Sun Hats – Full Brim vs Ball cap with neck cape/bandana

.”cancer..is not everyone’s immediate concern”

Well yeah so I guess smoking is fine too. That won’t kill you tomorrow either. All I can say is that dermatologists who slice up faces all day and watch middle aged and older people die from skin cancer all say that

1. a low spf cotton bandana certainly is not just fine
2. avoiding sunburn isn’t sufficient
3. a few dabs of sunscreen isn’t sufficient

But have at it! we certainly agree on the usefulness of a wide brimmed hat.

Oh and just as an aside (and not in response to anything MB wrote) vaccines don’t cause polio, sunblock doesn’t cause skin cancer.

Isn’t the whole point of a sun hat to prevent burning yourself to a crisp without having to slather on sunscreen?  Let alone other sun caused issues. If so don’t you want the best choice for that task at hand?  If not a hat, something else to protect yourself.

Well, people arent worried about health.

Thats why they drink, smoke, eat poorly, etc.

Drinking alcohol….is major risk factor for almost every type of cancer…..including skin cancer.

I have SA hat. I found the crown rather closer fitting than I like, but I also found that the seam allowances in the crown were quite generous. So I pulled out some stitching and redid it with smaller seam allowances and got a significantly enlarged crown for a looser fabric fit over the top and thus better ventilation. Also thinking of tearing out the dark lining on the neck skirt since I see no reason for it – would dry faster, be slightly cooler and slightly lighter.

What *is* a more effective material for a bandana?

Re: hats. I’d love one that does both a wide brim and a cap. Prefer a wide brim for sun. But the cap fits under my rain shell jacket and keeps the hood on in windy weather + generally does a better job of keeping rain out of my eyes.

So a wide brim hat with a stiffened front “beak”, where the back 3/4 can be folded/clipped up? Surely this exists..

+1 Jonathan.

I bought a Simms ‘beak only’ cap from my local fly rod shop. It has a huge stiff front brim and no top, just a strap that wraps around the back of a head. The generous front brim is great for under a rain hood. I wear glasses and this brim actually keeps rain off them.

If I was going on a trip where rain was forecast, I’d bring this (not at all heavy) along with a wide brimmed hat for any sunshine.  I could also put the Simms under the wide brim hat and forgo the hood with little or no penalty. But putting all of these features together into one hat would solve one of the world’s important problems.

Potentially.

Oh and Solumbra is the sun fabric that keeps 100% of sun rays from penetrating, as well as mosquitoes and black flies. I imagine that anyone might be able to get a swath of the stuff somehow and sew their own bandana out of it. Then I could stop griping about all of this.

https://www.sunprecautions.com/

Solumbra is a company located in Seattle that makes this fabric for Sunprecautions and others, so maybe they could be contacted.

I often bring wide brim hat

And

A running ball cap

The ball cap works better around town, under hood in rain,  at night (light clips on bill), in bivy keeps net off face

And is only 1.87 oz

Jeffrey I’d be surprised is this kind of hat does not exist already… It seems like such an obvious idea but i haven’t searched for one. Maybe at a stretch, so wire could be sewn into a softer brimmed full coverage hat?

Thanks for the fabric link. Part of the appeal of my bandana is that I can find them in any second hand store for £1. Not many fabrics stop 100% UV but I guess some are better than others. What to look for when budget second hand shopping?

My go-to sun protection hat since ’91:

https://www.armyuniverse.com/tri-color-desert-camouflage-military-wide-brim-boonie-hat-3508.html

Cheap, comfortable, washable, packable, and it does a great job of keeping the sun off your face and neck. I use a UV Half Buff around my neck to keep the sun off the back of my neck, and it also works great as a washcloth, head cover, eye mask, and dust or water filter.

https://www.backcountry.com/buff-uv-half-buff

Update since I made my post.

Well, not really… Still use a boonie hat, long sleeved button down, and olive oil in the bloodstream. ;)

Death Valley Canyons loop – Cottonwood to Dead Horse to Marble canyon. Maximum ventilation and cooling, excellent shade, hands free use, lightweight reflective umbrella. (Wild horse on right)

Pretty good in the rain as well.

Jonathon, check this out. The Australian road workers hat. This does it all.

https://sunprotection.com.au/product/adapt-a-cap-ultimate/

Any Ozzies and kiwis on here know the value of good protection given the extreme UV we are stuck with.

I believe Cam Honans choice of hat for many a year.

Graham, that might be the all-time winner here – providing that it weighs 100 gm or less. I like the various options for how one wears it.

The Sun Precautions drape hat that I mentioned earlier, and that I use in bug season, is very similar to that Aussie hat. The SP drape is huge and has velcro so that the drape can hang loose or be ‘zipped up’ all the way over the nose if desired, this last is good in snow or for clouds of bugs. And it’s made of Solumbra, which is 100% UV protective.

And Gary check out the size of the peak -great for the eyes. 100grams, I don’t know about that. Must be close. You can buy dirt cheap versions of this hat at workwear shops here in Australia. But in flouro green or orange. Roadworkers have to cope with monumentally dangerous (the highest in the world unfortunately) amounts of UV amd work conditions here are strictly mandated for the most part. I believe this is the only hat officially recommended because it works.  The hat I linked has much more pleasant  colours.

Option 4–You can look like a desert bandit too which is nice.

I’ve been using this hat from Sunday Afternoons:

Great coverage, no fabric flapping over my ears, light weight.