The Zpacks Goose Down Jacket is an insanely heat 950-fill energy goose-down jacket that’s good to put on in camp on chilly nights and as an adjunct to a sleeping bag or quilt. It’s type of a cross between a parka and a jacket, lower lengthy and really roomy however with the sewn-thru model of building widespread in jackets. Regardless of DWR coatings on the within and out of doors, this goose down jacket is just too heat and puffy for use as an energetic midlayer when mountain climbing. Whereas it does have the hood adjustment controls which light-weight down jackets typically lack, its worth lies in its wonderful heat and very low weight.
Specs at a Look
- Weight: 6.1 oz to eight.8 oz; varies by measurement – S,M,L,XL,XXL
- Examined Weight: 8.5 oz (males’s XL)
- Down fill energy: 950 Downtek handled down
- Down fill weight: 3.0-4.6 oz, varies by measurement
- Shell: 7 denier Ventum Ripstop Nylon
- Building: Sewn-thru
The Zpacks Goose Down Jacket is a really light-weight, very heat down jacket, lower lengthy and really roomy for layering. It’s made with a extremely breathable 7 denier ripstop nylon that’s down-proof and has an expensive silky really feel. The development is sewn-thru, which means that the within and out of doors cloth are sewn collectively to carry the down insulation in place. This a standard building method in down jackets though it supplies much less house for the right down to loft and retain heat than a field baffled building, which is extra generally utilized in hotter parkas.
That mentioned, the Zpacks Goose Down Jacket is extraordinarily heat, which I attribute to the 950 fill energy down that it’s insulated with. The Males’s XL measurement jacket I examined accommodates 4.2 oz of goose down however solely weighs 8.5 oz, which is a really excessive warmth-to-weight ratio. I’ve discovered it nice to put on when utilizing a hoodless sleeping bag or quilt, offering further head insulation with its snorkel-like hood and serving to to seal out drafts, notably across the neck and shoulders.
Nonetheless, fit-wise, I discovered the jacket to be somewhat bigger than I favor. I didn’t thoughts the additional size as a lot as the additional girth and shoulder width which makes the jacket really feel like a sleeping bag with sleeves! Measurement-wise, the massive was too small for my chest girth so I opted for the extra-large with the subsequent bigger chest girth. Whereas it doesn’t matter that a lot, since this isn’t a jacket I’d advocate for energetic use when mountain climbing, it felt unusual with all that further quantity.
The Zpacks Goose Down Jacket has three pockets, an inside chest pocket with a zipper, and two open handwarmer pockets alongside the perimeters. The jacket may be stuffed into the chest pocket for packing, which is an efficient solution to compress it and defend the shell cloth from any sharp pointy issues in your pack. That chest pocket can be good for storing a smartphone or a screw-on water filter at night time wrapped in a Ziploc bag when it will get beneath freezing at night time. The hand hotter pockets don’t have zippers and are open, so you’ll want to be somewhat cautious with placing something useful in them. They’re additionally positioned considerably low on the jacket which I’ve discovered somewhat awkward however not insurmountable.
The jacket has neck cords so you possibly can regulate the dimensions of the face opening, which I believe is crucial, however is usually left off of light-weight down jackets. However the wire locks that management the size of the adjustment wire are positioned contained in the hood at mouth peak, not outdoors the hood, so that they rub towards your face. Furthermore, the seam the place the wire exits the hood isn’t strengthened with a plastic or metallic ring so it rubs immediately towards the seam and seven denier cloth, which doesn’t bode effectively for sturdiness.
In the event you evaluate this hood building to the hoods of the Montbell Ex Mild Anorak and even the artificial Enlightened Tools Torrid Jacket, which I’d take into account good aggressive alternate options, they’ve rather more durably constructed hoods with exterior adjustment controls which can be out of the way in which. Each additionally defend the hood seams from the management cords with metallic rings so that they don’t tear the material or seams. The identical goes for his or her hem changes, one other weak space on the Zpacks jacket.
I additionally don’t notably like the stitching on the Zpacks Goose Down Jacket, the place the stitching is totally uncovered, with numerous free threads, and never buried and out of sight just like the aforementioned aggressive jackets above. In the event you’re going to $375 for a down jacket, I believe you must count on a extra refined degree of building.
Evaluation
The Zpacks Goose Down Jacket is the third garment I’ve reviewed from Zpacks this yr, together with the Zpacks Ventum Wind Shell and the Zpacks Vertice Rain Jacket and I haven’t been blown by every other of them. Whereas tremendous light-weight clothes was a lot more durable to come back by a number of years in the past, there’s much more competitors on the market than there was. Zpacks makes nice backpacks and shelters, however I’d give this Goose Down Jacket and their different ultralight apparel a go.
Disclosure: Zpacks donated a jacket for this evaluate.
SectionHiker is reader-supported. We independently analysis, check, and price one of the best merchandise. We solely earn cash if you buy a product by our affiliate hyperlinks. Assist us proceed to check and write unsponsored and unbiased gear opinions, newbie FAQs, and free mountain climbing guides.
