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a new super duper insulation

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The following advertisement I have copied from SGB’s web site. Outdoor research company is trying once again to offer an insulating material used in garments they make. This could be their fifth maybe attempt at making an insulation for use in the garments they make.

Sometime back when the Polar Guard factory was damaged by an earthquake in California so they could not ship to The North Face Outdoor research stepped me to fill the void with sleeping bags, a product they had never made. That was about 30 years ago. They have been successful failures at the task of making sleeping bags or I should say no sleep sleeping bags. None of the insulated products they have made have proven to last very long because they do not work.

Now they have a new fiberfill product that will prove to be as unsuccessful as all previous products.

Introducing VerticalX™ SuperStrand; The Best Down Alternative for Four-Season Warmth

Posted: November 01, 2022

Categories: Gear and Tips

Author: Outdoor Research

We’re building on the VerticalX™ name with a new insulation technology that’s the lightest way to layer effectively and stay warm in all four seasons, providing the very best warmth-to-weight ratio.

This statement is as erroneous as can be said about insulation. There is no insulation that will perform as they state. Just like goretex works, it doesn’t and neither does this so called insulation.

Meet VerticalX™ SuperStrand

VerticalX SuperStrand is the lightest, softest, most compressible insulation available, blending the very best qualities of down and synthetic into a single superpowered technology.

There is no best quality of down and the same goes for the strands of fiber they are using, not continuous filament.

Unfortunately, I am not able to copy and paste the picture they show of the strands of polyester fiber, but it has to be quilted and therefore it will be thin just like all of the jackets that have preceded them coming out of Asia.

Outdoor research is as all of the other companies that they compete with are looking for a new insulating product because all of what they have used so far are failures. They have thus far refused to acknowledge that Climashield is the best and in my educated opinion only insulation to use for whatever clothing item they want to make. This particular product they term verticalx will not be around in a year or two.

We live and have lived in a throw-a-way society for generations, basically since the end of WW2. Look around and you can see how things products have changed but not necessarily for the better.

In the one small sphere of manufacturing a product I have changed nothing about it. The primary component of what I produce is the insulation and the method is via lamination. Wiggy’s has followed this method for the 35 years of its existence and I used it for several years at my old company Olam. The insulating material has demonstrated it outperforms all other forms of insulating materials used for the same purposes, so there is and never has been any reason to change.

So far all they are using this wonderful material for is jackets good for Key West in July and not yet in their no sleep sleeping bags.

I have now seen numerous insulations that are synthetic that are flash in the pan as this one will be and also the coating of a water repellent on down to make it less capable of absorbing water. Do you see any garment or sleeping bag made with it? I don’t.

There is a serious situation when the mind is blocked from learning what works and what doesn’t. All of what they in the industry do demonstrates that they chose not to review what existed before them. They block it out.

I like to think there are other companies that have chosen to continue to make whatever the same way for years or generations. They to have learned that change is unnecessary when you already make a product the right way to begin with.

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