Customer Project: Rain Chaps

by Dave G

• OVERVIEW
• HOW DO I MAKE IT
• MATERIALS

• Rain Chaps
• I made these rain chaps to augment the Zpacks poncho.  I made a pattern from some rain pants.  I used the pattern to determine how much material was needed.  There are four identical-sized pieces - two for each leg. There is a outside and inside to this material so you need to make sure you cut left and right front and back 'outside' pieces.  I put a 'waterproof' zipper on the outside of each leg to accommodate shoes/boots and velcro patches on the bottom to match up with velcro patches glued onto the sides of my boots and reinforcement patches on the inside of the legs to reduce wear on the material from boot impact.  The chaps are attached to your pants belt loops with reinforcements and utility cord.  All the vertical seams are flat fell seams and taped with Dyneema repair tape.  When the rain stops you can unzip the legs, roll them up and tuck them in the tops of the legs for cooler hiking.

• Required Materials:

  * 1.2 oz Dyneema® Composite Fabric Waterproof Breathable CTB1B3-1.0/H2.   I used this material because I made previous chaps from non-breathable Dyneema and moisture condensed on the inside made my legs/pants wet.  
  *  #3 HHH Waterproof Coil Zipper, YKK coil sliders (#5 would have been better), zipper pulls, and 1" Dyneema repair tape
  * Hyper D 300 for reinforcement  and velcro patches.
  * Gutermann MARA 70 thread

  Related Products:

  • 1" Dyneema® Repair Tape
  • HHH Waterproof Coil Zipper
  • Gutermann MARA 70 Thread
  • HHH Coil Slider - Reverse Mount
  • HyperD™ 300