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Technology

Self-Warming Jackets 323

Posted by michael from the virtually-zero-electrocution-risk dept.
jeffy124 writes: "Those of you in the frigid north who find their coats unfulfilling of their duties may be interested in a self-warming jacket. By using steel microfibres woven into the fabric plus a lithium battery, heat is actually generated to as much as 114 degrees fahrenheit. The jackets, sadly, come with a nasty price -- US$500. Among those interested in purchasing are skiers (including some Olympians), and the Military."
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Self-Warming Jackets

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  • Finally... (Score:2, Funny)

    by Rayonic ( 462789 )
    a reason to plug in my coat!

    ...what? Why are you all looking at me like that?

  • microfibers, ok (Score:5, Funny)

    by twitter ( 104583 ) on Saturday February 23, 2002 @10:00PM (#3059228) Homepage Journal
    for a second I thought that was steel wool. There's the poor man's version of this. Wrap yourself in steel wool and apply a lead acid battery. "Oh, ow! put it out! put it out!"

    -Do NOT do that.

    • Reminds me of when I used to burn still wool, like that as a kid. The fine stuff was great for making homemade fireworks.

      Also, reminds me of George Jetson in one episode (when he thought he was going to die) trying out some indestructable suit for Spacely Sprockets to win the Good Spacekeeping Seal. It survived all the tests, but was ruined when Jane put it in the wash. Dry Clean only!

  • I dunno about the submitter's jacket... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Akardam ( 186995 ) on Saturday February 23, 2002 @10:02PM (#3059238)
    ... but most jackets are designed to be "self heating". At least, any good REI type jacket is. They should create multiple layers of air around your body that your body heat will warm, with a protective layer outside that blocks most wind and water.

    Not to say that this isn't cool, but it seems a bit impractical. One wonders if it can sufficently operate as a normal jacket once its battery's worn out.
    • Well, I don't know about the submitter either, but $500 for a good coat is well worth the price.

      Just think if emergency situations -- fall in a puddle of water while separated from the group? Just turn on the coat! If you carry another battery and use the heat sparingly, it could easily save your life....

      (Of course, REI must have been thinking the same thing when they dropped some poor guy in the snow. :-)
      • Yes, and that's another question: How well does that jacket function after it gets wet?
      • Just turning on your coat would not be
        sufficient. You need to get rid of
        the wet clothes. There is a reason why extra
        clothes is one of the 10 essentials.

        For more severe hypothermia, it will be
        necessary to warm the victim. Certainly if
        you are in a group, someone else can warm
        you up. If you are solo, your best bet will
        be to prevent that situation from ever
        occurring. And I doubt that anyone soloing
        would want to carry the extra weight for
        an emergency battery-powered heat-you-up
        blanket.
        • "For more severe hypothermia, it will be
          necessary to warm the victim. Certainly if
          you are in a group, someone else can warm
          you up. If you are solo, your best bet will
          be to prevent that situation from ever
          occurring. And I doubt that anyone soloing
          would want to carry the extra weight for
          an emergency battery-powered heat-you-up
          blanket."

          I agree with you, but I was thinking of the gold-medal winning wrestler who just recently found himself in a survival situation.

          You can read about it here:
          http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f ile=/ne ws/archive/2002/02/19/state1322EST7807.DTL

          He didn't have extra clothes or survival gear packed into his snowmobile. (Which would have saved his toes.)

          The least he could have done is wear this coat on the trip. Assuming it still works after it's gotten wet, that is. :-)
    • Not to say that this isn't cool

      Well, the whole point of it is that it's warm. So, yeah, it isn't cool.

    • Having actually been in -100 degree weather(that include wind chill, obviously) I would have given my left nut for something like this, instead we had to settle for wool thermals and nylones.

      I would imagine somebody will come out with a recharging battery that plugs into a "shoe generator".

      Now if they would add microwave pockets, I could cook a potato...

