BADASS PHOTO OF THE WEEK
Orange Hat Dan and Buffalo roam down "Little Chute" circa late april 2007
Please reply to this if you have any of this outerwear, and tell us what you would like to see changed about the suits. Or if you dont have any of these outfits, maybe there is something you would like to see on outerwear that doesn’t already exist. Maybe we can use this as an open forum to get some controlled feeback to the companies, rather than 10000 random posts on various internet forums.
Ill start since we have all 3.
TREW: The crotch zipper on the bibs needs to be much longer. And they need a belt on the bibs. Slim down the pant cuffs because when I ski tour in the pants, they make the most annoying swooshing ever (but thats from their indestructable cuffs).
SAGA: Our size medium suit has small pockets and openings. I can feel wind come through the main zipper when its ultra windy and cold.
LDC: The suit is big, bulky and heavy, they use buttons, zippers, velcro, magnets for closing the suit, i think they should pick two. I get rather annoyed when the tiny buttons on the pant legs come undone, and i have to take my gloves off to button them back up.
I do not have any of these suits, but something I would greatly appreciate is a magnetic hood thing so it doesn’t come flying up when you land switch. My hood always comes up and gets in the way when I don’t want it to. It has a cinch instead, which is good until you want to use the hood. Also, I do not like Velcro over the zippers, specially up top near the mouth. The very top of my jacket is kind of permanently folded and my helmet strap always gets caught to it when I unbuckle it and then it tears up the strap after a while. Buttons are much more appreciated, or magnets as I said before. Also, pockets that zip down, there is nothing worse than having your pockets unzip on their own somehow and loosing whatever you had in your pocket. Thumb holes in the arm liners are always good.
For pants, inner and outer vents are always a plus. Magnetic back pockets I find work the best. My old pair of pants has a magnetic pocket on the ass where I kept my wallet and I never had to worry about it falling out. Reinforced heels/ lower legs would be greatly appreciated. Some type of jacket/pants connection for powder days would be sick, I think some companies have jackets and pants that zip together, some button together. Sometimes just having a powder skirt can be a pain if it starts to hike up on you. My Orage jacket has little strips of material with buttons that line up with the belt loops and they work great, the only problem the powder skirt ends up above the waist of the pants because the little buttoned loops are on the bottom of the powder skirt. Maybe if some “belt loops” were added a couple inches lower on the leg just for the purpose of buttoning the loops on the jacket to so the powder skirt doesn’t hike up.
Pete,
Thanks for the reply. The hood problem is one that should be attended to. With all of the switch cornice buttering, and switch double mistys these days, you have a 50 percent chance of getting a hood to your field of vision, thats something to be attended to. Thankfully The LDC has magnet on the hood to keep it back. SAGA uses a button for the same purpose.
Velcro over the zipper….. again i have had the problem of stuff getting stuck to velcro up there and shredding my helmet strap and face. SAGA has 3 buttons up top and the lower portion is velcro.
Pockets that zip down is also a good thought, but i think any force that could make a pocket open would not discriminate against the direction it unzips. Maybe that time when you were trying a polish roll was when your pocket unzipped? Or just the force of sitting on fabric wrong could maybe pull a pocket open. I have also found that H2o proof zippers stay in place about 100 percent of the time because of the tighter seal. I dont like anything in my butt pockets, because it will get on my nerves when on the chair lift, and get wet if its snowing out. All of these suits have plenty of storage up top where you don’t feel it.
Pants inner outer zippers… all three suits LDC, TREW, SAGA have the inner outer feature. Deffenately an awesome feature. Typically i am lazy though and appreciate a light technical breathable fabric like my mountaineering pants so i am not hassling with zippers.
Reinforced heels. If you are constantly tattering your pants, the TREW has this stuff called super fabric on the bottom cuff and up the inside. The stuff is crazy durable. You probably won’t tatter your cuffs ever. I have a pair of mountaineering pants and the TREW stuff deffenately is way above them as far as cuff strength.
Powskirt riding up. SAGA has a system where the pow skirt buttons to a loop on the side of each leg. Deffenately stops your skirt from being hiked up. Again i am lazy and really love bibs. bibs = no powder skirt. The TREWth bib nearly goes up to my shoulders, pretty awesome out on the slopes, though when I am rolling around town, or out to a bar I have a hard time rocking neck bibs. I pretty much live in my ski gear or shorts.
Thanks for your time pete, I did the best with what i have to answer some stuff here, I will find a way to organize these questions and have it be more seen.