an order worth printing and more

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This will be my second Ducksback shell parka. Going from XL to L. I too have waited my whole life to find rain gear/ insulation that I can wear without sweating inside.

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I have reprinted Greg’s order because of his comment. Is he alone having had the experience of retaining sweat; NO! every person who owns a goretex or other equal material to goretex knows what it is like to retain sweat inside of their garment with or without insulation!

I believe the closure of stores that have been selling these garments will demonstrate to people who own non-wp/b garments find they work better. I also believe the more people who do buy the Ducksback garments will gladly share their experiences with them with others and the others may become Wiggy’s customers or at the least I hope so.

Lunch this Saturday with Kok and Pum allowed me to further educate Kok on how insulation works and why our insulation makes all the rest obsolete.

But first lunch.

I have a vertical rotisserie that I normally use to cook Peking duck. But I had a small jar of Chinese barbeque sauce, I gave the jar to Pum, so I do not know the brand. Any way I marinated a natural chicken in it for 3 days, then put it in the rotisserie for 2 hours at 325 degrees. What I was hoping for happened the skin became crisp. Having never done this before I did not know how it would taste. We all agreed it was quite good. Of course, Pum had fried rice and I had bought sugar snap peas. They do not grow in Cambodia, so they were new to Pum. Out of ½ pound she eat about ¾, she has a sweet tooth. Cherries are about $10.00 or more a pound in Cambodia so being inexpensive here she devours them.

I like the vertical rotisserie because it allows all of the fat to run out of the bird. I also suspect most any barbeque marinade would be tasty because the bird is constantly moving versus laying in one spot on a grille waiting to be turned so it never burns.

Now for the education.

Air sticks to any surface for a distance of 1/8^th inch. This is not something I have ever spoken of with him, so it was new information. I then showed him a section of the 15-ounce Lamilite which is made up of about 8 or 10 layers of the continuous filament fiber. The thickness is about 2 ½ inches and is comprised of several hundred thousand filaments. The L-15 is used for the Super Light one-layer top and bottom and the Ultima Thule as well as the Antarctic bags in multiple layers.

At this point I told him about conduction. I gave him the following analogy. If you have a caste iron skillet it gets hot on the burner and if the handle is caste iron the heat moves from the skillet to the handle which gets hot. The movement of the heat to the handle is called “conduction”. The heat is being conducted through the caste iron to the handle.

When you are in a sleeping bag the heat from your body rises and meets the nylon lining. The nylon conducts the heat from your body to the fiber, but the fibers that make up Lamilite are not compressed together so the heat touching a fiber is not conducted to the fiber closest to it, because there are not enough touching each other. There is not enough heat available to cause the air between the fibers to move. Of course, there would have to be extreme heat to cause the air to move since it is less than 1/8 inch stuck to the fibers. The greater the density of the fibers the smaller the spaces between the fibers, hence the more difficult to move the air. So, it stagnates, and stagnant air is warm.

Then I showed him a layer of the L-6 or 6-ounce Lamilite which is 1/3^rd the thickness but is also made up of 5 or 6 layers of the continuous filament fiber which leaves the layers and fibers further apart. This is used for the Nautilus, Desert bag, and over bags. It is easy to see how much further apart the fibers are which means less insulation.

The bags with the L-15 are for temperatures from 0 degrees to -60 degrees. The L-6 is used for 40 degrees.

I further explained that quilting the thicker polyester battings that other companies employ brings the fibers against each other which means that there is conduction taking place and of course the stitch lines in and of themselves allow the heated air to move through them. However, the heated air that is stopped by the thicker areas of the quilt moves to the thinner areas where the quilt stitch lines are and flows out through the stitch lines as well. It is a chimney effect.

I explained that a wet person getting into a wet Wiggy’s bag finds they warm very quickly and the heat their body is producing does move away from them at a very slow rate. This heat is trapped within the fibers that make up the Lamilite and since the fibers are not drawn together as happens when you quilt the heat just stays stagnant and as such is the catalyst that drives the moisture out of the bag. you wake up dry and if the bag were wet it too is dry.

I gave Kok another analogy. You walk into a cabin in the woods something he has never done, and it is cold and damp. You start a fire in the fireplace and the heat heats the brick or stone fireplace which in turn heats the air that starts drying it and you begin to warm up. The same thing happens in a Wiggy’s bag. This action accounts for the reason so many people have had the experience of getting in a sleeping bag wet and being able to sleep; because they are warm and finding they are dry in the morning.

He did ask about the quilted liner vest, jacket ands some of the warm weather sleeping bags we make. I explained that I did not feel comfortable using the L-3 laminated. It could shift around when laundered which does not happen with the heavier weight Lamilite, and we did not need returns. However, these products are not made for cold weather use although many have written and told me the liner jacket has been surprisingly warm.

I get a great deal of enjoyment educating Kok as well as reviewing so much of the knowledge I have acquired over the years and not only sharing it with him but obviously all of you. I think it is unfortunate that the people who worked in the industry years ago when I was first learning what I know chose not to take the time themselves to learn, had they there would have been more good products made and maybe these companies wouldn’t have moved off shore where all they get made for them are in my opinion trash products.

Since the virus has changed things maybe there will be somewhat of a resurgence of manufacturing domestically.