  • military battery safety (Score:5, Interesting)

    by steve_l ( 109732 ) on Saturday February 23, 2002 @10:02PM (#3059239) Homepage
    I was told by some DARPA person that one of the problems the military had with wearable tech was that a bullet which has just travelled through a lithium battery was more toxic than one which hadnt; wearing a coat with Li-ion elements is not the kind of thing you'd want to do on the battlefield. is that correct?

    • Re:military battery safety (Score:4, Insightful)

      by pongo000 ( 97357 ) on Saturday February 23, 2002 @10:38PM (#3059330)
      Why not just wrap the battery pack up in Kevlar? If a round gets through the Kevlar, you probably have bigger things to worry about then a few stray Li ions...
    • This could be countered by placing the battery somewhere where it most likely wouldn't get shot, say, the sole of a boot. Also, a bullet through a lithium battery is probably no more hazardous than a bullet through a full magazine.

    • Re:military battery safety (Score:5, Funny)

      by PD ( 9577 ) <slashdotlinux@pdrap.org> on Saturday February 23, 2002 @10:38PM (#3059334) Homepage Journal
      So put the battery in the helmet. Lead poisoning of the head is almost always fatal, so a little lithium won't hurt.
    • Don't get shot.

      Okay, seriously, there are a lot of out-of-the-line-of-fire jobs that would benefit from such a coat. Also, there are other battery technologies out there, shielding, batteries embedded in boots, etc...
    • I was told by some DARPA person that one of the problems the military had with wearable tech was that a bullet which has just travelled through a lithium battery was more toxic than one which hadnt.

      Would the answer be to make a bullet-proof self-heating vest?
      • Hrm. What vest would stop a modern rifle round? I was under the impression that most can stop a .38 or 9mm pistol round, but the remaining energy can still crack your ribs... and a rifle cartridge usually has a LOT more power.
        • When i was serving here in Germany, the vest we got we're called "Splinter and Stab protection". Granted they were not Kevlar hi-tech articles. Yet they wore in at around 20kg and we were told that any assault rifle round would rip right through your body and both sides of the vest. This may have gotten better with todays hi-tech Kevlar, but I am sure a rifle round from a very short distance would still rip right through.

          Absolutely the same is true for the helmets, be them simple sttel or hi-tech kevlar - it is just a thin piece of metal and believe me it rips...
    • Keep the battery in your boxer shorts. Not only will it keep nice and warm, but if it gets shot you certainly won't be concerned with a little extra toxicity.

      <cringe>

    • While the Li-Ion cell taking a hit would certainly be a problem, maybe even starting a fire (is this thing fireproof?) I expect these microfiber wires aren't insulated, themselves. So you get some salts from persperation in there and poof, caustic could be produced. No thanks.
    • At the newseum I saw an exhibit (link sadly doesn't have item I'm goint to mention) [newseum.org] where they had the cell phone of a reporter in the gulf war. It was an expensive sony phone, using new-at-the-time lithium batteries. The phone is shattered; you can see where the bullet entered and was stopped by the dense battery. The battery didn't violently explode with the damage.

      That gives me an idea... can you have an antibiotic and/or steriliazation suit? Not that it would help a whole lot...

  • Oh? (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I thought the military used full metal jackets. Are these the replacements?

    I guess the steel mesh woven into it makes them partially metal jackets then....

  • $500 isn't anything for many skiers (Score:3, Insightful)

    by glrotate ( 300695 ) on Saturday February 23, 2002 @10:05PM (#3059247) Homepage
    I'm a semi avid skier and I'm amazed at how much people spend on ski crap. $150 bucks for a pair of flimsy nylon pants (like th kind I got at Kmart for $12) isn't uncommon. So I would imagine a selfwarming jacket (if it has stylish logos) at $500 will have no problem selling.
    • The $150 pants you're talking about are
      probably Goretex or a Goretex clone that
      make the pants both waterproof and
      breathable. Cheap nonbreathable pants
      are fine if you aren't exerting yourself
      much, but you work up a sweat, you'll be as
      wet on the inside as on the outside.

