I believe nylon will melt into wounds too, although perhaps not to the degree that polyester will; I'm not sure. The US Army issues Nomex (I think that's spelled correctly) uniforms for flight crews (aircraft crashes and severe burns go together). Nomex supposedly does not melt into wounds.

Natural fabrics like wool and cotton don't melt into flesh, something to think about, particularly with gloves which could easily catch fire while cooking. I have convertible fleece mittens/gloves which I like for cooking. Just pull the mitten portion outward and then up and back and the mittens convert to fingerless gloves which are great for dexterity. I wear some thin liner goves underneath, so my skin isn't comepletely exposed but I can still feel.

While I like my fleece gloves, I'd be in potentially deep doo-doo if they caught fire while cooking. Had I to do it over again, I would buy wool convertible mitten/gloves or wool fingerless gloves. I may even buy some wool ones even though I already have the fleece ones and just use the fleece for day trips where I don't plan to cook. Fleece is generally lighter than wool, and snow doesn't bond to fleece as much as it does to knit wool.

Hello,

This is my first post in this forum and writing in english is not really easy for me, but I think that I could perharps give some response to the first question.

First you could get good advices about cotton in winter in the book of Garrett & alexandra Conover "snow walker's companion, winter camping skills for the north". They will describe anoraks made from "egyptian cotton" by Empire Canvas Works.

If you want to know all the story about Gabardine (from Burberry's), Grenfell and Ventile you could read the book from and english professor Mary Rose : "Invisible on Everest - innovation and the gear makers". You have good explanation about these specials windbreaker and water resistant cloths.

Some interesting advices about grenfell cloths and cotton for jungle's war:

http://www.lostworldsinc.com/Grenfell_Cloth_Trench_Coat.htm

You could also see the klattermusen site in sweden. They have some cotton jackets in "Eta Proof" this a kind of ventile made in Swizterland. You could see "rimfaxe"

http://www.klattermusen.se/start.php?lang=EN


I have, like other friends, a jacket from SASS. They are very wind resistant and could resists some hours under the rain, good deal.

http://www.sasskit.co.uk/products/militaryclothing/sassmock.htm

This not "real Ventile". The owners says that the the cloths come from USA and the quality is very good. You could find extra long staple cotton in USA, equal or better than "egyptian cotton" the name is "sea island cotton". I like a lot this jacket.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gossypium_barbadense

I know that a lot of people say "cotton kill", especially with underwear, and I think that it is very often the truth. But, you could have for underwear netsuit from Brynje : these cotton underwear were with Hillary and Tensing on the Everest. Thes "netsuit" was "standard equipment" for scandinavian armies and russian special troops.

http://www.brynje.no/public/index.php?set_language=en&cccpage=historikk

So cotton,is perharps "not the best" but It could be useful. It is very good for antarctic expeditions, and it is good for underwear if you are a soldier : cotton doesn't melt on the skin like other fire resistant synthetic (nomex, kermel....).

During "falklands/malouines/malvinas war" (england vs argentina) in eightys a british destroyer (sheffield ?) was destroyed by a missile exocet. A lot of soldier were burned because they wore "polypropylen" underwear. These underwear were warmer, cheaper, easier to clean than cotton or wool...but polypropylen has a very low melting point. I think that US soldier have discovered this fact in Irak against IED.


sheffield

"The fires on these ships did result in one clear change, which was the shift away from the nylon and synthetic fabrics then worn by British sailors. The synthetics had a tendency to melt on to the skin causing more severe burns than if the crew had been wearing non-synthetic clothing. The official report into the sinking of Sheffield, recently disclosed under UK Freedom of Information laws after an extensive campaign by ex-RN personnel,[8] severely criticised the ship's fire-fighting equipment, training and procedures and certain members of the crew.[9]"



Apologize for my english.

PS : A big article with a lot off illustrations about Grenfell and Ventile gear. Sorry this is in French...

french article

Merci pour les liens et bienvenue sur le forum / Thanks for the links and welcome to the forum.

Frankie

Actually, your English is reasonably good. Far better than my French.

Thank you for the good information.

IMHO the expression "cotton kills" comes from mountain rescue teams etc who rescue persons clad most unsuitably in cotton jeans and t shirts etc.
Such clothing is of course suitable only for fine weather.

Cotton clothing of reputable manufacture, designed for cold conditions, such as the ventile garments refered to above is quite suitable.

