REVIEW: Rab Alpha Flash Jacket

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 UKC/UKH Gear 10 Oct 2017
The Alpha Flash at Reiff, 4 kbA lightweight and highly breathable fleece, the Alpha Flash is ideal for mountain trad, chilly sea cliffs or cold weather hillwalking, finds Martin McKenna

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In reply to UKC/UKH Gear:

So we have gone full circle!

Fleece kept you warm but let wind pass through.

Then Primaloft, etc, filled garments were as warm but better due to wind resistance, layered easy due to slick lining. Less breathable for on the move though.

Polartec Alpha, all of the above but more breathable.

Take out slick inner lining, lighter, more breathable, still windproof.

Voila, take off outer windproofing, leaving insulation, ie fleece!!

So it is a new fleece, with the inherit limitations!? Hmmmmn.....

Stuart



In reply to Stuart the postie:

Not necessarily the same, but I did smile when we were shown an ice axe without - you wait for it - a rubberised handle at a trade show a few years ago. The reasoning for it's removal was, apparently, because 'it reduced weight and made it slicker + easier to plunge'.

What's the chances that in three years, maybe less, we'll be shown an identical ice axe *with* a rubberised handle because it "provides extra grip, making it easier to use".

Or maybe I'm just getting too cynical
 TobyA 10 Oct 2017
In reply to Stuart the postie:

It is an odd one isn't it? Polartec Alpha was the big new thing in synthetic insulation, as approved by US special forces no less!, just a few years ago. I wasn't very convinced back then that it was that more breathable, but the outer and inner material seemed crucial http://lightfromthenorth.blogspot.co.uk/2014/02/marmot-isotherm-hoodypolart... So they take the inner liner away, and do what Buffalo did 30 years ago, then take the outer shell away and do what Helly Hansen did 40 years ago! Doesn't mean it's not a great light fleece, but is it any thing more than that? And do the US military feel annoyed they were sold a micro fleece wrapped in a windproof as something new and game changing?

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