      Normally I wear waterproof/breathable stuff
      when I'm in the mountains. I'll take the
      cheap stuff only if I want to travel really
      compact and light (i.e. trail-run), and I'll
      take the cheap stuff in addition if I am
      glissading.
    • K-mart sucks.

      nyeahh! nyeahh!

    • $500 really isn't much for jackets, realistically speaking. Leather jackets--I mean genuine quality leather jackets, not the flimsy made in Taiwan things you get at Kmart--will often cost in the $300-$500 range already. $500 for a super-high-tech battery-powered jacket wouldn't seem to be that bad for someone used to spending that much anyway just to look cool. The only question in my mind would be how long the battery lasts.

  • North Face : Old News : Check Here (Score:4, Informative)

    by Hates ( 168348 ) on Saturday February 23, 2002 @10:05PM (#3059248) Homepage

    Wow! These were shown in Mens Health magazine here in the UK before Christmas...

    Slashdot/CNN need to get with the times or get more healthy! Check it out! [northface.com]

    MET 5 Jacket [northface.com]

  • When Batman went to fight the order of St. Dumas in the Sword of Azrael miniseries, he carried a special version of his Bat-suit that had the same technology. Leave it to the fucking Canadians to rip off something from a truly gifted American innovator like Bruce Wayne.
  • the jackets filled with the aerogels made in micro gravity. sadly, they cost more like $5000 though.
  • Replace the lithium batteries with a small methanol fuel cell easely rechargable and that last 10 time longer and you have the ultimate jacket. hehe
  • $500 really isn't bad when you consider the prices people paid for first generation Gore-Tex jackets. I'd just worry about shorting it out and bursting into flames.

  • Murphy (Score:4, Insightful)

    by trustno_one ( 122616 ) on Saturday February 23, 2002 @10:17PM (#3059275)
    I think this is a not so good idea.

    - Batteries work very bad/not at all in cold conditions, you world have to keep the entire resupply of batteries inside the jacket.

    - Adds complexity, will probably not work when it is really needed (Murphys laws of combat)

    - Cotton still works very well from -15 deg C
    to -30 -15 deg C, in fact t-shirt, jacket and winter camo works quite well if walking.

    - May be usable as a emergency blanket, if you need to reheat someone suffering from mild hypothermia. Having tried that once, it was not very pleasant.

    • "- Batteries work very bad/not at all in cold conditions, you world have to keep the entire resupply of batteries inside the jacket."

      Well, the battery would be right next to the core of your body, so presumably they would be warm enough to heat the jacket. (And in turn, heat themselves.)

      "Cotton still works very well from -15 deg C"

      You've got to be kidding. Do you have any idea how many soldiers and weekend warriors would die in the wilderness if you sent them out wearing cotton?

      Cotton soaks up water. That means if you sweat at all, they'll find the body sometime in the spring.

      "Having tried that once, it was not very pleasant."

      You didn't happen to be wearing cotton, were you?

      :-)

    • Re:Murphy (Score:2, Informative)

      by Gary Yngve ( 416254 )
      Never use cotton in cold/wet conditions.
      It is very poor at keeping heat in when
      wet. And it is slow to dry. Polyester
      or fancy wicking fabrics function much better.
      You can find cheap polyester shirts/underpants
      for near the same price as cotton.
    • First off let me say that I wear electric clothing on a regular basis. Of course, mine is the somewhat low-tech variety. More cheap electric blanket, less lithium-ion.

      The main reason I wear them, is for when you need to be stationary in the elements for an extended period of time. Sure, I'd be warm if I were moving about, but if you have to sit still for 60 minutes it's going to take a *LOT* of insulation to equal the warmth of a good electric vest.

      There's another subtle difference between heavy insulation and active heating. Alterness. You'd be amazed at how fast your reaction time sinks when you get a little cold. That's not so bad when your hiking along a trail, but if you're driving a motorcycle (like me) or holding a gun (soliders) then a half second can be critical.

