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Reviews > Clothing > Socks > SealSkinz ChillBlocker Socks > Coy Starnes > Field ReportSealSkinz®
ChillBlocker™ Socks
Field Report 4/29/2004 Tester: Coy Starnes Gender: Male Age: 42 Weight: 230 lb (104 kg) Height: 6 ft (1.8 m) E-Mail: cstarnes@nehp.net Location: Grant, Alabama Tester Bio I live outside a small town in northeast Alabama. I have access to a good hiking area right out my front door, a large tract of woods called Pall-Mill Hollow (pronounced holler). It has a creek flowing through it with several good swimming holes. Caves abound in the area. I spent my youth climbing around the bluffs, swimming in the creek and exploring the caves. I also enjoy hunting, fishing, canoeing, and most other outdoor activities. Backpacking is my favorite pastime. I consider myself a knowledgeable backpacker but I am not an expert. I enjoy hiking with my friends and family or solo. I limit my hiking to areas fairly close to home, usually within a day’s drive of home. I hike throughout the year and actually hike the least in the hot humid months of summer. My style is slow and steady and my gear is light. However I will sacrifice weight for comfort and durability. A typical 3 season load for me is around 20 lb (9 kg) not counting food or water. I usually sleep in a hammock and cook with an alcohol stove. My backpacking trips are usually 2, 3 or 4 days in length. Product Information
Product Description Just looking at the ChillBlocker™ Socks laid out flat it is obvious they are shaped to fit a foot. Picture the letter L. They are substantially thick and a little stiff feeling. However, they are quite stretchy. At the top of the socks is a stretchy, single-layer fabric cuff. After holding them in my hands and then putting them on I would describe them as a cross between normal socks and neoprene booties. Laid out flat, the socks measure 11 in (28 cm) from the heel to the top and 10.5 (27 cm) in from the heel to toe. The socks are joined in the center with a visible seam showing inside and out. The seam runs from the front of the socks, down to my toe crossing at about the middle two toes, continues on under my foot and back up the back side of the socks. The outside layer of fabric is close in appearance to a black dress sock while the inside layer of fabric is fleece but bunched up so that little wave patterns are formed. I can stretch the sock out and make the fleece appear smooth. The ChillBlocker™ Socks are waterproof but breathable. See my Initial Report for a more detailed overview of the technical features of the sock. Testing Locations and Conditions Testing was conducted in the northeast Alabama and briefly in North Carolina on a short section of the Appalachian trail. Elevations ranged from around 1000 ft (300 m) ft to around 4000 ft (1200 m). Temperatures were mostly mild but cool on occasion ranging from 32 (0 C) to 80 F (27 C). The ChillBlocker™ Socks also saw quite a bit of creek duty. Field Testing Results Testing the ChillBlocker™ Socks has been interesting. The weather has not been cold enough to really need the socks except for a few nights in my sleeping bag, but I have observed that the socks are not uncomfortably hot in mild temperatures. The socks also are very comfortable on short and long hikes with and without a pack on. I have also learned the socks stay up well. Each time I returned from a hike, I noticed a few flakes of the inner fleece had worn off. I say flakes because that is what it looks like. I had already submitted my Initial Report when I first used the ChillBlocker™ Socks other than a few hours puttering around in the house and yard. I wore them on a hike to the creek below my house wearing my size 11 Bite sandals. It was one of those cool mornings which quickly warms up. I had on sweat pants and a T-shirt, but was wishing for shorts by the time I reached the creek. I was carrying drinks for the trip and was privileged to tote a 3 year old part of the way. The hike was about 1 m (1.6 km) round trip. I had to wade in the creek to see how warm the socks felt. Of course both socks filled with water, due to the creek being up and the water moving fairly fast. But my feet stayed warm despite being soaked. I did not remove my sandals and try to wring the socks out but rather just hiked home in them wet. The socks remained comfortable on the hike home. It was 62 (17 C) when we returned home about 2 hours later. Once home, I wrung them out as gently as I could and hung them on my custom sock dryer sometimes referred to as an elliptical trainer. By turning them inside out and right side out ever few hours, they were almost dry by bedtime some 11 hours later. My next test was to find out if the socks leaked in a more controlled test. On March 1 I filled the bath tub with about 6 inches of cold water and carefully stepped over into it. It only took about 10 seconds to notice my left foot was getting wet along the seam at the back of the sock just above my heel. The right sock stayed perfectly dry. The following day Danaclo was notified and agreed to send a replacement pair of socks. I continued to test the defective socks for normal wear by avoiding water until the replacement socks arrived. On my next hike it was really feeling like spring when I left home with the temperature at 71 F (22 C). I wore a pair of size 11.5 NB 806 trail runners. During the hike which included some steep scrambles and a few briars I was careful not to get my socks poked but did manage to scrub them a bit. Upon returning home, I removed them and noted they were just slightly damp, as were my feet. I noticed my feet had ripple marks on them especially across the top or my foot. The socks did not slide down and they left 2 distinct rings around my leg where the tops of the socks were riding. While the socks felt good on this hike my feet felt hotter than I like which is really no surprise. The socks had a bit of odor but not too bad, so, I turned the socks inside out to dry and air out. My next outing came a few days later on March 10th. This time I walked 2 m (3.2 km) with my wife on the road. I then continued on down to the creek and back. It was about 60 F (16 C) during this hike but the ChillBlocker™ Socks only became slightly damp inside, no more than