Hey folks!
Just thought I would share a project I've been working on for the last few months.
After a long winter of hauling a 6+ lb sleep system (bag+liner) to cope with -20F and lower nights, and reeling at the cost of down bags, I started thinking about making some down gear. With cheaper down starting around $7/oz I decided to get creative.
I set out on a mission to find as many down jackets as possible at local Goodwill & Salvation Army stores. If you time it right, you can get 50% off on certain days, so after several weeks of bargain hunting I picked up nine down jackets for about $45 total.
Fast forward through several weeks of slicing, dicing and vacuuming and I just weighed in the final pull for a grand total of 52.1oz. At around $45 that's $0.87 per ounce.
I tried to select 80/20 minimum but sometimes the labeling is unclear or misleading.
Overall the quality breakdown is about as follows:
15oz – The good stuff; 90%+ down, freaking luxury
22oz – The fair stuff; 80% down minimum, very usable
15oz – The not-so-good stuff; 70% down, waterfowl feathers
And here are the results:
The only tools I used were an X-Acto blade, a mini shop-vac, large paper bags for collection, and gallon ziploc bags for storage & labeling.
My one problem with this is the wastefulness. Granted, these were jackets abandoned by their owners at some point, but I don't want to throw away 9 jackets worth of fabric just to get some used down.
After pulling down I salvaged any and all fabrics, cords, zippers, insulation, etc. for future projects. A few of the articles had some great coated, calendered nylon that gave me enough material for about a dozen stuff sacks of varying sizes.
After pillaging whatever usable materials I could I've got about 1/2 of a large trash bag with "waste". I'm still trying to think of something useful to do with the scraps; thinking maybe donating for use as theater or arts scrap.
The vacuuming process did a good job of filtering a lot of the particles from the down. But I'm thinking about trying to wash it before using it in any projects.
First two projects on the list are an experimental down/shredded foam pillow and a basic down quilt to work on my sewing skills. Depending on how this stuff performs I may or may not use it in a full bag, but at the least I hope to make a quilt or two and maybe hook up a few of my broke hiking buddies. :)
Anyway that's my experience thus far… anyone else tried harvesting cheap down this way? Thoughts or tips?