    • Re:Murphy (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Performer Guy ( 69820 )
      So put the battery INSIDE the jacket. It'll be snug as a bug in there and be operating at ideal temperatures.
      • Everyone's forgetting the battery also generates heat, which you want to capture and use ...

        Batteries are not very efficent, but thanks to our friend thermo-dynamics those losses are converted to heat...

        ... Now the reason you want active heating is simple, many of the tasks they are talking about fall under the category of hurry up and wait.

        A bit of background, one of my hobbies is caving in the northeast. The caves year round are mid 40's, wet, 100% humidity. When things go wrong you and the injured party can be stranded for long periods of time sitting arround while things are done to extract said party. The cold rocks and mud will just suck the heat out of your body faster than you can generate it. Tricks we use are, use 'space blankets (aluminized mylar, trash bags work just as well)', minimize physical contact with the cold rock (roll them on there side, sit on your helmet, on a pack, foam pad, ect), try to move the injured party out of any standing water, put a wool or fleece cap on (a large percentage of your non contact heat loss), use active heating if possible (candles, carbide (old miner's) lamps, heat packs (reusable, single use ones eat O2), remove any wet items that do not hold heat (wet COTTON!!, it will kill you faster than you can get out of the cave). A large percentage of an extraction involves waiting for the right tools to end up in the correct position ... ie you are ready to go, but the injured party is not on the stretcher, or the rope for raising the stretcher is not in position, or the rope is rigged, but the party has not arrived yet, ect...

        Why do you need active heating, becuase an enviroment like this will suck the heat out of you faster than you can generate it. As for a battery powered heater, I suppose if you could get the battery life up there. But then you have to lug arround extra weight, and if you are doing that, Carbide is lighter... and has a nice yellow flame.

        TastesLikeHerringFlavoredChicken
    • "- Cotton still works very well from -15 deg C
      to -30 -15 deg C, in fact t-shirt, jacket and winter camo works quite well if walking."

      Cotton sucks as a cold weather textile. Period.

      Aside from that, the problem is not when you're walking or active, but rather when you're sitting in a wet foxhole for three days. Even during a mild North Carolina winter with the temperature still well above freezing, sitting wet and motionless will quickly induce hypothermia.

    • Anyone ever think about what happens when the battery goes out?

      Being as how steel is woven into the fabric, and being as how steel is a very good conductor of heat, it also means that it's a very good heat-disipator as well. When the battery goes out, not only will the heat be lost quick, but your body heat will also be lost quicker through the fabric of the coat.

      Something like this would work nice as a vest or an inside liner, but I wouldn't want to have it inside the coat itself.

      Words of wisdom from a northerner who loves the cold (and hasn't been getting enough of it this winter).

    • Re:Murphy (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Lumpy ( 12016 ) on Sunday February 24, 2002 @10:25AM (#3060449) Homepage
      this was the point of the military application..

      the armymen are not going to be jogging, doing jumping jacks, etc.. they are going to be sitting in a ditch full of ice and snow, while a blizzard of snow and small bullet shaped pieces of lead fly overhead. you are not moving while you wait it out in a foxhole... so you dont generate heat and you get hypothermia even with 32" of polar fleece wrapped around you. All military footsoldiers have never fought a hard war. in reality, if you are fighting a ground war in a very cold region (because the enemy has been shooting every plane we have out of the sky, and the country is too far inland for the Iowa to lob Volkswagen Bug sized projectiles all over. so far we've fought countries that have no abilities, so in the event we actually have to fight a real ground war this technology would be a life saver. plus it would be a morale booster, which is more important that health during combat.. A warm soldier is a fighting soldier. I pray that we never again fight a war that is anything like the conditions were during WW-II,Vietmnam,Korea..as I am certian that our ground troops are not ready for such conditions.
  • Forgive my ignorance, but how does this compare to normal extreme weather jackets? I'm not talking about your standard department store or whatever jacket, but the kind of jacket you'd buy if you were going camping in Alaska (since that sounds like what this is meant to compete with). My totally uneducated guess is that those probably cost between $100 and $200, so for the added warmth, maybe it's really not so expensive.
    • The heaviest fleece jackets from North Face, Marmot, et al, run around $200 (with out Windstopper). Warm down jackets run $200-$250, and ultra-warm down (for Himalayan/Alaskan climbing) usually runs in the $500 range.

