I’m a backpack nerd. I love backpacks and usually carry one around with me on a daily basis. I have a lot of gear and gadgets I like to carry around and most of it wont fit into my pockets. I wouldn’t want to carry it in my pockets anyways as it gets very uncomfortable especially now that I grown out of the “baggy pants” phase of my life. Backpacks are just so convenient. Even when traveling, I forgo the carry on roller and would much rather just pack everything up into a backpack. This leaves my hands free to do other things. With that said, I’m always on the lookout for new backpacks that can do more than my current one or that serve a different purpose. That’s when the Chrome Industries Bravo Night caught my eye. The Bravo Night is a backpack for “stuff” that can literally swallow it all. Not only that, it can expand from a compact 20L bag to a whopping 40L bag, essentially doubling its capacity. In fact, that’s one of Chrome industries signature features.
Design and Build
The Bravo Night is a versatile rolltop backpack. That means that unlike most backpacks that have a zippered main compartment, the Bravo Night has an extension that rolls up when not needed and is then secured by a Velcro flap. I’ve never seen a backpack like this before with this type on inclosure, but after looking at Chromes entire lineup, they have many bags set up in this same way. More on this in a bit.
Like most of the high end backpacks and bags I’ve seen lately, the Chrome Industries Bravo Night is made of a special fabric for the outer shell. In this case, the Bravo Night is made of 1000 denier CORDURA® Brand fabric. It is waterproof and highly versatile and resilient. Pretty much the entire outer shell is made of this material, including the shoulder straps. On the front side of the bag, you’ll find a large 3M Reflective panel with a highly visible CHROME logo on it. This 3M Reflective panel can supposedly be seen from over 100 meters away at night. This is mainly the reason why this Bravo bag gets its “Night” moniker.
On the front side of the bag, there is a large pocket secured by a Velcro flap. This pocket is also lined with the same material as what is on the outer shall of the back but also has an inner lining of waterproof 1000 denier military grade truck tarpaulin. This is to keep your valuables dry in case of a heavy storm. Inside the pocket, you’ll find some organizational pockets for pens, and a larger pocket for something like your phone. Inside here, you’ll also find a large laptop sleep that is padded and large enough for a 15″ laptop like a Macbook Pro. On the outside of this large pocket, you’ll also find a smaller pocket, but this one uses a waterproof urethane coated YKK zipper to keep it shut. This pocket is completely lined with the tarpaulin material.
On the shoulder straps, we find that Chrome Industries did things a bit different here too than your average bag maker. Where most people include accessory loops in the shoulder straps for adding things like carabiner clips, the Bravo Night has industrial strength Velcro accessory mounting straps instead. This allows you to mount almost anything you want and in any position along the strap. Again, this is something that I haven’t seen on another bag before. Each one of these accessory straps also has a highly reflective strip on it. The shoulder straps also include an adjustable sternum strap for load distribution. It can be fastened using Chrome industries iconic quick release seatbelt buckle. Lastly, the shoulder straps are length adjustable industrial-metal cam lock underarm compression buckles.
Moving to the back of the Bravo Night, you’ll find that it is heavily padded using EVA foam for comfort. It takes up almost the entire rear of the bag. It is grooved with a pretty cool looking pattern and the Chrome name at the bottom. The grooves allow your back to breath so it will not get all sweaty when wearing it for long periods of time.
Now on to the main compartment of the Bravo Night. To get to the main compartment, first undo the Velcro flap up top. Then unroll the bag extension until you can get to the opening. Unrolling the extension makes the bag look huge and tall and if you extend the nylon portion of this part as well, you basically get a bag that is about twice as large as it was before. It goes from 20L to about 40L. It will swallow up almost anything you want to put into it and can transport large items while also keeping them nice and dry thanks to the fact that the interior of the main compartment is completely lined with the waterproof 1000 denier military grade truck tarpaulin that I talked about earlier. When you have the nylon portion of the bag completely extended, it seals shut with Velcro all the way around.
Lastly, the Bravo Night includes a cross-compression strap system that was military inspired. These straps are used to haul things you might not want to place inside of your bag or items that might be too large or too long.
After running through the specs, you can already see that Chrome Industries uses some really heavy duty materials to make their bags as rugged and tough as they should be. They didn’t cut any corners at all or skimp on any of the details. The Bravo Night was made to last and made to withstand an active lifestyle.
Features
- Signature 3M Reflective front panel
- Welded-Waterproof main compartment
- Dedicated laptop compartment fits up to a MacBook Pro 15″” computer
- Cross compression straps to secure large haul items
- Waterproof external zippered front compartment
- Industrial strength Velcro accessory mounting shoulder straps
- Reinforced back panel for added support when fully loaded
Final Thoughts
Before receiving the Chrome Industries Bravo Night, I had never even heard of the company before. I was told by a friend of mine that they are really huge in the biking sector but I can say without a doubt that the Bravo Night is stylish enough for even non-bikers. In fact, I got complimented by several people on the Bravo Night with how great and looked with questions about what the rolled up part of the bag was. It was nice having something that people had never seen before which put a nice smile on my face.
I’ve been using the Bravo Night for a solid couple of weeks and not sure if I will switch back to the backpack I was using before. I really like how the Bravo Night looks and how comfortable it feels when wearing it. The only thing that I wish it had was more pockets. The bag really only has 2 compartments you use to hold stuff in and one of them is basically just like a huge grocery bag that you just stuff any and everything into with no type of organization. Despite this, the Bravo Night is awesome and I’m able to hold most of what I need in it.
Overall, the Bravo Night is a keeper. The fact that people take notice of it is more than enough reason for me to keep using it. Grab your own Bravo Night over at Chrome Industries official site here.
