight and eliminate failure points while keeping the strength soldiers and cops need. The slings use durable webbing and proven adjusters, and the whole catalog is designed around the idea that lighter and simpler is better, as long as it does not cost you durability.

How Blue Force Gear compares

Against Magpul’s slings and MOLLE, Blue Force Gear is the softer-goods specialist with the Vickers heritage, while Magpul leans on molded polymer designs — both are premium and widely run. Against pouch specialists like Esstac and Ferro Concepts, Blue Force Gear competes on the ultralight Ten-Speed and Helium Whisper systems. Against budget imported nylon, Blue Force Gear simply costs more, and that is the honest trade-off: the Ten-Speed’s elastic retention is brilliant for weight and profile but can loosen over years of hard use compared with rigid Kydex inserts or heavy Cordura, and the made-in-USA price is real. For most shooters, the weight savings and the proven sling designs are well worth it.

Who should buy what

Anyone buying one rifle sling: the Vickers Combat Applications Sling — the category benchmark.
Single-point preference: the UDC Padded Bungee single-point.
Minimalist loadout: Ten-Speed mag pouches for the lightest, flattest setup.
Plate carrier or chest rig builder: Helium Whisper pouches and the Micro Trauma Kit NOW!
Two-point or one-point flexibility: the Vickers 221.
Bare-bones budget loadout: cheaper imported nylon will cost less, if you can accept the trade-offs.

If you just need the absolute cheapest sling and pouches, this is not the budget brand. For a sling you will never think about again and ultralight gear that holds up, Blue Force Gear is the standard.

The Blue Force Gear philosophy

Blue Force Gear’s whole approach is “lighter, stronger, simpler” — take a piece of load-bearing gear, question every ounce and every stitch, and engineer out the weight and the failure points without losing the durability a professional depends on. The ULTRAcomp laminate and Helium Whisper system are pure expressions of that thinking, and the Vickers sling shows the other half of it: bring in someone who has actually used this gear under fire, and refine the design until it is dead simple to run. American-made, Berry Compliant, and obsessive about weight — that is the brand in a sentence.

How to choose your Blue Force Gear setup

Start with the sling, because almost everyone needs one. The padded Vickers Combat Applications Sling is the safe, do-everything pick; choose the hardware that matches your rifle’s attachment points. If you run a plate carrier or chest rig, build it with Ten-Speed pouches for the lightest profile, or Helium Whisper pouches when you want a bit more structure, and add a Micro Trauma Kit NOW! so your medical gear is always on you. Match the colors to your kit — black, coyote, ranger green, or MultiCam — and you have a coherent, lightweight loadout from a brand the professionals already trust.

From “Old Betsy” to the Vickers standard

There is something fitting about a company that now equips military units starting with one sewing machine and a nickname. Ashley Burnsed built Blue Force Gear on the belief that American-made tactical nylon could be lighter and better, and the proof showed up in the Vickers sling — a design so right that it became the reference point for every quick-adjust two-point sling that followed. Two decades on, the gear is still sewn in Pooler, Georgia, still obsessed with shaving weight, and still the answer when a shooter asks what sling to put on their rifle.

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Blue Force Gear Sling Sleeve for Storage, Multicam - SLINGSLEEVE-500-MC