      The thing that most people seem to be missing with this coat is the bulk and weight savings compared to traditional fleece/down coats. The Met 5 jacket is significantly less bulky than down jackets, and offers more warmth for the less weight than heavyweight fleece.

    • Here's what I use, not for "extreme conditions," but for any cold and rainy day when I venture out to check the mail. It's VERY warm, amazingly waterproof, and damn expensive -- I'm a "tall" so it's $300! It's also guaranteed for life, so it's not as if you're spending a lot of money on something that's going to fall apart in 5 years.

      The phrase "you get what you pay for" certainly applies. I've had 'cheap' winter coats before, and this thing makes them look like a spring jacket! The ability to apply 114F to your chest area for 2½ hours could be a life saver... so if you take the risks (off-trail skiing, winter hiking, etc.), this is a trendy form of insurance. Not that I'm going to buy one, but I can understand the comfort it affords -- less layers, more freedom of movement, the ability to sound like a true geek when you say "Excuse me, I need to go plug in my jacket..."

      It'll sure be interesting when they manage to carry information on those wires, instead of just current. (Yes, I know they're working on it!)

    • Well my replacement for this is layers. I use a wicking undershirt followed by a polartec fleece top (same manufacturer, great stuff) and finally a Gortex mountaineering jacket: $40,$80,$350=$470 but I'd still need at least the wicking undershirt and probably one of my lighter fleece tops. If I get my wish and go down to Mexico to climb Orizaba(18,405 ft.) this spring I just might pick one of these up. When you are trusting your life to 2 things, your equipment and your skill no price seems too high.

  • Not just jackets! (Score:3, Informative)

    by Raetsel ( 34442 ) on Saturday February 23, 2002 @10:19PM (#3059278)

    I saw an announcement at MSNBC about the same thing [msnbc.com] yesterday. Interesting thing: They're not worried about it standing up to washing. The problem was making the heating filaments sturdy enough to withstand industrial weaving! Never thought about that...

    Interesting to note that Lands' End [landsend.com] is going to be selling electric blankets based on this same technique. Toasty! (Unfortunately, it looks like they don't have them listed on their site yet.)

    Malden Mills (the PolarTec manufacturer) has a bit on the stuff as well:

  • X-treme R&D (Score:5, Funny)

    by jacoberrol ( 561252 ) <jacoberrolNO@SPAMhotmail.com> on Saturday February 23, 2002 @10:21PM (#3059281)

    "The company even dropped one climber in a 20-foot crevasse and buried him in snow until he started shaking..."

    Now that's what I call R&D. How will they test cooling textiles? By Dropping this poor guinea pig into a pot of hot water and increasing the temperature until he starts hallucinating?

    RD: "Fred, turn on the cool suit!"

    Fred: "Get the bugs out of my head! Get them out!"
    • That's nowhere near as extreme as the
      testing Black Diamond did for the Avalung.
      Bury people entirely in snow with and
      without the Avalung. Monitor oxygen levels
      as they slowly suffocate. Dig them up
      before oxygen levels become dangerously low.
  • >The company even dropped one climber in a
    >20-foot crevasse and buried him in snow until
    >he started shaking, then had him flip on the
    >jacket.
    >"Soon afterwards he stopped shaking, and we
    >realized this was a pretty cool project," said

    If they didn't have him flip on the jacket,
    he would have stopped shaking [a little longer]
    afterwards as well. :)
  • Many people are saying "$500?!?! That's way too much money!"

    Consider: If this jacket prevents you from getting hypothermia and dying, was $500 too much to pay?

  • heh (Score:1)

    by brood ( 126904 )
    Me and a friend had to come up with an invention for my gifted class when I was in middle school about 11 years ago. Our idea was essentially this product, a cross between a jacket and a heating pad. Nice to see something I thought up when I was a kid get put into action :) Not that it's an unobvious idea or anything...

