Does any “waterproof” kit actually remain waterproof for longer than a few hours?

My hiking boots – Salomon fabric- that cost a hundred and plenty quid now have the waterproofing of a teabag after a year and around 200 – 250 miles. They were replacements for a pair that leaked after even less time. They have been well looked after, they still bead up water on the surface but after an 8 mile wet walk my feet were soaked to the point of squelching as the boots soaked thru

£100+ jackets that leak on their 3rd wear – MrsTj was totally soaked and borderline hypothermic after a long day in the rain in her new jacket on its 3rd outing. My jacket now leaks 3 years of little useage soaked thru after the same walk but not as badly

Do I just give up and buy cheap boots and use gortex socks and accept the sweaty feet? ( I have very sweaty feet)

do I just use builders oilskins? I lent a 15 yr old set to my nephew for the same walk – he remained dry – these cost £10!

Any recommendations? I have never had a pair of “waterproof” fabric boots that actually remained waterproof for more than 5 mins. I get fed up of replacing expensive jackets every year or two. and of getting wet walking in the highlands. It seems to me the jackets are ok until the first time they get really soaked then are never waterproof again. Its a bugger when you find this pout miles from the road on a wet and windy day.

All expensive branded stuff.

anyone good experiences of any particular brand? Boots or jackets?

You should get a car.

I’ve done thousands of miles in mine and was as dry as a bone.

Ok – What car for crossing fisherfield? Must be able to go where even intrepid HTR 550 chaps have to walk their bikes

Meindl Bhutan boots. Top quality. Mine have been faultless. Used for nearly two years and still look pretty new.

Arc’teryx gorerex jackets. Expensive but easily the best quality I’ve ever had.

loddrick – have they done 6+ hours of driving rain tho? thats the question. 6+ hours of walking in 3″ of water / long wet vegetation?

Ok – What car for crossing fisherfield? Must be able to go where even intrepid HTR 550 chaps have to walk their bikes

This will free up time for tea and cakes when you get there…..

I’d advise wearing a helmet.

My Lowa boots have been faultless, as has my Patagonia Triolet Gore-tex jacket.
Would highly recommend either bit of kit.

Salomon IMO are iffy on waterproofing, particularly if they are light boots. That said, I have just bought a pair….but they are a tougher split leather pair.

What jackets and fabric is failing? I find I can get three hard years use of out most good fabrics. My ME Gore Tex Pro-Shell is now 4 years in and gets ‘damp’. How often do you clean & proof and how? The solution may be Paramo + proofer…

loddrick – have they done 6+ hours of driving rain tho? thats the question. 6+ hours of walking in 3″ of water / long wet vegetation?

I think that all my boots, brand new out box would have got wet in that, particularly with my gaiters on.

Having been introduced to the stunningly effective, cheap and readily available lightweight(*I was a country boy) SAI 1 cwt plastic bag with head/arm holes gilet by my parents as a child, in later life (esp on a motorbike) I found that a decent bin liner/rubble sack*extra holes usually reqd) under a jacket can make a pretty decent waterproof liner and they fit in a pocket. (*edit and supermarket carrier bags inside boots)

I’m no longer bothered by goretex/equiv stuff as I don’t think they release (for me) enough moisture esp when cycling/working hard -platic is cheaper and waterproof, sweat and rain are both wet.

I’m rather with Towzer on this. Boots have a fundamental design flaw in that there’s a hole in the top for your foot, so, IMHO water will run in the top. As to fabric boots I’ve never found them to be as waterproof as leather. Jackets – I tend to get 1-3 years out of them – after that they leak if it’s filthy. Tried Ventile (leaky), site jackets – v waterproof but horrid, goretex – gives up after a bit, Lowe Alpine Tri Point Ceramic (de laminates after a bit and doesn’t like impact). On a bike now I just layer up. On the hills I am trying Event. Doubltess it’ll be good for a bit then not so much.

Matt – they they are not waterproof are they? waterproof means no water gets in surely. Thats just a typical day out in our lovely country!

Jackets? a mix of stuff. Berghaus, mountain equipment, Patagonia, All goretex IIRC all well over £100 and sold as waterproof

Washed in proper stuff from Tisos and “reproofed” according to instructions – but thats just the beading on the surface on the outer shell – if the membrane is intact surely they shouldn’t leak even if soaked? Or does it just soack thru eventually? If so its not waterproof

I wish someone did mountain type jackets in builders oilskin material.

