New Locking Latches for Pelican Cases

New Locking Latches for Pelican Cases

Some of you who travel frequently or who transport and organize a lot of gear may have seen some new items supplier listings when you browse the Pelican Case pages. In addition to the now-established Pelican Air case models like 1535 and 1615, you may have seen related listings with the TRVL suffix after the model number. What's up with that?

It turns out, Pelican is now offering some of their Air series cases with lockable latches. These latches operate with both a user key (the P001 luggage key, which is not all that secure or unique, mind you) and also the TSA007 key. If you're a frequent traveler and don't want to stick a gun in your luggage all the time in order to use high security locks... maybe you're interested in Pelican cases whose latches can lock?

The thing is... Pelican is selling these new TRVL series cases at what appears to be an *exorbitant* mark-up. Fortunately, it is possible to purchase these new latches by themselves from 3rd parties. This is a video where I showcase the various ways to lock one's luggage and then I swap out a latch on one of my Pelican cases, installing these new TSA compatible locks.

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[DeviantOllam]

Hey, cool update news!... @SkylarxLily hit me on twitter and informed me: "Did some sleuthing and found those TSA latches in your vid. If you email colorcase, which does a ton of Pelican sales, they gave me a private link for the same 40$ price that has been out of stock on amazon now forever. Hopefully they keep doing it."

[yakmedic]

If you use a TSA lock you can add a serialized (numbered) tamper tag to one of the case locking points. This gives you a quick visual indicator to let you someone has opened you bag. They aren't too expensive ~$10-15 for 100 of them.
As an alternative I have used several small zip ties with different colors (2 red, 1 green, 1 yellow, for example), super cheap and with a wide range of colors

[kristianskaland]

VJO? Well someone certainly watches AvE


Also tomatoes

[JulesVonBasslake]

Tomatoes used to explain Dungeons and Dragons stats:
Strength: How for you can throw the tomatoes
Dexterity: How well you can dodge tomatoes thrown at you
Constitution: How many bad tomatoes you can eat
Intelligence: Knowing tomatoes are technically a fruit
Wisdom: Knowing not to put tomatoes into your fruit salad
Charisma: Being able convince people to buy your fruit salad based on tomatoes

[keithtwombley]

a couple more tips for removing pins I learned from modding toys:

When the pin starts moving, check the end that pops out with an eagle eye. If you don't see the hash marks, you're at the wrong end.

BTW, If you decide to YOLO the pin all the way through the wrong way, those hashes will gouge the plastic all the way through, making it so the pin will never stay in again.

[tacpunk]

Aaand the latches are no longer available on Amazon.

[gamehulk]

"Vijeo". Found the AvE fan.

Edit: "She's got some gravity to 'er". lol

[matthewmiller]

Very excited to see a way to add TSA lock latches...I've got a few year old 1615 case (before the "air" branding) and I have basically given up on any way to lock it. The locks end up either broken off or damaged such that I can't actually remove them without tools at the other end. Even when I don't care about "stuff stolen" I worry about the latches catching and popping open in transit letting stuff fall out.
Parts ordered, I look forward to a conversion!

...and I don't even fly that much, all my headaches are only within half a dozen or so legs of flights. After losing probably $100 or more in various locks until now I've decided the best hope is $0.97 keychain clips...at least they provide a small additional "oops bumped the latch" protection and they also are cheap to replace when they go missing.

[TheKnightofSand]

Thanks for the video! I'll have to look into Pelican's travel case lineup now.


That way I can travel safely with my tomatoes.

[jayeff]

I love me some fried-green tomatoes, as long as they are seasoned and cooked correctly! Thanks D.O.! Excellent video!

[xXTECHxKNIGHTXx]

I strapped a pelican case onto the back of my motorcycle as a tour pack, these latches seem like a solid solution to keep opportunist thieves out!

[LogicBob]

Tomatoes, huh? I ordered some latches! Thanks for the heads-up!

I always liked the thought of TSA not being able to cut my locks, but I hadn't ever considered that they may just keep the case. My phone number is written across the case in 2" tall letters, but you never know with those knuckleheads.

Do you have any tricks for locking your luggage when you're traveling to/through a prohibited place like Chicago or Mexico? I was thinking about packing a 5.56 stripper clip because the federal guidelines say that "ammunition clips" need to be locked up like firearms, but its not serialized and won't even be recognized by most anyone. Thoughts?

[Bostonaholic]

I have found that the Abloy PL340 fits my Pelican Air. I also use the SP321 (with the thinner shackle) for locking the zippers on soft bags. I really like your idea of swapping out the latches for the ones with integrated TSA locks. I might have to do that too!

[tomiesz]

Now wait for tsa to start getting the pins out from your latches when using the lock hatches

[chandranatha]

My friend just buzzed this video to me on Buzz Chat. Definitely worth the watch!

[jjohnson]

Very cool idea, going to have to pick up a couple new locking latches to secure my tomatoes in the old pelican cases

[StuttersC]

Thank you for showing ways to keep our tomatoes secure in our luggage.

[fpscrash]

Good to hear about these TSA latches for the Pelican cases. If I'm in a hurry and not locking up anything too special, I use zip ties. Which I then cut at my destination. Keeps quick hands out.

[garyanvil]

I grow tomatoes ever summer...
Great videos thanks

[DonzLockz]

I use Abloy 330's with a sentry key to protect my special strain of organic tomatoes. Lol. I brought over 8kg of locks from Australia to the States in 2017 and locked them in a plastic storage box with a 40mm Abus dimple padlock. They cut the shackle to see the strange blob of locks on their xray. Luckily they kept all the precious $800 Lockwoods in place and put the cut padlock in the case with a tsa card saying they inspected the case. We don't have guns here but store classified files and electronics, luckily no PL330's have been cut yet. 🤞 Thanks for the info and I'll look up those replacement latches/tsa locks.👍🏻🤓🍺