Cotton long underwear looses its insulating properties if wet, it is therefore totally unsuitable (and may well kill) if the wearer gets wet. Wool or synthetic fibres would be much more suitable.

Cotton long underwear (tops and bottoms) is very suitable for cold dry conditions, such as in unheated homes , vehicles or workplaces, or in case of fuel shortage, failure of heating plant etc. I would also wear cotton long underwear for outdoor work or gardening etc were there is little chance of geeting wet.
Cotton is moderatly priced, can be hot washed or even boiled without damage, and is far more comfortable to wear than wool or synthetics.
Such articles dont seem to be sold in the UK, I had to purchase from the USA.
Here in England it does not often get cold enough for long underwear to be required, though I consider it prudent to keep a good supply just in case.

There are some very important caveats that should go with this advice. The biggest one is - don't perspire. If you aren't going to be exerting yourself and don't perspire when you sleep, cotton can be acceptable.

In my case, this is never true. I sweat freely at slight exertion and sweat heavily in my sleep. Cotton longjohns are no-go for me since I load them with moisture almost no matter what I do. (I can't even sleep in my own bed in cotton because I am so damp.)

The book COLD COMFORT (don't have it handy to name the author) about 20 years ago explained to me why I was cold at the end of a warm day while jeeping in the Colorado mountains. Changed my outdoor life for the better.

I wear 100% cotton and poly/cotton BDU pants for outdoor stuff but for cold, I have the longjohns to wear underneath. Both type BDU pants are better than jeans since neither hold as much water. Even the 100% cotton BDU pants because they are fairly thin. (but I always wear polypro shorts underneath)

Personally, I do not care for the cotton-poly blends for outdoors use, but YMMV. NyCo beats it in all ways but cost. However, cotton-polyester is much more suitable as a general purpose outdoor fabric than ordinary short-staple coarse-weave fabrics. Long staple cotton in very fine weaves, usually with some sort of DWR finish, is just a whole different topic and IMHO prone to some pretty extreme opinions on performance (both ends of the spectrum).

So let's drop Ventile and similar fabrics out of the discussion for now. I will note that my first-hand experiences with those type of fabrics, while limited, have been generally favorable, but I have realistic expectations - they are not really GP do-it-all fabrics.

Cotton/Poly is more about durability and so forth than anything else. 50-50 NyCo has been around a lot longer than an earlier poster mentioned. That blend is far superior to cotton-poly blends for most conditions, but there is more to the story... Take 2 different US military clothing items, both 50-50 NyCo, both readily found surplus: D BDU trousers and Field Trousers. The performance in windy/cold conditions is dramatically different in favor of the field trousers. Why? Weave. The D BDUs are twill; the field trousers are sateen. Durability is about the same, but the cold wx performance of the sateen makes it seem like an entirely different material than the twill (and it is).

BTW, neither will "melt" on you like pure nylon or polyester - part (only part) of the reason it is a blend is to provide reasonable protection against that from happening from flash burns. Performance is more like cotton in a flash fire.

Anyway, I digress - 50-50 NyCo sateen clothing that still has its Quarpel water repellent treatment intact performs incredibly well - it is STILL my cloth of choice except for very hot conditions, and I can pretty much afford anything I really want. Surplus clothing (any blend) is very unlikely to have any useful Quarpel treatment remaining. Re-treatment with a suitable commercial product is something I'm finally forced to experiment with (my DW insists on laundering my gear too frequently...). Jury is out on what is "suitable" so far.

NyCo does NOT dry as quickly as 100% nylon, to be sure, and there are conditions where I just absolutely prefer 100% nylon trousers and windshirts. But no one fabric does it all; most of us just compensate for what we are accustomed to using, according to the individual choices we make and conditions we experience.

If you like the poly-cotton value-performance, use it - it's not bad stuff, regardless of MY preferences. Any outdoor clothing fabric for temperate to cold use is improved with a decent DWR finish freshly applied, so you might want to consider polishing up your gear that way. No rec from me as to which product to use - my experiments are strictly on NyCo.

<edit> Epic fabrics (which can be about anything material-wise, as long as it is treated with Nextec's propitiatory process) may be the best soft shell stuff so far. I think I would really like NyCo Epic as an outer layer. Think I'll wait for the post-season sales, though... <end edit>

HTH,

Tom