Riding Pants

Information on Riding Pants

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So you are thinking: “What the big Deal with Pants?” and "Why is this a Safety and Awareness article?". Well it seems like daily in the summer I have see someone who does not care about the skin on their legs while riding. I have seen shorts, Capri’s, and even swim trunks. Why does this bother me? In the field as an EMT and have seen the damage that even a minor accident will cause to your skin, and after my accident I know from experience (although my arms were unprotected not my legs). Do you know that when you get gravel, dirt and asphalt in your skin the only way to remove it at the hospital is to scrub it out with something like a brilo pad? I don’t want you to have to go through this so I am writing this to educate you on your options.

Shorts or swim trunks: First off with my bikes and my body build, I cannot even think of riding in shorts. I would burn my thighs on the engine/exhaust. I know some of you don’t have this issue and ride fine without this problem. I know Shorts are cooler on hot days especially in an urban area where you don’t get much airflow. But you have very little protection from anything flying up off the road, thrown out of car windows, or god forbid if you go down. If you think about it, sliding on bare skin it would not take long to burn through all your skin to the muscle layer and even bone.

Leather or Kevlar Armored Pants: This is on the extreme other side from shorts. You can slide a long way before you burn through Leather or Kevlar armored or even the ones without the armor. They more than triple the time you can be sliding before your skin hits the pavement. The issue with these are they are HOT even when vented they are warm. They are also expensive to buy. You see many sport bike riders/racers that wear these.

Capri’s : You know these are those pants that are longer than shorts but they don’t cover your ankles or lower calves that are really popular. I see a lot of women riders wearing these with tennis shoes and even with crocs or sandals. They do cover more than shorts and are cooler than long pants but they are also usually made of light weight material and so are not much protection at all.

Carhart/ Canvas /Firehose : Carhart is the brand name of a company that makes workwear used all over the world and it know to be very strong and durable. I know from experience that even my EMT trama shears have problems cutting the Canvas material that Carhart uses in it’s cloths. I personally like Carhart or Walls or there are other manufactures that make the same type of cloths. They last and are not too expensive. But of course they also have drawbacks. They are Hot in the summer. They are stiff especially when new. I usually buy Mens since they seem to last longer but to do that, I have to go up about two sizes above my normal because they have no give in the sizing. I put Firehose in this same area because I would think they are similar but I have not personally tired them yet. I want to but they are pricey and you have to order them over the internet or find one of very few retail stores, so I can’t try them on. This makes me uneasy. So, if anyone has tired these please let me know what you think. (update: I have a friend who tired these. He said they were not good at keeping the bike heat away. He burned the crap out his leg when he wore them.)

Dress Pants/ Slacks: Dress Pants or Slacks are long pants and do give some protection and I must confess to wearing them myself but I do tend to wear thicker, EMT or Military BDU pants that are stronger. You should consider what the pants are made of when riding. Polyester will melt and that will cause even more issues.

Riding Jeans: These are Jeans you can buy that have Kevlar, nomex, and/or armor. These are more costly but they are a step down from racing leathers. So they would be very good for riding. They do tend to be stiff and usually need to go up a size to get the right fit.

Jeans: Jeans are the go-to riding wear. Most people have several pairs and they will help protect in most crashes. They are not expensive (unless you have to have designer). You do need to be aware though that especially women's jeans are going to a spandex/cotton mix in the Jeans, These will get hot and the Spandex will melt when sliding. 100% Cotton is the best if you cna find them.

Chaps: Chaps most people wear in the cold weather over jeans but I have seen they over shorts in the summer. I don’t personally like this but it is safer than shorts alone as long as the shorts are long enough that no skin is exposed when you have the chaps on.

I suggest jeans at the very least when riding.

Here is information from a drag test I found on a rider chat site:

Tear and Abrasion Strength by the numbers
Pounds of force until fabric tears Abrasion cycles on pavement until fabric fails
Cotton Jeans 4.5 pounds to tear 50 cycles to failure
70 Denier Standard Nylon 4.5 pounds to tear 165 cycles to failure
500 Denier Polyester 8 pounds to tear 180 cycles to failure
200 Denier Standard Nylon 7.5 pounds to tear 275 cycles to failure
500 Denier Cordura 22 pounds to tear 710 cycles to failure
620 Denier Cordura 35 pounds to tear 1200 cycles to failure
NEW Competition Grade Leather 80-110 pounds to tear 1200-1700 cycles to failure
1000 Denier Cordura 110 pounds to tear 1780 cycles to failure
Air Mesh Kevlar 1260 pounds to tear 970 cycles to failure Stretch Kevlar Blend 420lbs pounds to tear 1800 cycles to failure

This is how quickly some materials take to create a when dragged hole:
Material Seconds
Denim 0.2 to 0.5
Some race gloves 0.6
Most leather gloves 1.0 to 1.8
Keprotec stretch material 0.9
Poor Kevlar 1.0
Two layers of waxed cotton 1.3
1.3mm thick cow hide 3.8
Two layers of 1.3mm thick cowhide 18
Three layers of 1.3mm thick cowhide 55
Two layers of Kevlar plain weave 5.6
Suede 18
Boot leather (generally 2.2mm thick) 20
Leather stretch panels 20.4

There is also this test from a while back:

Drag Test

"For the Drag Test, samples were stitched to a bag that held a 75-pound
sandbag inside a milk crate, then dragged behind a pickup truck..."

