Ideal stalking jacket

If anybody wants one, I've got a windproof arctic smock in DPM which is pretty much 'as new' but has someone's name written in it (not mine!). It is size 180cm Height (6-foot), and 112cm chest (44"). It is the older green/black/brown style DPM and has the wired hood and massive pockets. I reckon £30 posted would be a fair price?
MS
 
My parents were very poor and always bought my clothes from army surplus shops but i hated having to queue up for school dressed as a Japanese fighter pilot!
Ha!
I need to dig out an old black & white photo of myself standing outside school in a freezing day, in my father's old shearling bomber jacket, and matching "baseball" cap. I still have the cap - a bit goofy looking, but if it will keep your head warm flying the Himalayas in an unheated plane, it will do the same on a cold day deer hunting.
 
I use one of these Mil-Tec Smock Lightweight Olive: Amazon.co.uk: Clothing it is wind proof so surprisingly warm with just a t-shirt underneath but thin so doesn't get hot in summer. I got it in a larger size than normal so I can layer clothes underneath in the winter. It has loads of pockets so I keep all my stalking bits in the jacket so don't needs bag of any kind. Being olive green it blends in nicely and doesn't look too military when teamed with some plain trousers.

Are they waterproof and/or breathable? If not, what do people recommend to treat themwith? Nikwax, Fabsil....?
 
Hi Caorach

I have read your advice quite a few times on different threads, and finally ordered a Olive Green SAS (alledgedly) smock.

Would your "system" work well with:

"Laksen Maral Fleece is a three-quarter length men's fleece jacket made from 100% polyester fleece with micro-fibre reinforcements to the shoulders. Lined with a CTX-AIR membrane, it is completely windproof yet highly breathable making it perfect for those active on days with wind chill."

I already own the Maral and really like it, so I hope it will work OK without having to buy the goretex jacket?

Cheers

:-)

Give it a try, cheapest jacket you'll ever buy and once you've worn it a few times and worked out how the "system" works you'll not have much use for the others!
 
Would your "system" work well with:

First of all the system isn't mine and I can't lay claim to being that smart as to see the obvious, this is the way some clever bloke in the army decided it should work and I have just been pointing out that this scheme also works well for stalking etc. Not only is it the best solution for our climate where you can have hot sun and hail all in 5 minutes but it is cheap as well.

I have worn windproof fleece jackets under various non-waterproof shells for a long time now and I would sometimes wear one with my windproof smock. Now it is important to realise that as neither layer is 100% waterproof so the final solution will never ben 100% waterproof however as with the smock you can also wash waterproofing into a fleece jacket and my experience has been that this works very well. The truth is that for most purposes it will be more waterproof than you need for most stalking.

The down side to wearing a windproof fleece under the smock is that the fleece has a lining which is not as breathable as the smock will be so it will tend to sweat you a bit more, often the windproof layer used is exactly the same material as used for waterproofing (i.e. Teflon type stuff) so you could expect to retain moisture in a similar way to when wearing a Gore-Tex layer, in fact the only reason why it isn't sold as waterproof is probably because the seams aren't taped etc. So in that respect you abandon some of the advantage of having the very breathable windproof smock but this will only be a problem if you don't keep it in mind and use your common sense when out and about.

As with the Gore-Tex layer designed to be worn under the windproof smock it is probably best to put the fleece on only when you need it so ensuring maximum breathability. If you walk hard in a heavy fleece then you will get damp no matter what the weather. I know that sounds like stating the obvious but you'd be surprised at how many people spend £1000+ on the latest waterproof gear, climb a hill in it and then want to know why they are wet when they get to the top.

Be careful of some of the "SAS" smocks as, clearly, this is only a marketing claim aimed at bumping the price up and even with a genuine Para or SAS one the only difference is often an extra pocket, or different cuff material. You can get the standard British DPM smock for £10 so if the smock you have ordered doesn't suit you or isn't as water repellent as you'd hoped pick one up and give it a try though I'm guessing you are trying to avoid the cammo colour scheme.

Another point to note if you don't like the cammo thing is that the desert windproof smocks have a light beige/brown colour scheme and some people have success dying them brown so the beige bit effectively darkens to match the brown bits. The result isn't completely perfect as you can usually see darker and lighter areas if you look closely but it might suit your purposes. Again the desert cammo smocks are very inexpensive.
 
Thanks Caorach.

It was the 29.99 olive smock from ebay. You assumed correctly I am avoiding all the camo gear.

I have bought some Nikiwax washing machine proofing to use on the fleece, hat, gloves, smock etc.


Thanks
If I can find an ultra light weight olive green goretex jacket then I should have all bases covered.
 
If I can find an ultra light weight olive green goretex jacket then I should have all bases covered.

Arktis/Country Covers used to do a lightweight green gore-tex liner for their windproof smocks. I've no experience of it as I just bought surplus flecktarn or DPM gore-tex layers but if you are looking to avoid cammo that might be somewhere for you to look. They used to sell it for around £50 but I think a lot of people were buying a surplus smock off ebay for £10 plus the Arktis gore-tex liner and so buying into the system for £60 whereas I think Arktis were charging around £220 for the smock alone. Given that they were, at least for a while, only selling the gore-tex layer along with a smock purchase. I don't know if this situation has changed but it is somewhere for you to start looking.

Actually just done a wee search and found this "coming soon" it is a bit steep at £85 so I'd still be buying a surplus DPM for £23 for a new one but...