my cotton socks would have been. I turned them inside out, noticed the odor was getting stronger, and hung them up to dry. The next day I tried the ChillBlocker™ Socks in my size 11 EE Georgia Boot Eagle Lights work boots. These work boots are uninsulated but have a Cambrelle lining. I wore them all day working out in the yard. I was cramping in my ribs by 4 PM, but still had some fruit trees to prune. By the time I finished at 5 PM I was ready for a bath, as were the socks. I decided to take care of it right away and rinsed them under my outside faucet. I then proceeded to the kitchen and in a small wash pan I put about 2 g (8 L) of luke-warm water and about 1 fl oz (15 ml) of liquid clothes detergent. I swished the socks around, then reversed the sides and swished some more. After a few minutes the water turned a little gray, probably a combination of black dye, sweat, dirt, and trail grime. I rinsed them until I could get no suds to appear on either side of the socks. I then gently squeezed them as dry as I could and back to the custom sock dryer they went. My replacement ChillBlocker™ Socks arrive a few days later and I immediately tested them in the bath tub. No Leaks! Back to some serious testing. I won't attempt to record every hike I made while wearing the replacement ChillBlocker™ Socks but suffice it to say, I continued to use the socks for both short hikes and for sleeping in my sleeping bag when conditions warranted. On a trip to Rainbow Springs in North Carolina, I actually wore them on a fairly long hike on the Appalachian Trail. Wearing a 25 lb (11 kg) pack, I hiked about 3 m (5 km) to a camping spot and then did another 4 m (6 km) of night hiking with only a fanny pack. I crossed several small streams and wet the outside of the socks but my feet stayed dry. It was around 45 F (7 C) during the night hiking but my feet were actually hot enough to sweat. I took the ChillBlocker™ Socks off a few minutes before bedtime and let my feet air out a little. The lining felt barely damp when I put them back on. It dropped to around 32 F (0 C) overnight. As on previous nights when I got a little cold in my sleeping bag, my feet remained very warm all night. It was very cool early on the next morning but again the ChillBlocker™ Socks were almost to warm for serious hiking. After about a mile (1.6 km) of hiking (mostly uphill), I stopped to check the socks. They actually steamed when I turned them inside out on a log to air them out a bit. I logged about 10 m (16 km) total on this overnight hike and the socks were comfortable, stayed up well and kept my feet warm and dry. Over the next few weeks as the weather continued to get warmer I finally gave up hiking in the ChillBlocker™ Socks, but still wore them a few times when wading in the creek below my house. I would wear regular socks while hiking to and from the creek, then change into the ChillBlocker™ Socks at the creek. The ChillBlocker™ Socks do not seal out water from the top so I always managed to get the socks soaked inside and out in just a few minutes due to splashing or getting in water deeper than the waterproof line of the socks. However, my feet always remained warm. I would return home and put the socks out on my deck in the sun. They would be dry in just a few hours if I swapped sides as soon as one side dried then flipped them inside out and continued to dry the inside the same way. On my last trip to the creek, I decided to give the ChillBlocker™ Socks one more controlled test for waterproofness. I carefully waded into the creek in a shallow slow moving area, found a good rock for a seat and sat down for several minutes with my feet in the slow moving water. After about 2 minutes my left foot started feeling a little different than the right so I carefully removed both sock and confirmed the left foot was leaking a little around the heel area. I put both socks back on and continued to test them by carefully wading around in the shallow water. After another 10 minutes the right sock leaked slightly, but by now the left sock was pretty wet inside. I was surprised to find the leaks because in all my shallow stream wading before this both feet had remained dry. I finally took both socks off, captured some air in them and dunked them. I could get bubbles to stream out of both pair with only very light pressure. The left one leaked the most at the heel area, but surprisingly, both socks were leaking at various points all around each sock, and not just at the seams. I have to wonder if the twigs, sand and gravel accumulated along the trail and pretty much ground in while hiking in sandals caused the leaks away from the seam? I tried to keep the socks free of debris while hiking but this is almost impossible. Observations Thus Far After 2 months of rough treatment I have observed several good and bad points on the ChillBlocker™ Socks. First I have to say that for socks this thin, the ChillBlocker™ Socks are amazingly warm. My feet stayed much warmer in the ChillBlocker™ Socks than in 2 pair of (much thicker when combined) wool boot socks. I would also say that rough treatment of the socks will compromise the waterproofness. Perhaps, if I had worn the socks under the protection of regular hiking shoes or boots only, I would not have developed leaks. It is impossible to determine exactly what caused the leaks but I have a very strong suspicion that the debris in the sandals is a major reason. Biased on my own experience early on in the testing, the ChillBlocker™ Socks are great for cold weather activities when not moving around much. They kept my feet warm overnight (in my sleeping bag) in conditions when my feet are normally my Achilles Heel. I look forward to next winter when I can more thoroughly appreciate the warmth of the ChillBlocker™ Socks. Future Testing Plan It may be difficult to find excuses to wear the ChillBlocker™ Socks during the next several months. I will continue to use them as I play in the cold creek water. The socks keep my feet dry when briefly exposing them to water. I will monitor the socks to see if the small leaks become any worse. Read more reviews of SealSkinz gear Read more gear reviews by Coy Ray Starnes Reviews > Clothing > Socks > SealSkinz ChillBlocker Socks > Coy Starnes > Field Report | |||||||||||||||||||