The Role of Comfort in
Product Design – Page
3
Kelty
Kelty internal frame backpack.
TragerUSA
Trager external frame
backpack.
Kelty
Kelty external frame
backpack.
The reason: internal frames tend to be lighter and easier to
balance, supporting the way people naturally move. That’s
important to the people carrying these packs on their backs
for long periods of time or with significant weight inside.
The World Health Organization states that eight out of ten
people will suffer from lower back pain at some point in their
lives.
According to the Japanese Ministry of Health, Labour and
Welfare, more than 12 million Japanese experience back pain
every year.
One hundred years ago, the backpack – or rucksack, as it’s
sometimes called – consisted of a heavy bag, often made of a
coarse fabric such as burlap or canvas, and two straps. For
serious trips into the wilderness, or in warfare, the bag allowed people to carry more supplies
than with the arms alone, but often at the price of serious physical discomfort.
Then in 1920, Lloyd “Trapper” Nelson was sent by the Puget
Sound Naval Shipyard to Kodiak, Alaska. After completing his
work for the Navy, Nelson took a short leave to hike into the
Alaskan wilderness. A member of the local Native American
tribe lent him the backpack his tribe had used for generations –
a sealskin bag stretched over willow sticks. Though the bag
improved on the earlier rucksack – and supported more weight
by distributing the load to the willow frame – Nelson lay awake
at night, with sore and bloodied shoulders, determined to come
up with a better solution.
When Nelson returned to Seattle, he purchased an industrial
sewing machine and after more than eight years of trial and
error, developed a design that incorporated the wooden frame
with the rucksack. He was
the first to commercialize the
frame backpack in the U.S
and within a year, the U.S.
Forest Service wanted 1,000
Trapper Nelson’s Indian Pack Boards.
In the early ’50s, Dick Kelty improved upon Trapper’s external
frame design by using aluminum instead of wood in the frame,
as well as adding a hip belt. Kelty’s innovations reduced the
frame weight and, with the hip belt, transferred some weight
from the back to the hips. In the early ’70s, Greg Lowe
introduced the Lowe 1972 Alpine Systems Expedition. This
backpack featured interior aluminum stays (inspired by earlier
internal-frame packs from Europe). Because internals sit closer
to the body, they are much easier to use during popular
outdoor sports, such as rock climbing or snow shoeing, that
require good balance; for the same activities, the external
frame might easily tip over or even cause the athlete to tip over.