The boots were not wet from the top – they soaked thru.

Fabric boots never seem to last, probably too much wear on too small an area.

I’ve never had a problem with GTX jackets leaking – been walking in monsoon conditions and they don’t leak, although eventually condensation might make you damp.

I don’t think I’ve ever been out in rain for 6 hours, maybe choose your days better?.

Recently we did 10 hours in solid rain – thats the day Mrs TJ got hypothermic. We were more than a days walk from shelter bar our tent. it was walk out or call for the big yellow whirlybird.

6 hr wet day was a prearranged trip with folk from all over the country. In scotland if you don’t go out if it might rain you hardly ever get out. I was wearing near on £500 of waterproof kit. I should have been dry inside it.

Maybe paramo is the way to go.

For summer I just accept that my feet are going to get wet. I suppose it helps that I’ve done a lot of fell running so I’m used to that lovely feeling of squelchy mud squishing through your toes 😆

Not sure how long after I met you in Fisherfield it was before you reached the top of that climb but I crossed the plateau over to Carnmore when the bad weather hit, it had mostly passed over by the time I was on the descent. I just put my jacket on and accepted that extremities would get wet but I was limited in what I was carrying which was based on the forecast for the event. The jacket was the only “heavy duty” item I took, the rest of the kit was lightweight. Most of the showers were dealt with quite adequately by a Haglofs Windshirt. I suppose it does help if you are generating a lot of heat.

I had three pairs of socks (all wool/synthetic mix) for the HT550, used one pair for two days using one of the other pairs at night, then another pair for two days before putting the third pair on at night and using them to the finish. I dry my feet at the end of each day – towel dry then apply talcum powder. Shoes weren’t “waterproof” but that meant that my socks would dry out if the conditions allowed. River crossings – just get on with it! Take socks off if you want (I didn’t since I knew that the sections before and after were boggy as well) then dry your feet at the other side and put your socks back on.

Many modern jackets have a water repellent coating which needs care, it gets worn off with usage so the material itself becomes soaked which in turn makes the membrane much less effective. It’s usually a case of shoving into the washing machine with the relevant replacement then, bizarrely, ironing with a low heat afterwards.

whitestone – we were fine that day – IIRC we actually bailed and dropped back down to camp. It was a week later we got soaked. Much worse weather than that day

I used to not worry about wet feet – my feet are never cold but I thought modern materials might make waterproof boot feasable

all the kit had been reproofed and tested that it was beading before we went

For me Paramo would be far too hot for summer use, great in winter.

If you want waterproof then wellington boots or similar with overtrousers coming down over the outside then jacket over those. You’re going to boil though.

I’ve not yet had a membrane give up and start leaking, even on cheaper jackets. The ‘D’ in ‘DWR’ may well be slightly optimistic though.

However, on a day like that, i’d never bank on being completely dry, either the outer fabric will wet out and cease breathing and you’ll get wet from sweat, or enough water will get down the neck and gradually soak everything else.

fifeandy – the water came thru the shoulders and back of the jacket. You could see from the pattern of water on the layers underneath. Not from sweat or down the neck. MrsTJs jacket has been replaced under guarantee, I am going to take the boots back tomorrow and see what they say. My jacket being 3 years old obviously not worth taking back. I have never had a “breathable” jacket that was actually waterproof when it was more than a few months old and been out in the rain all day

I never used to find condensation an issue anyway back in the pre goretex days and my nephew who had on my builders oilskins was completely dry apart from where a bit came in the zip

fifeandy – the water came thru the shoulders and back of the jacket. You could see from the pattern of water on the layers underneath. Not from sweat or down the neck. MrsTJs jacket has been replaced under guarantee, I am going to take the boots back tomorrow and see what they say. My jacket being 3 years old obviously not worth taking back

Shoulders and back are prime areas to get wet from inside out as i assume you’d have been wearing a pack? The pack itself will be blocking the breath-ability, and will also wear off the (not so)DWR allowing the outer material to wet out and stop the entire garment breathing.
A quick google suggests its very unlikely water is actually penetrating goretex membrane.

You can of course always be unlucky enough to get faulty kit.

Mrs TJ baselayer was and fleece even wetter – wet enough to drip. She was also borderline hypothermic. No way was it sweat. Her jacket was replaced under guarantee. I could actually see daylight thru pinholes in it but they were not enough to account for the amount of water

My boots were squelching – again no way it was sweat.

