DIY Ranger Pace Beads With a “Manly” Twist: Make it Mondays

I was bored the other day and decided to make my own Ranger-style pace counting beads for hiking and bug out. But, rather than using the traditionally accepted method of paracord and “girly” beads I figured I would “man it up” a bit and use paracord and machined nuts, you know, the kind that are used with machined screws. Why? Because I could! Note: if you’ve got some time on your hands and want to use ONLY paracord, check out this idea.

Step-by-step to make beads

Here’s how (click images below to enlarge) and follow along in step-by-step instructions below the images:

1.  Cut a 26″ length of paracord (I would add a few inches if you have large hands and want to hold this around the wrist like I did). Remove the inner strands and fuse the ends of the sheath so they don’t fray using a lighter. Wait for the sheath to cool a minute then tie the ends together using an simple overhand knot.
2. Take one of the inner strands and loop it through the paracord as shown and tie the ends of the inner strands together, just like you did with the sheath. You’ll end up with two loops: one of paracord sheath and one of a single strand with their respective ends tied together and now also looped togehter.
3. Now feed the tied-together single strand through a machine nut (I used #8-32) and use that as leverage to push/pull the nut onto the paracord sheath. If done right the machine nut should be a bit difficult to move over the paracord which is what you want. After all, you don’t want these nuts to move on their own!
4. Continue feeding three additional machine nuts as you did in step three and move them all the way down until they touch the paracord sheath knot. You should have a total of four nuts on the paracord.
5. Now tie an overhand knot in the paracord sheath but leave about an inch gap (or a finger’s width) between the knot you tie and the nuts at the end of the sheath. Repeat steps three and four until you have the remaining nine additional machine nuts added as shown. When they’re all on your pace counter you’ll have thirteen total machine nuts, four of which are separated by a small gap and knot.
6. The last step is to tie yet one more knot in the paracord sheath about an inch away from the set of nine machine nuts, just like you did in step 5. Doing so should allow enough of a loop to slip your hand through. Click image six above to see what the final product should look like. You could also choose to make a sliding knot with one of the seven inner strands that you removed to make it easier for your hand to get in and out, here’s how. Personally, what I did worked fine for me. If you’re a larger person add a few more inches to the paracord in step one if you want to be able to slip your hands through the loop.

To use these beads

The idea is to be able to keep track of when you’ve traveled a full five kilometers. Personally, I’d rather have this laid out in feet and miles because that’s what I’m used to but the system doesn’t lend itself very well to tracking in miles as Dave Canterbury explains in the following video. With that in mind, rather than me trying to explain how to use pace beads watch this video (skip to about the 2:00 mark to get to the heart of the topic)…

That’s it. Hope it helps!