A310 RAINSHEILD
 
I have just started using the country covers smock absolutely superb all other jackets to be redundant, I cannot rate this gear more highly, they even put pockets where i needed them, fast turnaround as well. it is superb in hot weather, breathes very easily but it will also do well i think in winter with an extra layer. The only thing I would do is ask for the back to be slightly longer for sitting on but i am sure they would do this no problem, atb wayne
 
As mentioned and known for many years, the best systems by far are, Layers..Layers..Layers, light, warm, breathable & removable, topped of with a Ridgeline pintail or equivalent, job done even on the hill.
 
I purchased one of these in DPM c1994 and have never regretted the outlay:


b226-fr.jpg




Just add a Paramo Mountain Vent Pull-on beneath when it gets chilly.


K
 
Rain or shine, winter or summer. 1 x shirt or t-shirt and 1 x expensive ass waterproof gortex jacket. (Musto in this case). Control body temp with neck buff and beanie in winter. sorry to go against the grain folks!
 
Arktis/Country Covers used to do a lightweight green gore-tex liner for their windproof smocks. I've no experience of it as I just bought surplus flecktarn or DPM gore-tex layers but if you are looking to avoid cammo that might be somewhere for you to look. They used to sell it for around £50 but I think a lot of people were buying a surplus smock off ebay for £10 plus the Arktis gore-tex liner and so buying into the system for £60 whereas I think Arktis were charging around £220 for the smock alone. Given that they were, at least for a while, only selling the gore-tex layer along with a smock purchase. I don't know if this situation has changed but it is somewhere for you to start looking.

Actually just done a wee search and found this "coming soon" it is a bit steep at £85 so I'd still be buying a surplus DPM for £23 for a new one but...

A310 RAINSHEILD
Thanks Caorach

Just got an Austrian army gore tex jacket in green. Looks a bit like a smock / jacket hydrid.

Layers are layers I guess.

Cheers
 
So where can I buy the windproof smock for £10?? I already have the MTP smock and gortex jacket, but fancy the DPM pattern as well.
 
So where can I buy the windproof smock for £10?? I already have the MTP smock and gortex jacket, but fancy the DPM pattern as well.

Go on ebay, find ones with starting prices around 99p in your size and bid on them. It will take a while and some will go to crazy money but eventually you will pick one up for £10 or not much more. It is basically a matter of getting lucky but there are often so many of them on sale that you are in with a reasonable chance.

The DPM smocks are, in some ways, better than the MkII MTP ones as they don't have the handwarmer pockets and pit zips and mesh lining and so on. This means they dry faster and seem better at doing the job they were designed for. The Mk1 MTP smocks were to the same design as the DPM smocks but were made out of a very weird fabric which seemed not to wear very well.
 
Yes... Layer up and use lightweight gear... look at the American systems from the likes of Sitka and Kuiu.. My combined Kuiu merino base layer, merino mid layer, (soon to get) waterproof down insulation and wind/waterproof/breathable shell weighs half as much as a Harkila Pro Hunter jacket and I can remove or add layers as I need them.. I can also compress it down to almost nothing and fit it in pockets or small backpack! Modern fabrics from Torey are also much more breathable than Gore-Tex stuff and are just as waterproof.!

But like Vipa i have Sitka layering systems, they work really well, i love my Jetstream jacket.
Kuiu also come recommended.
The above not cheap, but quality never is.

Whilst i have never tried the gear caorach recommends it does sound like an option.

Cheers

Richard
 
Arktis/Country Covers used to do a lightweight green gore-tex liner for their windproof smocks. I've no experience of it as I just bought surplus flecktarn or DPM gore-tex layers but if you are looking to avoid cammo that might be somewhere for you to look. They used to sell it for around £50 but I think a lot of people were buying a surplus smock off ebay for £10 plus the Arktis gore-tex liner and so buying into the system for £60 whereas I think Arktis were charging around £220 for the smock alone. Given that they were, at least for a while, only selling the gore-tex layer along with a smock purchase. I don't know if this situation has changed but it is somewhere for you to start looking.

Actually just done a wee search and found this "coming soon" it is a bit steep at £85 so I'd still be buying a surplus DPM for £23 for a new one but...

A310 RAINSHEILD

.....as I was traipsing along behind Mrs Merlin in TK Maxx the other day, I spotted a lightweight waterproof that may also be a layer option, and at 25 quid I thought I'd give it a go....
It's a Regatta, the store I was in only had xxl (but they aren't enormous), and they did have a few on the rail. Stuffs down into its own pocket (my dainty size 10 for scale), but drops perfectly into the lower back pocket of my recently acquired windproof jacket....look forward to trying this system out in anger later in the year....
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.....as I was traipsing along behind Mrs Merlin in TK Maxx the other day, I spotted a lightweight waterproof that may also be a layer option, and at 25 quid I thought I'd give it a go....
It's a Regatta, the store I was in only had xxl (but they aren't enormous), and they did have a few on the rail. Stuffs down into its own pocket (my dainty size 10 for scale), but drops perfectly into the lower back pocket of my recently acquired windproof jacket....look forward to trying this system out in anger later in the year....
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Merlin please tell me what windproof smock that is. I have the standard DPM one but it has no rear pocket and armpit zips that yours has . It looks ideal although Im not sure about the cuffs, cn't see them properly.
 
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