My jacket – I had soaked theu a soft shell into my fleece. base layer dry.

In all cases certainly soakthru

Would cheaper boots & some of the knee length sealskinz work?

Not really a walker, so don’t know what will & won’t work…

I bought some cheap Hi-Tec boots when camping once for around £30. They were impressively waterproof for a few years, but quite sweaty & only used occasionally; not monster hike-athons.

In a similar vein, perhaps cheaper jackets replaced more frequently might be a better option?

Could you take along plastic poncho type things to wear as temporary layers, so if the weather gets really bad you can cover-up until it passes, before removing?

stumpy – thats the sort of road I am thinking of going down.

Its not just me that finds this – I know others with breathable fabric failures in these conditions

2 bits of gear that have never let me down even in torrential rain – Scarpa SL boots and Keela Munro jacket. Everything else get’s wet through after a while, don’t mind though as I can stay warm with layering.

I find the stiff old three-layer Gortex materials last a lot longer than the lightweight or stretch garments. A North Face lightweight Gortex leaked on the shoulders the first time I wore it with a pack and no it wasn’t condensation. I also find ski jackets with three layers and a drop liner last even longer.

The best so far is a Schoffel ski jacket with a drop liner but no insulation. It’s about 800gm with the snow skirt and mask pocket taken off which is little more than a mountain specific three-layer. It’s kept me properly dry driving into pouring rain on a bike when touring. Given it’s kept me dry at least twice as long as any other “Gortex” the initial jeez-that-much price now seems good value.

As for boots, none of the hill walking waterproof boots have been remotely waterproof. Cramponable leather mountain boots have kept my feet dry as do plastic boots, but walking any distance in them is a miserable experience. My Gortex Salomon hill walking boots leaked the first puddle I stepped in.

Here’s the Schöffel, styled like a tent and equally cosy:

Ta folks

Do yo9u need to be warm ‘ hot in goretex to drive the moisture out? ie if you are cold can it soak thru?

I have a old pair of zamberlain winter boots ( leather) that are waterproof but my feet sweat in them. I have a non water proof pair of merril mesh boots that I don’t sweat in. breathable waterproof boots seems bit of a holy grail – the salomons stink now as well – as even tho they are “breathable” they don’t really breath enough. Stink like a wet dog thats been investigating a dead deer

A mate of mine runs a sizeable chain of independent outdoors shops and webshop, with the amount of fancy goretex/fabric boots they sell i was surprised that his personal ones are leather. I bought leather ones too

Do yo9u need to be warm ‘ hot in goretex to drive the moisture out? ie if you are cold can it soak thru?

You need to be warm to vaporise the sweat I would guess, don’t think being cold would let anything in the other way though compared to being hot.

Outdoor activities in Scotland I would always prioritise staying warm over staying dry as the range of conditions you can experience over the course of the day is so wide. Warm and wet is far better than dry and cold.

Do yo9u need to be warm ‘ hot in goretex to drive the moisture out? ie if you are cold can it soak thru?

As I understand it, the moisture needs to be in vapour form to pass through the tiny holes in the membrane, and the temperature between your body and the goretex shell is going to have some impact on that: the cooler it is, the more moisture is likely to have condensed before it reaches the membrane.

Whether the temperature/condensation relationship is so significant in your case that it would account for your experience is not something I can say. I did have experience with a first or second generation goretex jacket on one occasion of cycling in dry below zero conditions, and I slowed down for the last few miles home due to tiredness. When I got home and took off the jacket, it was coated inside with a layer of ice (frozen sweat) and there was ice on the outer face of the fibre pile jacket I wore. I presumed that my slowing down meant I was generating less body heat, and that resulted in the condensation point moving to the inside of the jacket (as can happen in sleeping bags).

However, another factor is the humidity. Again as I understand it, Goretex works best in low humidity: the more the air outside the jacket has a lower humidity than inside the jacket, the better it performs. I guess this may be osmosis and the establishment of an equilibrium: if the humidity outside is as high as inside the jacket, then I suspect the amount of moisture that passes through the membrane will be the same in both directions. The UK, and especially Scotland, probably experiences higher levels of humidity than much of the rest of Europe, so people’s experiences of goretex shells may vary significantly dependent on the climate and conditions they use them in.

Ta

try Fjallraven

they use a material that required waxing. and if its good enough for all the hunters in Scandinavia then it’s etc etc

and it ain’t exactly dry up here