adding toe loops for gaiters

I took a pair of trail runners to a local shoe shop with grograin loops rubber cemented in place and had them sewn.

I’ve tediously added loops by hand to other shoes as well.

Details Here

What shoe? I’ll google an image. I might have a few ideas.

Thanks, Greg. I am contemplating hand sewing loops of 2 mm line to the toe guard. Either using poly thread and a curved upholstery needle, or I may swipe outdated suture from the office–it has a curved needle attached to it, and I think using needledrivers will be easier than my fingers.

Altra Lone Peaks 1.5

Diane,
I've got Lone Peaks as well. A tight radius needle sounds perfect.

We'll expect pictures….

I have stitched some 2 mm loops onto the toes of my Lone Peaks. I did think about making wider loops, but decided that being able to just stitch in one spot was easier, and I didn't care about covering up the Lone Peak name.

The above photo is of my new rain gaiters made by Zpacks. They are too long in the foot for me because I have fat calves and short feet, so the toe loops make them fit better. It remains to be seen if the water proof zipper will be a problem in the mud.

Edited for spelling; sorry, not sure how to get the second photo to flip.

Nice.

Simple and effective.

Thanks for the update and photos.

Nice work Diane

I'm also interested in how the zipper does in the mud (and with general bushwacking abuse that the front of gaiters cop off trail). Also interested in how the material holds up in general, especially inside leg.

Simpler solution: Slightly shorter gaiters, with a hook at the front (or whatever) to catch the lace at the bottom end of the tongue. We have been doing it that way for decades. Works fine.

Cheers

I think perhaps they are trying to either:
a) deal with purchased, larger gaiters and the subsequent slack, or
b) utilise the gaiter to keep some moisture out of the forefoot mesh area?

owfinc.com has gaiter hooks you can sew on

you can find similar ones at fabric store, but not quite the right size.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SXRfXYJWQpE is this what you where looking for?

^^^

Nope.

The OP is in typical trail runners, not VFF.

Reading comprehension is not what it use to be.

Diane's words are "to help the gaiters cover the whole laced area."

Got it?

^^^#CaffinBurn

"to help the gaiters cover the whole laced area."

This is key. I'm using some DG-type gaiters (OR "sparkplug") and twigs and pebbles still manage to find their way in through those small gaps in the forefoot laces when trail running/hiking. Although much less frequently than when using no gaiters at all, it happened twice yesterday during a very short trail run with the dog.

Diane, you should send that picture to the Altra company. I wrote them and suggested that their Lone Peaks have the lacing at the bottom be anchored better so that when you loop your dirty girls in, they don't pull up that lacing. My gaiters end up pulling it up about an inch or more. Your idea is even better. They've done such a great job of already including the velcro in the back, now all they need to do is make it better for hooking the gaiter in front.

Well it took me a while to find this thread again (BPL search is tough!) but I didn't want to start a new thread. So I added the toe loops to use with my OR Sparkplug gaiters, which are obviously very similar to the DGs, and they did indeed help somewhat with debris getting through the laces. However, even with the toe loop I was still getting little pebbles and twigs working their way in through the remaining gaps in the laces. What's needed, of course, is something to spread out the front part of the gaiter to more thoroughly cover the laces. I tried one mod that worked pretty well, but those gaiters have quite a few miles on them and I'm just about ready to need new ones, so I updated the technique and was able to test drive them yesterday for a couple of hours. The idea is to use a triangle-shaped piece of plastic attached at the front of the gaiter using polyester thread. The plastic is from some snowshoe "snow poppers", but any kind of stiff, durable plastic that doesn't crack easily should work. The holes were made with a tiny 1/64" drill bit. A tiny drop of CA (super glue) was applied to the thread to make it abrasion resistant.