Yellowknife
WKR
Just got back for a sheep hunt in the Alaska Range. As I was packing, I made a last minute decision to throw in my MH "Ghostwhisper" down jacket with the new "Q-Down" waterproof fill. The Ghostwhisper is a UL 850 FP lightweight down jacket, with a super thin 7d shell. I didn't get it specifically for hunting, but at only 7.5 oz it sure doesn't take up much space in the pack. The Alaska Range turned out to be a worthy testing ground, and I thought I would report on how the new technology worked out.
As background, I'm no stranger to down garments. 30 winters in Alaska and the Canadian Territories have given me plenty of experience. I've heard some conflicting reports on the usefulness of the latest water resistant downs, and was curious how it works for hunting in real life. Kuiu is advertising it as a full on replacement for synthetic, while Sitka states that they don't believe that the technology is currently worthy of warm weather hunts and sells down as a cold weather option only.
This jacket I own was purchased primarily as a liner for heaver winter garments or shells, and it looks to be ideal for the purpose. The shell fabric is extremely tightly woven with a DWR finish and sheds water like crazy. However, like most light down garments, it uses through sewn baffle construction, with leaves it with a lot of potential leak points on the seams.
We went the second week of sheep season, which as it turned out was a less that optimum choice, and we caught 6 straight days of rain, cloud, and fog. That made for some pretty lousy hunting, but it did however, make the perfect field test for finding the limits of waterproof down.
Day 1 and 2 consisted of intermittent drizzle and fog. The temp hovered between cold and dang cold, so the jacket got used a lot.
As advertised, the down held up to the sweat and 100% humidity amazingly well. I was impressed.
Day 3 it settled down into a steady cold rain that didn't quit. If you've ever hunted in the rain for days in a row, you know that EVERYTHING eventually gets wet. Water runs down your sleeves when you glass, gets down your neck, soaks the hem of your jacket when you bend over, and of course you get to sweat in raingear all day. Despite babying it to the best of my abilities, this kind of non-stop sogginess was the death of even the waterproof down, and by the end of the day sleeves and fringes of the jacket were soaked and useless. Although the body still had some loft, the jacket had lost a large percentage of it's insulation capabilities. If I had been relying on this as a critical layer, I would have been screwed at this point.
Day 4 and 5 it continued to rain pretty much non-stop. I hung the jacket up in the tent at night, but the 100+% humidity wouldn't let it dry. On the 5th night, the rain finally quit for a few hours, and amazingly, the down recovered it's loft.
Although it rained again on Day 6, I avoided wearing it during the day and it retained it's loft.
So.... the results are in for me.
1. "Waterproof" down does indeed resist wet and humidity to a much much greater degree than regular down. Pretty cool stuff.
2. Cool or not, it's staying home on future sheep hunting trips. Primaloft has not lost it's place in my pack.
Anybody else out there use this stuff too the failure point yet?
Yk
As background, I'm no stranger to down garments. 30 winters in Alaska and the Canadian Territories have given me plenty of experience. I've heard some conflicting reports on the usefulness of the latest water resistant downs, and was curious how it works for hunting in real life. Kuiu is advertising it as a full on replacement for synthetic, while Sitka states that they don't believe that the technology is currently worthy of warm weather hunts and sells down as a cold weather option only.
This jacket I own was purchased primarily as a liner for heaver winter garments or shells, and it looks to be ideal for the purpose. The shell fabric is extremely tightly woven with a DWR finish and sheds water like crazy. However, like most light down garments, it uses through sewn baffle construction, with leaves it with a lot of potential leak points on the seams.
We went the second week of sheep season, which as it turned out was a less that optimum choice, and we caught 6 straight days of rain, cloud, and fog. That made for some pretty lousy hunting, but it did however, make the perfect field test for finding the limits of waterproof down.
Day 1 and 2 consisted of intermittent drizzle and fog. The temp hovered between cold and dang cold, so the jacket got used a lot.
As advertised, the down held up to the sweat and 100% humidity amazingly well. I was impressed.
Day 3 it settled down into a steady cold rain that didn't quit. If you've ever hunted in the rain for days in a row, you know that EVERYTHING eventually gets wet. Water runs down your sleeves when you glass, gets down your neck, soaks the hem of your jacket when you bend over, and of course you get to sweat in raingear all day. Despite babying it to the best of my abilities, this kind of non-stop sogginess was the death of even the waterproof down, and by the end of the day sleeves and fringes of the jacket were soaked and useless. Although the body still had some loft, the jacket had lost a large percentage of it's insulation capabilities. If I had been relying on this as a critical layer, I would have been screwed at this point.
Day 4 and 5 it continued to rain pretty much non-stop. I hung the jacket up in the tent at night, but the 100+% humidity wouldn't let it dry. On the 5th night, the rain finally quit for a few hours, and amazingly, the down recovered it's loft.
Although it rained again on Day 6, I avoided wearing it during the day and it retained it's loft.
So.... the results are in for me.
1. "Waterproof" down does indeed resist wet and humidity to a much much greater degree than regular down. Pretty cool stuff.
2. Cool or not, it's staying home on future sheep hunting trips. Primaloft has not lost it's place in my pack.
Anybody else out there use this stuff too the failure point yet?
Yk
