Down mittens

There is a fantastic thread on this subject I somehow skipped over in my search. Just found it.

All set.

For those of us who can't read your mind, would you care to share the link? I'd love to read up.

C'mon Stephen, my mind is vibrating so powerfully I thought everyone could read it. Oh well, back to tweak the old oscillator.

http://www.backpackinglight.com/cgi-bin/backpackinglight/forums/thread_display.html?forum_thread_id=39061

I don't know how cold the conditions you are expecting to be out in, but if you're looking for significantly warm down mittens–it suggests that it may be pretty cold at times or you run on the cold side..

If either is the case, you may want to think about using a thinnish pair of neoprene, latex, or butyl rubber gloves underneath the mittens, as fairly non conductive VBL's. Butyl rubber has the lowest thermal conductivity at .09 so at the same thickness of the others, will be the warmest. However, i don't know the specific gravity of all these materials, so it's possible that others are warmer for their weight.

Would boost whatever insulation you tend to use, as well as protecting the insulation from body generated moisture. With down especially this is very important.

Mittens are an item of clothing that are compressed often – as in most of the time.

To have better loft when compressed I'd say that 650 fill weight would actually be better than 850 fill because it resists compression better. Mittens are so small when compared to down jackets and sleeping bags that any increased "stuffed size" over 850 fill would be negligible.

Also I would try my damnedest to get down mittens with Down Tek DWR treatment since hands seem to sweat more than most parts of the body.

Personally I use removable fleece liners for both my gloves and mittens. I find they dry fast and are sufficiently warm down to -40 F./C. (Same temp on both scales.) I've only experienced this temp once but my mittens with double layer fleece liners did the job very well.

When I want to be absolutely positive my hands stay warm, I wear these things:

http://marmot.com/products/details/8000-meter-mitt

700 fill down mittens with a waterproof over mitt (both GoreTex PacLite AND a GoreTex liner).

Insanely warm. Really only useful for temps below 20F.