Have OR Helium II- Worth Upgrading to eVent Jacket for Heavier Rains?

That jacket is supposed to be 100% waterproof. Send it back. They have a lifetime guarantee. Driducks are cheap and work

I use a Helium 1 for summer trips and its definitley
not as breathable as my event jackets.

Not sure if the 1 and 2 use the same materials though.

First of all, I would warranty the Helium II with OR. They back their stuff 100% and I'll bet you could put the credit towards another model or other gear. I assume it was leaking through all over rather than a failed seam. Bad way to find out it leaks!

eVent is cool stuff— if you can afford it. My wife has an eVent bike shell (swiped from ME) that is her go-to winter and rain shell; likewise a friend with an eVent shell from another maker. Biking has high aerobic activity and a built in breeze: I can't think of a better test of a rain shell fabric. 9oz sounds pretty good. Keep it clean and launder it properly.

del

(Edited to add a few things I forgot)

My definite perception was that the water was seeping through the fabric in general- I wound up pretty uniformly wet all around. (I could easily be wrong here.) I wasn't really moving all that heavily and it was chilly, so would not have been generating a ton of heat/sweat, although it could have been enough.

That said, I don't have a ton of experience getting heavily rained on, since my backpacking schedule is usually dominated by weekend to 4-day trips and one big trip to somewhere fun over the summer. Since I'm mostly doing weekends, I have pretty reliable weather forecasts and will confess to avoiding trips where it looks really bad. (I have to rent a car and drive 4-6 hours to get anywhere interesting, so, while I understand the "hike in the rain" crowd, I'll usually just postpone.) Since I don't deal with a ton of heavy rain, I don't really have a great baseline for what the reasonable limits of a rainshell are. The Helium II is well-liked on here, but rarely recommended for cases when you expect to get dumped on, so I'm trying to suss out how much of this is a failure of the product vs. how much of it is just going beyond the jacket's intended use.

(I know that what I just wrote about my trips screams "just in case" raingear over "bomber," but I really didn't care for getting soaked under my jacket and am willing to pay if needed to have better protection in the future.

del

do a shower test, if it fails … or you simply arent happy send it back to OR

ive used the helium 1 in some good rain storms up here … in heavy rain, youre going to end up getting damp one way or the other

if it aint the rain seeping through the openings, itll be from the condensation

which is why in those conditions you wear as little as possible when moving so as to not to sweat (light longsleeve) and make sure its synthetic (not wool) so itll dry out to be less damp with body heat

for serious continuous rain for days on end get something that weights at least twice what the helium does with pit zips

;)

^ this, I use a Helium 2 because 90+% of the time it's sufficient (hell-50% of the time my windshirt is sufficient), if it's really heavy rain or very prolonged rain- you're going to get wet- save the weight and money IMHO

To answer your question: Event will do much better in the conditions that you describe.

Typical Event jackets come in 2 layer, 2.5 and 3 layer. I have a three layer and it's saved my butt a couple of times.

There's an endless argument on this site about rain shells and 'sweating out' etc. which you can reference by exploring the search features.

Bottom line, in my experience, in heavy sustained rains and/or sleet, a 3 ply
Event jacket is great–when "great" is defined as the best option out of all the available compromises. It sounds like your jacket was quickly overwhelmed by conditions. It would be good to understand why that is, so that you can get a jacket that won't fail the same way.

The eVent will be more comfortable in a wider range of conditions but when it is raining really hard and you are moving there is no way to truly stay dry.

This is the dirty secret of the hard shell industry. You will always either get wet from the inside (condensation) or from the outside (thru the hood and sleeves) if it is wet and persistent enough. Here is no magic bullet and there is no ultimate fabric. After using $600 hard shells all the way down to $50 bargain basement shells, none will keep you dry all day. Some will keep you dry longer than others.

For me, the Helium keeps me dry enough and warm enough that I find it sufficient for 3-season adventures. I prefer something more expensive and tougher in the winter only because there are a lot more sharp objects to deal with then.

Thanks for the shower suggestion- it's a pretty obvious way of testing in hindsight, but clearly it didn't occur to me.

(The last time I tested out rain gear, I brought it with me when visiting my parents and had my dad zap me with the hose. Needless to say, he enjoyed it. Far too much.)

I was surprised to find how much humidity was building inside and how much that led to my perception of the water coming through. (Amazingly, the exact thing that the people who know more than me said would happen, happened.) I also definitely have some spots in the jacket where water is getting through- the front zipper (which I assume can only be so waterproof) and a bit on the shoulders. That said, in a heavy storm (rain coming down a LOT more forcefully than the shower) all of these combined to leave me pretty cold and wet reasonably quickly (even hunkered down under a tree), so my take home from all this might still be that some kind of change is needed.

If nothing else, this thread has been super helpful in giving me an idea about what to reasonably expect in these conditions from my rainshell- I know that none of them are perfect solutions (and that I'm not going to wind up bone dry after a 10-hour downpour), but it's definitely given me a better picture of what this stuff is going to do for me in the real world.

One thing that does come to mind is fabric stiffness. A stiffer fabric (like 3-layer Gore Tex) will stay off your skin more and transfer less body heat when damp since there is less contact. Since the Helium is gossamer thin it doesn't help much in that regard. The fabric backing as well as the stiffness would both play a part in warmth and overall comfort.

For sustained heavy rain, especially in lower temperatures, when the Helium can't cope, I think the Arcteryx Alpha FL has incredible performance at 10.8oz for medium. This is the lightest jacket available in 3-Layer Goretex Pro. This will cope with anything short of an Arctic blizzard. Athletic fit. Only quibble is the baggy hood, since it's designed to take a climbing helmet – it cinches in, but could have saved 3/4 oz there….

call OR … talk to them about the water coming through the zip and shoulders …

theyll likely offer you a credit which you can then use for a burlier jacket …

they make plenty of gore tex jackets

they stand by their infinite guarantee

;)

1) I bought the OR Helium II in a pinch when I left my REI Event Parka on a tree, which I liked much more than my previous gore-tex parkas (3). I used it on one backpack in which it rained all day and I was left feeling very damp and uncomfortable. It was only one day old so I assume it was humidity. My experience is that it's not breathable at all and i don't like it. I now just use it for city use.

2) I bought the NEoshell EMS Helix Anorak to replace it. I am more happy with this coat than any other rain jacket I've ever had. Neoshell really feels like a soft shell to me. It's noticeably more breathable than my previous event jacket…….and that combined with this coats mechanical breathability (adjustable open sides) make it even more versatile. I even use it as a wind breaker and hike in it very comfortably in certain conditions. I'd look at this coat and neoshell……not just event.

http://www.ems.com/product/index.jsp?productId=18474736&cp=3707807.12019738

Second on the EMS Helix Anorak mentioned above. Cheap and wicked effective. Keep your arcteryx, suckers!