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qwert
Feb 4, 2009, 11:46 AM
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I was recently discussing this with a few buddies, but we didnt come to a conclusion, so i throw it a the swarm inteligence here:
Is wearing gloves inside mittens helping you to keep your fingers warm, or is it contraproductice?
So you need insulation to keep back the heat, wich keeps your fingers warm. So the thicker the insulation, the more heat retained, the warmer your fingers (as loong as you dont overinsulate, and cut of circulation).
But in mittens you fingers stay warmer than in equally thick gloves, since the fingers are together, and therefore directly warm themselfs. So a glove inside a mitten would stop this way of staying warm?
I am utterly confused. And testing it is hard to do, since you would have to reproduce exactly the same situation, once with every setup, and that is not really possible.
Whats your take on this?
qwert
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Adk
Feb 4, 2009, 11:54 AM
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I would say it depends on the gloves yet I do wear wool gloves inside wool mittens that have a trigger finger option when I hunt and it gets chilly. I never complain about cold hands and they dry out easily as compared to guys who wear modern gloves.
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brownie710
Feb 4, 2009, 12:07 PM
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well think about sleeping in a sleeping bag wearing a pair of down pants instead of just a sleeping bag. more layers usually equal more warmth providing you are not decreasing blood flow with tight gloves/mitts or using shitty gloves and mitts. i would say the rewarming might not be as quick if you have to take off the system and then put it back on compared to two mitt systems.
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reg
Feb 4, 2009, 1:26 PM
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moisture removal has a lot to do with warmth. i think thats the key. so, good insul, good wicking capabilities and a quality single glove is best. a nylon over mitten could be a good addition to a system to keep out wind and moisture in extreme conditions. it would want to be roomy enough so, i think i'd use a mitten system rather then stuffing a glove into a mitt.
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rhythm164
Feb 4, 2009, 1:59 PM
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I think it depends on the glove you're using. I usually wear a thin pair of liner gloves inside BD Mercury mitts for skiing, but anything thicker than liners is almost a hinderance. Beyond keeping your fingers a little more toasty it's nice to have a thin layer on if you have to take the mitt off to fiddle with something.
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qwert
Feb 4, 2009, 2:01 PM
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Some interesting thoughts so far.
To clarify a bit:
I am mostly searching for a system for extremer conditions. Like really really cold, or "need to warm my freezing fingers quick, while belaying, before if slip into my thin gloves for the next pitch" situations.
Apart from saving me money (not having to buy another warm mitten) it would also cut down on bulk and wheight a bit, and for the really really cold sitution i would have the possibility to do some finer work, without having to completely expose my fingers to the cold.
for standart conditions a good pair of gloves is probably the simplest and best solution.
qwert
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reno
Feb 4, 2009, 2:24 PM
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Qwert:
If you want to do this, be sure your gloves are not TOO bulky. Perhaps a thin liner glove inside a large mitten would be best.
And if you need to warm your hands in a hurry, a chemical heat pack works well.
Lastly, as others have mentioned: Keep your hands and gloves DRY. Moisture causes heat loss around 20 times faster than dryness.
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dingus
Feb 4, 2009, 2:30 PM
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qwert wrote: Is wearing gloves inside mittens helping you to keep your fingers warm, or is it contraproductice?
Here's what you do - next time out wear the glove liner one hand, a mitten liner on the other. Note which hand stays warmer.
On your next trip out use the oooosite hand liners - and also note which hand stays warmer.
Report your findings here.
THank you.
DMT
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Adk
Feb 4, 2009, 3:04 PM
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I have used poly prop. glove liners in the past and they seem to be the key especially when it's well below zero.
I can only really speak for wool gloves and mittens though. I prefer wool for the fact that I can take them off when they are damp/wet and slap them against a tree and get much of the moisture out, put them back on and my hands are toasty again.
I have climbed a bit with this combo too, yeah I'm a noob to ice, and it seems as if my hands get just as cold as the next guy but most of my experience here is in the pursuit of game with this combo and not too awfully much with ice tools in hand for extended periods of time.