  • Wow... another stupid idea... (Score:1, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    As a man who has worked for two years in the high Greenlandic arctic, I can tell you straight up-front that this is a dumb idea.

    You're own body heat is all you need, given adequate insulation; without it, this isn't going to keep you alive, let alone comfy. The biggest problem in the arctic environment is keeping the cold out, which means keeping the wind and snow out. I've bundled up to be super-warm, using many layers of normal clothing and sweats and jackets, and I can tell you adding heat doesn't help, since all you end up doing is sweating. Sweat+30 below zero F before windchill = unhappy freezing person.

    A set of decent insulated boots would be nice. If you stand on ice long enough, even in the best boots, your feet still get cold.

    By the way, do you know how much power it takes to generate heat in this fashion? If they're going to exchange insulating mass for heat generation, it will be a marvel of inefficiency. If they're not lightening up on movement restricting (and heavy) insulation, what's the point of adding a powerpack/heating elements other than to waste gobs of taxpayer money?

    The real problem is that you have to be bundled head-toe in that environment, and it makes movement tricky.

    So how much will a set of 12 D cells last? Probably a few hours. (Or were they planning on including a 12.7V automotive/marine lead-acid battery?) When they run out and start to leak or burst, hope you have another set. As for me, I'll take the standard issue stuff any day, it's warm, though heavy and bulky, but it's warm, and you don't drown in a pool of your own sticky sweat.

    Da p01ar b3ar
  • ... considering it must have a pretty heavy-duty battery (it's lithium ion) to heat it for 5 hours. Think of how much a little laptop battery costs. So if you give them $150 for the battery, $200 for a high quality winter coat, that leaves $150 towards the heating technology... which is not bad for a new technology, they've put a lot of time and money into developing it.

    Skiers will snatch these babies up, $500 is nothing compared to what a serious skier spends on equipment and lift passes every year (not to mention the $50,000 SUV to get there and the $150K for the ski condo...). I think that market alone is enough to make this technology take off, although I bet there will be many applications...

    -Turbo

  • Side effects... (Score:2, Interesting)

    by gutigre ( 539743 )
    What happens if you turn the jacket "on" when nobody's wearing it? This thing must generate lots of heat in a small amount of time. My chem lab experience make me think the jacket might start to melt or burn...


  • What the Butt Naked Brigade actually ordered was a warmer for their --

  • Finally... (Score:2, Funny)

    by neonstz ( 79215 )

    Finally I can stop using methane to heat up my pants.

  • To underpants that are warm, then maybe I'll be interested.

    Mmmmmm... toasty warm.

  • Nothing new for motorcyclists (Score:3, Informative)

    by dstone ( 191334 ) on Saturday February 23, 2002 @11:38PM (#3059461) Homepage
    I ride year round and it's frequently cold enough to put on my electric vest under my motorcycle jacket. These things are a life-saver and they're pretty low-tech, with fine wires laid out in an electric blanket configuration surrounding your torso. Of course, I guess this approach to keeping warm is much easier to pull off when you're riding a high-current, 400+ pound battery on wheels...
    • Not so easy on a touring bike (BMW K12LT) with CD Player, cruise, ABS, fuel injection, and two riders, both with full body heating, heated seats, and heated grips.

      I haven't tried it, but I imagine that a full load like that would seriously tax the charging system:)

  • Integrate it with laptops. (Score:3, Funny)

    by torpor ( 458 ) <ibisum AT gmail DOT com> on Saturday February 23, 2002 @11:52PM (#3059490) Homepage Journal
    My titanium puts out a lot of heat - and I'm moving to Europe soon (Germany) - so I know it'll function quite nicely as a bed-warmer during those long nights.

    Plus it plays DVD's, so in all it's pretty much like snuggling up in front of the fire and watching a movie ... in a tight little package.

    If they could one day *use* the heat that these sorts of devices put out, instead of trying hard to reduce it, things might become a little more efficient ...

