How well does your Goretex gear work?

In My Humble Opinion
1

I go hill walking in Scotland, where waterproof gear truly gets put through its paces, and was wondering how satisfied people are with the performance of breathable fabrics like goretex.

I have a set of superb goretex boots. I can walk all day through bogs and glens and come out with genuinely dry feet at the end of the hike. No complaints there. My jacket I’m less sure about. It’s a North Face goretex garment, great for keeping the wind and the rain out, but it seems pretty mediocre at “breathing”. I get wet underneath it with the exertion of the hike. I wonder how much you can expect from a goretex jacket, after hiking for hours through the rain would you expect to be dry as a bone underneath?

My wife has a North Face jacket made from their own breathable fabric called Hy Vent, which seems to be extremely poor. I’m not even sure if its completely waterproof.

2

I have a Gore-Tex rowing jacket I wear everywhere. It’s great for rain and wind but, you’re right, it’s not super breathable. I’ve even got the open vent back cape and I get hot if I’m exerting myself.

3
      • You need to be wearing synthetic or wool underclothes, no cotton at all. Even your socks. Cotton is bad, quite simply: it soaks up moisture, shrinks and stops insulating (gets cold) and takes a long time to dry out. Synthetics/wool don’t absorb moisture at all, shed it in fact–never shrink, so they always insulate. Your own sweat will soak your underclothes, but you will still not get cold.
  • Gore-Tex is good for some things (shoes and gloves) but many consider it overpriced for general outerwear. What costs a lot less and can work almost as well is to get some unlined nylon outerwear and spray that with Scotchguard/silicone spray regularly. Just wear long clothes underneath, to keep the silicone off your skin.
  • And a cheap source of nylon outerwear is at hunting stores, you won’t find the same colors and styles that the hiking/bicycling stores carry (maybe only black and camoflage styles) but the price differences can be huge. Also–hunting stores tend to carry larger sizes than hiking/bicycling stores do.
    ~
4

Color me stupid, but I thought Goretex was a made up thing, a la George Costanza’s puffy Goretex jacket on Seinfeld :smack:

5

That’s been my experience.

I love Gore-Tex boots. I use one pair year-round for everything from shoveling the driveway to mowing the yard to hiking to motorcycling to walking to work through the rain and snow. Worth the expense.

Gore-Tex as a rain shell is breathable enough, I suppose. Not as breathable as I thought it would be but it keeps the rain off, and is very tough but supple. The only reason I got a new one is I outgrew the old one after 10 years or so.

6

My Gortex Jeep always leaves me wet and cold. I always stay warm and dry with my Gortex Ford. (Usually while towing my Gortex Jeep out of the mountains)

Real Answer: Gortex only works as well as the realitive “wetness” of where your ass is stuck. I ski the Sierra Nevadas and mostly stay dry/warm, but every now and then a big, wet dumper comes along and the Gortex is stymied.

7

I find its rubbish, expensive and a complete waste of money.

I’ve had a few goretex items, and they have all been total crap.

The fabric isn’t all that robust, its not any good where there is any friction, such as on leggings around the crotch.

It does not pack down all that small, and for some activities this is a real pain.

At first I thought I was doing something wrong, like perhaps washing it in too aggressive detergents, or too hot water, but when I look back, it was all shite from the moment it left the shop with me.

It’s a good wind stopper, thats it.

I’m seriously under the impression that its one of those ‘king has got no clothes’ issues, that no-one will admit that its rubbish because everyone else and the advertising says its great.(and nobody likes to admit they wasted their money)

Talking to others, I find they had similar problems, but they also put it down to maybe the wrong care, or not quite using it right, but they also still say its good, when clearly it is not.

I used it as weather wear when cycling very serious mileages, the pressure of the air pushing against you forces dampness through, and you can tell this because areas that may not get too damp from rain, like around the sides, don’t get wet, and a light shower will see your front become wet, and your back stay dry, especially if you are headed into the weather.

Another serious weakness, wherever there are creases and folds and water gathers there, it will work its way through.

In severe weather I find that the pockets can fill with water, and it won’t run out!

If you are walking then waxed cotton works better, but when that gets wet it takes ages to dry, or capes are a good idea.

Cycling, well the search goes on, you tend to wear stuff that dries quickly, that keeps you warm when wet, capes catch the wind too much, you are better off with a wind cheater, which will probably fill up with condensation but if you make frequent stops you can keep it under control, plus riding into weather tends to keep your back dry, especially if you have full mudguards. Having clothing with waterproof fronts stitched in and plain material elsewhere helps.

8

I don’t wear my rowing jacket around everywhere anymore (it’s a boathouse), but I still use it for outdoor gear when it’s going to be relatively cold and wet out. The problem with the jacket and doing heavy exertion is that the waterproofing seems to work both ways and won’t let anything out. It turns into a swamp. Then again, when you’re on the Potomac at 5:30 in the morning in early March and you can see the ice forming on the riggers, it’s perfect and I always stayed dry.