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fresh
Feb 4, 2009, 7:08 PM
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I would expect glove-in-mitten to be warmer but who knows? just see what works for you. I'd actually expect circulation to be the main problem with so many layers.
someone also mentioned moisture management. totally important to keep excess water off, but remember that if you lose too much moisture to a wicking layer too quickly, you'll just end up colder. having slightly moist skin isn't always a bad thing. (of course the REI salesguy will never mention this.)
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graniteboy
Feb 4, 2009, 7:55 PM
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Liners inside of mittens on cold days. Always. This is pretty old hat stuff. For truly cold conditions though,
(< -20F), I wear this: midweight liner, fingerless wool gloves, Mitt inners, Mitt outershell. I do find though, that you pump out much easier from hanging on ice tools while wearing all those layers, which makes technical climbing a bitch at really cold temps.
One of the points that needs to be addressed is that, in truly cold conditions (see above), it's unlikely that you'll be climbing a bunch of hard technical stuff anyway, though, so hyper-dexterity is not that much of an issue.
A much more frequent issue is often the fact that when you're just carrying an axe by the head, even with all those layers, the axe head is a great heat conductor. Alot of experienced Denali and Antarctic climbers,guides, and SAR guys insulate the head of their long axe for this reason, and/or wear (relatively incompressible) Wool Dachstein mitts as the insulative layer. It's that close contact with a metal surface that steals the heat, so putting something in there that disables that close contact really helps.
There. A whole bunch of options to play with. Let us know if you like any of em, because, ultimately, this is a personal decision that can only be determined through lots of trial and error. Try to make sure that you don't lose fingers while finding out about the "error" part though. And remember, democratic "collective wisdom" regarding Inuit dog mushing methods is probably not nearly as important as knowing how the eskimos themselves do things.
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skiclimb
Feb 4, 2009, 9:05 PM
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Grew up hiking and camping in extreme cld temperatures.Down to -60F
Denali expeditions, Ice climbing skiing to -40F
Short answer is that a pair of light gloves in a pair of correctly fitted Mitts is DEFINATELY Warmer than the Same pair of Mitts by themselves.
Pretty much anytime it is cold enough for mittens my system involved a pair of midweight pile gloves inside a good expedition Overmitt. (OR was my choice for years) I live in Reno now and just havn't used mitts the last few years.
When I was a child out in -60 stuff (which is another world from -40 beleive it or not) Used Mittens inside Down Mittens.
(This post was edited by skiclimb on Feb 4, 2009, 9:08 PM)
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graniteboy
Feb 4, 2009, 9:54 PM
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Agreed. OR (outdoor research) mitts are good food when you hafta have mitts on. When in the Ak range, I usually have a spare pair of liners that I keep dry by putting them between my VB sleeping liner and my sleeping bag...although I'm actually from the balmy tropical region of Donner summit, not Nome.
Hey skiclimb....aren't you actually Johnny Waterman? Or Apple Benowitz?
Seriously, though, when it hits -40, I get my ass in a cave and stay there till it warms up... That winter ascent -60 denali thing is of no interest to me. I like my toes too much.
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skiclimb
Feb 4, 2009, 10:09 PM
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Nah Johney died ages ago, weird duck
Havnt climbed with Jeff in over a decade.
Ahh there was a time... But i just got to doing my own things..
-40 is just a gear thing not that big a deal... -60 or better is a strange world where most fabrics shred like tissue paper and many metals can snap like twigs. No serious technical climbing can be done in these temperatures. At least not without NASA backing you up with so far non-existent gear.
Lotsa great climbers you'll never hear about unless your a local AK climber. ( I never was a great climber.. great ski-mountaineer i suppose, but just a decent all around climber)
pretty much true everywhere.
(This post was edited by skiclimb on Feb 4, 2009, 10:13 PM)
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graniteboy
Feb 4, 2009, 10:45 PM
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Nah....Johnny is still out there...they never found a body...which makes me realize that you're a prime candidate, denying it and everythang.....that's the first indication....