  • ...I haven't worn a jacket for several years now. Of course, I live in Northern VA, near Washington DC which doesn't really qualify as the frigid north. This winter has been rather warm, but I didn't wear a jacket last year when we had a good solid month of cold in December (ice on the canal was thick enough to skate). How do I do it?

    Well, first of all, I find that I just don't spend that much time walking from the car to the inside. If you get that cold walking outside for a few minutes, you are a wimp. There is simply no other way to put it.

    Well you say, what about when you are doing non-wimpy things like hiking along the banks of the semi-frozen Potomac?

    In situations like that, I layer. Sometimes as much as 5 or 6 layers. More often than not, I end up pealing them off as the physical activity causes body temp to increase. In an extreme situation (e.g., hiking up the Blue Ridge) body temperature increases to the point where I have gone shirtless in 20 degree weather just for the thrill of it. You have to be doing heavy aerobic climbing for that to be comfortable though. No, I'm not overweight either. It is essential to pack several T-shirts and change the innermost layer if you are going to rest during such an outing. Otherwise the moisture can really get to you.

    My only special equipment for dealing with the cold is a warm cotton hat to cover my ears, and gloves. That takes care of most of the body heat loss.

    I can see how something like that jacket would be useful in Minessota, especially if you did a lot of driving and were concerned about getting stranded in the middle of a blizzard.

    For me though, I've found that most special Winter clothing is something I can do without. More Winters like this one, and I may not even have to endure much discomfort to save a few bucks.

  • Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Sunday February 24, 2002 @12:01AM (#3059519)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • I had read it as "Self wearing jackets" and I was about to be really impressed... Oh well, maybe someday!
  • Batteries don't do well in cold weather. More importantly, the colder it gets (and the more you want your jacket to be warm), the worse the jacket's battery will perform.

    Some form of fuel cell would be just the ticket:

    Laptop Methanol Fuel Cells Promised This Week [slashdot.org]

    It should be easy to convince the propane-toting crowd that a fuel cell is a sensible way to supply heat to a jacket.

    And you'd never again have to face that sinking feeling, high on an alpine ridge, that what you thought was a jacket battery was actually the battery you used to complete that chunk of code during the flight out...
  • which gets a lot of its stuff from REI, is paying much attention to this. Mostly they're discarding what doesn't work, and continuing to go after the bad guys.

    God bless Western Civilization (minus the French, Germans, Spanish, Italians, and other former fascists).
  • [ketzer.com]

    Marty McFly's jacket

  • Overclock it? (Score:2, Funny)

    by Zapdos ( 70654 )
    If I boost the voltage a bit, and cover my body with high quality thermal grease....
  • My cousin actually owns a neoprene jacket with
    microcapsules of wax. The wax melts at room
    temperature and can store quite a bit of energy.
    When it's cold outside, the wax slowly releases
    the heat to the body.

    I'm not sure whether this jacket is on the market.
    He was jobbing for a sports fashion producer when
    he got it (Adidas?).
  • $500 isn't that expensive considering when you walk into a store and see the same price on an unheated Tommy H. coat. I've seen many coats over a $1,000.

    $500 seems like a reasonable price for a new product like that and I'm sure price will come down after a while.
  • Slashdot item for 2012:

    This article [slashdot.org] over on FoodDot reports that researchers at Nutriglomerate have invented bread that toasts itself. A network of conductive thermal protein monofibers woven through the bread during baking draws power from an organic battery in the center of each slice. When the toast is done the battery's own heat converts it to a pat of butter. Bon apetit!
  • I don't know if this exists, but with the focus of news going to wepons and military hardware [nerdware]... let's use a Military category.

    I would like to list news that is related to Military improvments, but so would the Bad Guys [tm]
  • This is a company that's been in the news because the main plant burned to the ground several years ago and the owner, a family owner 2nd or 3rd generation refused to take anyone off the payroll even though the company nearly went bankrupt recently until it secured new capital. This new project will probably save the company which proves that sometimes good deeds are rewarded.

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