20 months ago I purchased a pair of Halvarssons Prince trousers and associated jacket, both are lined with Outlast. They have not been heavily used. This autumn whenever it chucked it down with rain I was certain the trousers were leaking in the crotch area. Initial enquiries made me think that they might be ready for wash as the Goretex may have become clogged however to no avail, after washing in Nikwax Technical wash and reproofing with TX10 I still felt I was taking in water whenever it was belting down with rain. However when I arrived home I checked it with a damp meter there was no sign of moisture at all - in fact it clicked faster when I put the damp meter probes on my hand! When I had washed the trousers I had taken out the liner and noticed that the Outlast PCM had been worn away around the crotch and so started think that this was the problem. I went in to my dealers to asked if I could buy a replacement Outlast liner but was told that I could not buy one, they are not sold as a replaceable item. I am an engineer and happen to work in a high tech environment so managed to firstly get a micrometer and measure the thickness of the liner - the areas of the liner that were obviously still covered with Outlast (i.e. the parts that were not subject to abrasion) was 0.041mm whereas the areas where the Outlast had been worn away was 0.029mm. Both to the eye and touch the Outlast PCM (phase change material - called 'Thermocules') was no longer present. Looking on the Outlast website some months ago (it seems to have been removed when I checked now) it stated: “When Outlast® technology is designed to be part of a fiber, it is a permanent part through the life of the garment. Our coated products also have excellent durability.” In other words, when coated it is not permanent. This morning I met up for the first time this year with my biking club and saw that one of the guys had a Merlin suit which also had Outlast. Although he paid a lot less for it than I did for my Prince trousers (I paid c£300) he too had noticed when he took the lining out the other week as he was too hot that it appeared to have worn away on the seat. I was very interested in the fact that another manufacturer was using Outlast as my contact with Halvarssons over the New Year had ended quite badly when the Outlast Technical Director's word was given precedence over my own and I was dismissed out of hand, and quite rudely, by Jofama (who own Halvarssons). As I mentioned above, I have access to some very high tech equipment including a thermal imaging camera and have quickly proven that the black areas on the liner do relate 100% to missing PCM as the heat loss through these areas is much higher than the areas where the PCM is still intact. I am wondering if anyone else has been experiencing similar problems with Outlast-lined tourers - I have no complaints about my jacket as there are no significant abrasion areas with a jacket as compared to trousers.
