question Columbia Outdry shell gear any good??

[DanO]

Thinking of trying columbia outdry jacket and pants or bibs. Mostly for cool to cold weather bushwhacking. ?? Looking for info or recomendations, thanks. I have a packa which is ok for useage on trail but not so good in climbing situations and dealing with gear on pack.

 

[DanO]

    I decided not to buy an Outdry for now.  I have a very unscientific test method of putting my mouth on the fabric to see if I can move air through it.  By this test it is non breathable....  However it could be OK anyway , as most breathable materials actually do not work anyway in rain especially combined with wet brush. For me If it is wet out and I am moving I get wet no matter what in a few hours,. wet from sweat and rain.  I doubt there is any magic way to stay dry in rain if your hiking at any real pace.  Even when I use a flappy loose poncho I get wet on a trail, if moving in heavy rain.

    However I never tried the super high end expensive gear.

     I do know that the waterproof breathable gear if soaked with rain, whetted out, holds a lot of water, hard to dry out, not good, sucks out body heat trying to dry it out,,,,, the non breathable stuff is likely better in really wet conditions.

 

 

Dan

Edited February 6, 2018 by DanO

[olyclimber]

I think Outdry is more popular in Europe.  I see a bunch of brands starting to use it instead of Event...which I assume is because they believe it is good enough or equal to that, but its probably cheaper?  I know for example Schnee's (boot maker in Bozeman) had Event in their boots up till not to long ago and now they use Outdry instead.  

https://blog.columbia.com/outdry_extreme/

https://gearjunkie.com/columbia-outdry-extreme-waterproof-jackets

List of brands using it:

http://www.outdry.com/ENG_partners.html

I have not seen a head to head vs Event or Goretex, etc...but many times there are more than just how dry it keeps you but how durable it is, etc...

 

[olyclimber]

There is some interesting discussion in the comments section of this:

https://andrewskurka.com/2015/speculative-thoughts-on-new-gtx-active-outdry-extreme/

if you feel like geeking out over "waterproof" fabrics....

[DanO]

I can breath through the event fabric in my bivy sack made of event. The outdry I tried was like non breathable rain gear, but there may be other outdry fabrics than what I tried.

 

Dan

Edited February 7, 2018 by DanO

[DanO]

By the way the most breathable fabric I found to date is a Bull Frogg jacket by Frogg Toggs. (mouth on fabric breath test) But it does saturate with water when running in the rain....

 

 

Event is very breathable via the breath through fabric test.. Like most everything it is nice to verify things

yourself in some fashion, no trust and verify. >)

 

Dan

Edited February 7, 2018 by DanO