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granite_grrl
Feb 4, 2009, 11:56 PM
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rhythm164 wrote: I think it depends on the glove you're using. I usually wear a thin pair of liner gloves inside BD Mercury mitts for skiing, but anything thicker than liners is almost a hinderance. Beyond keeping your fingers a little more toasty it's nice to have a thin layer on if you have to take the mitt off to fiddle with something.
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macblaze
Feb 5, 2009, 1:58 AM
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I think there is also some dependency on your constitution...
I frostbit my hands mildly as a teen and they suck at staying warm. I have definitively found a two mitt system to work better for me than a thin glove/mitt system. When I start whacking my hands together to get that stupid blood flowing, I want as little between the fingers as possible 
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Lazlo
Feb 5, 2009, 2:10 AM
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I just bought a pair of OR mitts to go over my MH gloves.
I have XL mitts and M gloves.
Weather/school/work obligations keep bumping our climbs back.
...I'll let you know how it will work if we ever get out there this year.
I had good gloves last year...my hands were horribly cold. I needed something more.
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Alpinisto
Feb 5, 2009, 5:36 PM
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rhythm164 wrote: I think it depends on the glove you're using. I usually wear a thin pair of liner gloves inside BD Mercury mitts for skiing, but anything thicker than liners is almost a hinderance. Beyond keeping your fingers a little more toasty it's nice to have a thin layer on if you have to take the mitt off to fiddle with something.
^^^This iz korrect.
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julio412
Feb 5, 2009, 6:22 PM
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I've been living,working,and occasionally climbing here in Russia.
And to tell you the truth-too much insulation on your hands seems WORSE.
iF YOUR TAKING CARE OF YOUR CORE TEMPS; the rest of you seems to follow.
I mean unless of course you're dead exhausted, dehydrated,famished, things like that.
Moisture control; layers that breathe, block the wind and don't hold moisture like liners make all the difference.
I think we mountaineers suffer like those beginners who are cold because they think it's cold.
Think lite,carry spares and think of options if things get ugly.
My 2 cents
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wildone09
Feb 12, 2009, 10:01 PM
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Lots of good discussion here.
A couple of us have been playing with glove/mit systems for a while in an effort to find the ultimate ice climbing hand protection/warmth set-up.
We've narrowed it down into two categories: 1) Wet days 2) Dry days.
Wet days are warmer, high perspiration and a chance that running water or melty ice/snow will wet out your gloves.
Dry days are bitter cold - what you are asking.
For wet we have found that layered neoprene with plastic or leather protection on the knuckles is ideal for warmth and dexterity.
For dry we agree with what has been stated by many other folks here. Overmit with a down backing if possible over glove inner.
Most of our testing has been in wet conditions. Glacier Gloves has some nice neoprene options. Very grippy palms for leashless tools. I would like to see them add another layer on the knuckles for protection. Anyone have any experience with neoprene they would like to share?
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qwert
Feb 12, 2009, 10:08 PM
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Thanks so far. a lot of good suggestions.
Our discusssion also lead to the idea that thin liner gloves are probably a good thing, whereas too thick ones are detrimental.
However i am not shure if i will be able to test it this season. Still unshure if i will go somewhere cold or not.
qwert
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midwestpaul
Feb 23, 2009, 2:45 AM
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I use liner gloves inside flip-back mittens for a technical mitten. That way you just pop the mitten top off when you are messing with gear and your hand doesn't lose as much heat because only finger tips are exposed. I'll put on a pair of overmitts at the belay if it's very cold, like below zero F.
I prefer the flip-off mitten because it's easy to flip it back and rewarm your fingers on your neck/armpit when they get cold. I've been as frostbit as you can get without losing any digits, so re-warming my fingers is key as they can't do it themselves. Also, warming your fingers with your body heat beats the hell out of beating your partner up with those silly arm windmills.
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