Salewa Protection WS Gloves
Owner Review by André Corterier

Personal Biographical Information:

Name: André Corterier
Gender: M
Age: 32
Height: 1.85 m (6 ft 1 in)
Weight: 78 kg (172 lb)
Email: andreDOTcorterierATfreenetDOTde
Home: Bonn, Germany
DATE: 2004-10-13

Backpacking Background:

I began backpacking in my late teens using Europe’s "InterRail"-System – weight hardly mattered, as we were on trains a lot. I usually traveled through southern Europe during summer, for about three weeks at a time, moving from campsites (often without tent) to youth hostels etc. I recently rediscovered backpacking and have started out slowly – single-day 15 mile (24 km) jaunts by myself or even shorter hikes (pushing a stroller uphill through the woods). I am getting started on longer hikes, as a lightweight packer. My gear is either old or really new – nothing in between.

ITEM: Protection WS Gloves
Year of manufacture: 2003
Year of purchase: 2003
Manufacturer: Salewa
URL: http://www.salewa.com/
MSRP: 39.95 EUR

listed weight: none given
measured weight: 50 g (1.76 oz) (for the pair) (size XXL)

First Impression:
These are slim, lightweight finger gloves. They're black, though Salewa offers them in other colours, also. The "WS" stands for Windstopper, which is a windproof (though not waterproof) membrane incorporated in the gloves. Apparently, not making the gloves waterproof allows them to be much more breathable than waterproof membranes. As I was looking primarily for gloves which I could wear when bicycling to work on cold winter mornings, this seemed like a good idea. The outer surface has a soft, slightly fuzzy texture, which I assume means that the membrane is located just beneath it. On the inside, the gloves have a soft, extremely thin lining. They stretch a little. Both gloves had three tags on the inside. One said "100% polyester", another tag gave the size, and a third had what I take to be a quality control number on it. There were also two small black tags on the outside of each glove, saying "Salewa" and "Windstopper", respectively. This made for ten tags total, which I found to be a bit excessive (so I excised them).

Field Use:
I've worn these gloves mostly (daily, in the colder third of the year) for the purpose I had originally intended them for: bicycling. I have found the Windstopper membrane to make an astonishingly large difference, when taking into account that these gloves have no dedicated insulation layer. Even when cycling quickly (a little over 30 or so km/h - call it 20 mph) through sub-freezing wind, the gloves insulate well from wind chill. As I generate a good bit of heat when doing so, this was enough so my hands didn't feel cold.
I guess it bears bearing in mind, however, that windproof, not waterproof, really is a big difference. I was surprised how quickly the gloves and my hands were soaking wet when bicycling through rain. This also led to my hands quickly feeling cold. I guess this is because with the gloves soaked, there is a heat conducting layer of water between my hands on the inside of the glove and its outside, the latter experiencing wind chill.
The gloves do not dry out as quickly as I had expected, based on my experience with other high-tech fabrics. I guess the membrane is a hindrance in this regard. The fuzzy surface texture air dried quickly enough, but the inside was still quite moist and beginning to smell after a night. So I turned the gloves inside out entirely and let them air dry some more. Interestingly enough, when they felt dry after that and I turned them around again, the fuzzy side felt just a wee bit moist again. I guess water has a tendency to spread out in them. Next time I'll dry the inside first (should take care of the smell). Machine washing them was not a problem. I assume that wearing them until they are dry would be much faster, as body heat would drive out the moisture (at least this has been my experience with polyester clothes).
My hiking experience with these, while logging fewer total hours than on my bicycle, has born out these findings entirely. By effectively stopping wind chill, they've prevented my hands from becoming cold in sub-freezing temps, even though I used to find that - possibly due to shoulder straps - my hands quickly got cold in the colder third of the year when hiking. They're phenomenal when coldness is almost entirely due to wind chill, but even on windless cold days I've found them to make a large difference. When I put them on only after I've realized that my hands have become cold already, I note that my hands do not warm back up inside them - it takes some vigorous swinging of the arms to achieve that. That may be more an effect of my circulation (or lack thereof) than the gloves. I have also found rain to be much less a problem when hiking, compared to bicycling. On my bicycle, my hands are at the front of my aerobars and therefore the most exposed part of my body, being pelted with rain. When hiking, most rainfall pours off my sleeves and never encounters my hands/gloves. They are also able to shed a few drops of water before being soaked, which means that in the few instances in which I've hiked in rain (up to two hours in gentle rain) I've not had a problem with my hands feeling either wet or cold. I have not tried the gloves with walking poles in the rain.

Comfort:
I find these gloves to be quite comfortable. The thin lining is soft (and being soft appears to be its sole purpose), which together with the fact that these gloves stretch makes for a good feel. When hiking in windy situations, where the wind becomes uncomfortable, I quickly put these gloves on and find that they make all the difference. One of the reasons I chose finger gloves is that I wanted to be able to do things with them requiring a modicum of manual dexterity even with the gloves on. Of course, mittens provide much more warmth per weight by not separating the fingers and, admittedly, I take the gloves off for most finicky things to do. Yet, if and when I decide to leave them on, tasks like locking my bicycle or taking out my keys (even locating the correct one for the door in question) is easy enough.

Durability:
I have never done any serious work in these gloves - either I walk (and I do not use walking poles), or I ride my bicycle. This means that the gloves have yet to experience anything rougher than grabbing aerobars or pulling on a zipper. They still look like new (minus the tags), which I appreciate, but that may not be saying much.

Side Notes:
The gloves vanish in my jacket's pockets. I do not roll them up, and thus they feel like a thick, cozy lining when I put my hands in my jacket pockets. They roll up to the size of a candy bar (each).

Summary:
Good protection from wind and cold in not quite arctic temperatures. Comfy. No good against rain.