Posted by Matt Fisher from Manassas VA USA on May 07, 2021 at 16:49:33:
The fleece is a VAST improvement over the existing insulating system which consisted of several non-integrated pieces of kit such as the jacket liner for the combat jacket (both useless), the CF green wool sweater (fine for wear in garrison, but a too heavy/bulky for the field), and the wool flannel shirt (an excellent piece of kit, but again too heavy and bulky).
Chief advantages of the fleece clothing is a good warmth to weight ratio, durable when cared for correctly, highly breathable, hydrophobic (water hating)and maintains loft.
However the fleece does have some disadvantages. Fleece is not very compressible, which can be a serious problem when trying to jam them into your '82 pattern ruck. When packed, the jacket takes up approximately half of the space available.
Now the space problem is going to be somewhat alleviated when the new rucksack hits the field sometime in the next few years. Until then here are a few suggestions to make the fleece a little more packable.
1. Obtain a compression stuff sack for the jacket and pants from an outdoor goods dealer. I'd suggest Mountain Equipment Co-op, as they're Canadian run, and produce some great Canadian made equipment.
Their website is http://www.mec.ca While they don't have the stuff sacks onlin, you can order a catalog.
Another great online company is campmor at www.campmor.com or cabela's at www.cabelas.com
Both of these company's are US, but have a great selection of products.
By using a compression stuff sack you can reduce the size of packed fleece garmets by 20-30%.
Also, you can use the compression stuff sacks for the issue sleeping bag, so that it can be reduced to a more managable size.
2. If you don't like the fleece, there are alternatives. the best alternatives to fleece are loft filled garmets. The chief advantages of these are very very great weight to warmth ratios, and excellent packability. However if you're using these garmets be sure to wear them underneath your combat shirt/jacket, etc. as to protect them from abrasion/rips.
Probably the best loft filled jacket is the military oriented ones made by the British company snugpak. Snugpak can be viewed online at http://www.snugpak.com/codegreen/index.htm
They make a great line of jackets, pants and sleeping bags specifically designed for the use by the military.
MEC also makes a jacket in black (not an ideal color but permissible for wear under outer garments within some units) I can't remember the name of it, but it's in their current catalog.
Integral Designs out of Calgary manufactures some great equipment, of which insulated jackets and pants are included.
www.integraldesigns.com
So those are some resources out there for those of you who are affected by the CTS project.
I'm interested in hearing feedback from people who're getting the new kit.
Anything positive, negative, or any ideas you may have about equipment/clothing/kit in general would be great!
We've been blessed with this forum of discussion...let's use it for the purposes of making our lives in the CF's better, instead of letting the idiots control the course of discussions.