9

I have a pair of Goretex trail shoes I wear for Geocaching; they’ve stood up well to rough use and never get wet inside, unless, of course, I step in a puddle/stream/mudpit that’s a tiny bit too deep…

10

I love my Goretex ™ hacket and rain pants-- waterproof, even in a real downpour, and lets light perspiration out. No, it can’t keep up with heavy activity sweating, but nothing’s perfect.

Of course, I’m able to compare it with the experience of backpacking in the rain wearing a waterproof coated-nylon poncho, so I understand what it’s like to be really covered in condensed sweat. Believe me, Goretex doesn’t let every drop out, but it’s better than non-breathable stuff!

I can’t speak to other brands of breathable stuff. A few years ago, the consensus was that most brands were waterproof, but the GoreTex was more breathable; I don’t know what the current state of technology is.

It depends on how hard you’re working. If you work up a sweat, then the jacket won’t keep up, and some moisture’s going to build up. This will happen faster if the water-repellent coating on the outside of the jacket has worn off, so water doesn’t bead up and run off (you can recondition the coating with spray-on stuff). I mean, if you’re working hard enough that you’d be all sweaty even if it wasn’t raining and you weren’t wearing the jacket, do you really expect to be dry when you are wearing the jacket?

But if you’re sitting quietly in the rain for hours, at a non-sweating temperature, then yes, you should be bone dry inside. If not, then something’s wrong with the jacket (it’s leaking somewhere).
For comparison, if you sit quietly for hours inside a rubberized rain slicker, or improvised garbage bag poncho, or waterproof chemical suit, or anything else non-breathable, you will be very unpleasantly moist, believe me.

11

In my experience, it’s not so much the Gore-Tex itself as the apparel manufacturer that incorporates the Gore-Tex into its products. If the seams aren’t overlapped and then folded over onto each other and triple-sewn, they’re gonna fall apart and leak. If there isn’t a layer of cordura or other heavy nylon at the knees & crotch, those spots are gonna wear through. Gore-Tex isn’t supposed to stand up to abrasion and puncture. It’s only supposed to keep you dry and comfortable.

Some experiences of mine:

All through college and law school, I worked weekends as a ski instructor. I wore the same pair of Outdoor Research Gore-Tex pants for seven years, and even though they cost $375, through seven seasons of spending my weekends knee-deep in powder, sweating and slopping through spring conditions, sitting on icy chairlifts, or just laying on the snow while fastening my students’ ski boots, they never once leaked. On my own time, I also took them winter camping, ice climbing, and skiing in more rigorous a manner than my little teaching resort could provide, and I never had a complaint about them. I finally replaced them this last season when the inseam wore through.

I also have a pair of Vasque Sundowner Gore-Tex boots that are in their 11th year. I had them re-soled twice (the seriously hardcore Vibram soles) in the time it took for the Gore-Tex liners to finally fail and wear through. I once stood for fifteen minutes in a four-inch-deep stream of fast-moving snowmelt in the middle of winter with those boots, feet dry and warm. Now I use them to cut the lawn. Of course I replaced them with an brand-new, identical pair.

However, I did have a set of LL Bean Gore Tex gloves that were for shit. They fell apart and began leaking after one season. They stayed relatively waterproof after that only because of my liberal use of duct tape around the thumb seams… That’s usually the story with LL Bean, however; most of their stuff is pretty poorly-constructed, IMO.

Although I’ve always been partial to Outdoor Research, other manufacturers that utilize Gore-Tex pretty well are Marmot, Helly-Hansen, Arcteryx, Mountain Hardwear, Mammut, and North Face (at least for their more expensive, technical gear; North Face’s cheaper crap that you find on college campuses all over the US is really just for show…).

12

I used to work part time in an ‘outdoor shop’ and one of my boss’s favourite lines was “at the end of the day it’s a fabric not an anti-perspirant!” which pretty much sums it up for me. Any brethable fabric is going to be more comfortable than the 'sweating at rest plastic bags we had thirty yea

13

:smack: second time I’ve done that today

years ago.

I feel goretex has got into a cycle of having enough money to sponsor high profile events / expeditions /climbers etc. so people are willing to pay a high price for it so the company has enough money to sponsor etc. etc.

Although I’d not want to be without my Yeti Gaiters in Scotland rather than splashing out on a goretex jacket I’d spilt my money investing in a cheaper breathable waterproof AND windproof fleece of some sort.

14

Damnit I left something out again, third time lucky

Please insert
Any brethable fabric is going to be more comfortable than the ‘sweating at rest’ plastic bags we had thirty years ago but if you exert yourself you will sweat - many factors will play a role in how much you sweat and to what extent the sweat is wicked away from your skin before it reaches the goretex. Essentially goretex will not make you sweat like some traditional waterproofs but it won’t stop you either.

15

Yeah, mine’s boathouse too. I probably shouldn’t wear it everywhere anymore since it’s been 5 years since I rowed in college but I feel like such a bad-ass with the big “TEXAS CREW” embalzoned on the back.

I guess the lesson from all this is it’s Gore-Tex, not UnderArmor.