Desert DPM Issue Smock materials

[lostplanet]

Does anyone know if the Desert DPM smocks have been available in All Cotton or 100% cotton?

Reason is I like the design of the current issue smock with the hood and zipped napoleon pockets and they are very cheap, so not worried about damaging it,
but I don't like the pattern Woodland or desert DPM, so i'm thinking I can dye a smock some neutral colour but only if they are not the Poly-cotton mix version.

 

[litefoot]

I seem to remember this cropping up before and the outcome was that it was pretty well near impossible to get rid of the camo pattern completely.
Litefoot.

 

[sandsnakes]

You can dye them, the secret being dye them darker than the brown so the pale base fabric optically drowns out the brown. You will need a lot of dye and then they will end up a kind of designer camo in very muted colours.

Sandsnakes

 

[lostplanet]

even the poly-cotton versions? I thought that polyester thread couldn't be dyed or am I thinking Nylon?

 

[John Fenna]

Polyester is dye proof - nylon dyes OK - hence "Dylon".....
Polycotton dyes badly, especially the intimate spun poly cotton. Core spun dyes better as only the cotton realy shows...
I have no idea what kind of threads the new combat smocks are other than they are polycotton.....

 

[iano]

You can get black ones (MoD police issue?) from Jasper at Strikeforce, that's more neutral a colour than the cammy ones.

You might want to get it worn, washed and faded in the sun a bit though, all black might look a bit ninja-esque. I had a pair of black BDU trousers once, when faded to a kind of deepish grey colour (didn't take long) they were mega. The only other thing I can think of would be to ask a seamstress if they could knock up something in the smock pattern but out of a material of your own choice.

Just a word of warning though, the latest smock material (the one the post-ripstop field jackets and current issue hooded smocks are made from) isn't that quick drying - get it properly wet and you'll be that way for a while, unless you have a heat source or are doing some serious work in it and generating your own heat. The ripstop of earlier field jackets was a better material to my mind, more quick drying, more lightweight for summer or when exerting yourself, can still pop a Softy under it for when it's Baltic out or you are static, oh, and ripstop too. Perhaps there is a black ripstop one out there?

 

[Melonfish]

There's OD copies knocking around the net, i'll get my m8 to send me the link to where he got his from.