New, 100% Cotton Denim Jeans ----------------------- 3' 10"
Senior Balistic Nylon ----------------------------------- 3' 10"
Leather, Lightweight, Nude Finish, 2.25 oz/sq. ft. --- 4' 3"
Leather, Fashion Weight, 1.75 oz/sq ft. ------------- 4' 4"
Two-year-old 100% Cotton Denim Jeans ------------ 4' 5"
Cordura Nylon Type 440 ----------------------------- 18' 3"
Kevlar 29 Aramid Fiber, Style 713 ------------------ 22' 1"
Leather, Competition Weight, 3 oz/sq. ft. -------- 86' 0"

Taber Test

"For the Taber Test, the specimen was mounted on a rotating platform and
scuffed by two rubber-emery grinding wheels." The numbers represent the
number of revolutions until the fabric totally fails. A vacuum clears
debris.

Two-year-old 100% Cotton Denim Jeans 168
New 100% Cotton Denim Jeans 225
Kevlar 29 Aramid Fiber, Style 713 506
Cordura Nylon, Type 440 559
Leather, Lightweight, Nude Finish, 2.25 oz./sq. ft. 564
Leather, Fashion Weight, 1.75 oz./sq. ft. 750
Senior Ballistic Nylon 817
Leather, Competition Weight, 3 oz./sq. ft. 2600

More to consider...

"Finally, protection from road abrasion cannot be guaranteed by a
materials abrasion resistance alone. A jacket may have panels of
highly abrasion-resistant materials, yet if low-quality stitching joins
those panels and the seams come apart upon impact or during a slide, then
the abrasion resistance of the panels could count for nothing.
Furthermore, an ill-fitting garment may ride up in a slide, contorting
the body and exposing the skin. And the best jacket in the world, left
unzipped and/or unsnapped, won't give riders the protection they pay
for. When it comes to safety, the issues are more complex than just the
abrasion resistance of materials." __________________

From another site:

The textiles vs leathers debate is all about tradeoffs. Choosing which material to use to cover your hide with and spend your pennies on depends on how much you value individual tradeoffs and ultimately, your intended use and riding conditions. Sounds easy enough, but deciding between textiles vs leathers has had great rider minds in a muddle and increasingly so over the last couple of years as the quality and versatility of both materials has improved so much! Just type in “textiles vs leathers ” into google and you will find that 90% of the results are from forums with the answer ultimately resulting in the fact that it depends on your personal preferences. The problem is that this does not help those new to the biking world who have not had the time or experience to develop their own, well-guided preferences… and so the argument goes on.
But, it’s really quite simple if you use the BMI (Best Motorcycle Information) textiles vs leathers test. This test takes the four most differentiating attributes of the two materials into consideration – price, maintenance, comfort and protection. Each attribute is also assigned to either leathers or textiles, depending on which material has the greater advantage in terms of the attribute. After reading the brief summary on each, assign a score out of a hundred to each attribute, giving those attributes that are most important to you higher scores, so that in the end the total score of your four attributes adds to 100. Then add up the score that you gave to the leather attributes and textile attributes, and the material with the highest score is your answer – and best of all it will be unique to your personal preferences.
Price - Textiles
Motorcycle textiles are cheaper to buy than leathers. It is also much harder to judge the quality of leathers and so you take the risk of paying a lot of money for a suit that does not have quality stitching and construction. (Just beware however that it is widely accepted that your textile suit will probably only survive one crash before you have to fork out for a new pair.)
Maintenance - Textiles
This one is simple – motorcycle textiles can be thrown in a commercial washer, while leathers will need to be sent to the cleaners.
Comfort - Textiles
Motorcycle textiles have an all weather capability: vents for when it is warm, liners for when it is cold and water resistance for rain. It breathes more easily than leather, and water slides off it like a ducks back.
Leather is also much heavier than textile.
Protection - Leather
Tests are conducted all the time to compare the abrasion resistance of motorcycle riding gear materials and leather always comes out on top as the most durable material. Furthermore, leather does not melt from friction, it will cushion your fall more than motorcycle textiles would and it offers the best protection against a road rash. The fact that leather also lasts through multiple crashes whilst textiles will probably only last through one, says a lot about the difference in protection and impact between the two materials.
The textiles vs leathers debate basically comes down to protection vs everything else.
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