OR Helium II – $83.98

Would you mind posting the 20% coupon? I can't find it.

OUTLET-20 is the code- it's the biggest banner on the site in the outlet section! :)

thanks OP! I missed the Rab Pulse jacket yesterday, this looks to be very similar, including using Pertex Shield+.

I almost thought about holding out for the Westcomb Focus LT Hoody to go on sale, and just selling my REI Kimtah eVent jacket, and using the westcomb as my one and only rain jacket, but this is probably cheaper to have the Helium as my rain jacket to just toss in my pack when the weather report shows no sign of bad weather. On trips I know it will be raining, I can step it up to the full eVent Kimtah.

Xeren,

That's pretty much my plan too. I also missed out on the rab yesterday. There are some concerns about the hood design of the Helium but I plan on using it as a bare minimum rain shell and use my better designed (albeit twice as heavy) goretex 3L shell for extended rain trips. Considering OR has a superb lifetime warranty I'm pretty stoked on this. I figure worse case (for my wallet) scenario is that I eventually get a rab kinetic to fill a niche between my full featured alpine shell and this new OR bare minimum shell. The kinetic is a decent lightweight but featured alpine shell also using the pertex shield+…but that's assuming infinite funds and infinite time away from the city ;)

what are the issues with the hood that you've heard about? I've only seen good reviews of the jacket, but admittedly I haven't looked that hard

The hood is really not designed well enough to use in a heavy downpour by any means. When you cinch the hood tight using the pull tab on the rear of the hood, both sides of the hood get pulled back leaving the side of your face fully exposed. Kinda hard to explain so just look here as there is a nice photo showing what I mean – http://www.backpackinglight.com/cgi-bin/backpackinglight/ul_wpb_jackets_sotmr_part2.html#.UWcceSvF2SM

It's such a shame as otherwise it would be such a great jacket. Rab on the other hand make some of the best designed hoods out there. So if you actually expect your raincoat to keep you dry, I would go for the rab pulse.