There is nothing else that has rattled my brain more than hardshells, particularly the hardshell jacket. Commanding the three layer laminate onto a six hundred gram garment with a nine hundred dollar price tag, they are one of the most grotesquely fawned over and misunderstood garments in the outdoor gear space.
When anybody comes into the field of outdoor recreation and begins purchasing gear, it seems that it’s inevitable to be drip fed advertisements from companies and individuals alike about the “need” for a rain shell. Catalogues, online advertisements, even individual online media creators seem like they can't go without blaring about a company's opus hardshell jacket. And with the slew of terms and technologies that are beamed into product pages or even the coats themselves, it can leave consumers with far more questions or apathy towards the product. Better yet if apathetic as the clueless consumer can just be shuffled into buying one without fundamentally understanding what makes a hardshell special or for its real use-case. The skeptic will wander forums debating whether the hydrostatic head tests from Gore-tex pro to H2No command the heavy price tags of either jacket, but will feel miffed when the technological marvel that's been sold to them is actually just a sweaty sopping wet pile of nylon.
The truth is that hardshells are a niche piece of gear. Not every one needs one, and in most situations most people would do and feel better with a fucking umbrella. Advertising has done wonders with selling hardshells but its pedantic portrayal of youthful glamor shots of users walking along blue-bird day hills and misty mornings prove that either the media teams for these companies are either consciously trying to scam consumers or are simply ignorant. If you have hiked in 40F+ weather with a hardshell on you know that despite its advertised breathability and waterproofness, they still leave you sweaty and wet. To be true to the said ability of being both waterproof/breathable in those conditions is simply an impossibility with the textile technology of today. It's a real possibility that even some of the employees of these companies are not privy to the real use cases of these textiles as well. I once heard a story about a team of designers from Berghaus going and having a field day with some athletes out near the UK’s hills. When one of the athletes mentioned extending the hood brim and increasing the gauge of the wire inside the brim, a designer retorted that he had actually never understood why they put wire in the hood brims to begin with.
Now to notion a real user discussion/analysis about hardshells, ill begin with the initial concept itself. A hardshell’s waterproof breathable fabric is primarily used to create a fortress against certain conditions and facilitate a more static microclimate in your clothing system. The physical size of these porous laminates appropriately block rain and allow some air to flow through but is typically sandwiched between two other layers being the outer and liner, this severely limits airflow but improves on durability and comfort. Now you could make a hardshell with just its laminate, goretex has already done this by gearing the shells towards bike racing in adverse conditions but they are extremely susceptible to abrasion and tearing and thus can’t be used effectively in most outdoor activities. It seems the technological differences between companies proprietary laminates aren’t so drastic as they make it out to seem. Hydrostatic head tests and air permeability rates do vary in testing across different jackets and technologies but are generally minimal and it always seems to be a tradeoff. The results typically show if you make a more breathable jacket, you get a less waterproof jacket and vise versa. Now back to the construction, if you need two layers of fabric sandwiching the laminate you will now have to deal with the properties of these two added layers. Obviously the denier and chemical makeup of these textiles will influence the jackets characteristics but most importantly can destroy the fundamental objective of the jacket. How so? By simply getting wet. When the outer fabric of the jacket becomes “saturated” with water it will close up the pores leading to the laminate not being able to effectively transfer air/moisture through the system, thus rendering the jackets function useless and leaving you stuffy and wet. To combat this, designers and engineers use DWR (Durable water repellent) coatings on the outer fabric in order to shed water off and effectively fix the problem. However, in practice take any hardshell in the rain and you will realize that these DWR coatings are really only effective for sprinkles of rain and any more will overbear the coatings and begin to saturate the jacket. Not to mention, it was only a few years ago that these designated laminates and DWR coatings were chock full of fluoropolymers (better known as PTFE’s) which are now known to cause severe health defects and refuse to break down due to their long half-lives, and due to textile shedding are found in almost every environment on earth.
And so if these jackets are ineffective in their advertised rainy conditions what use are they? Well to bring it back to the initial statement, they are very functional at slowing down the transfer of air/moisture due to their fortress-like properties. Creating slow moving interactions between the outside and users inner microclimate clothing system prove extremely effective in especially high variable conditions such as a climber in freezing weather. The laws of thermodynamic physics helps this case as the warm microclimate inside a user's clothing system effectively pushes out moisture through the porous laminates into the outside cold. If it's cold enough to freeze then the user most likely won't encounter rain and the DWR coatings can effectively do its job by slipping off any minor moisture the user comes in contact with. Not to mention the general construction of these jackets prove effective wind blockers
So some conclusions here, If you don’t recreate in freezing weather there really isn’t much of a use case for hardshells and you would be better off with an umbrella/poncho/softshell. The outer textiles' denier and properties are important if not more so than the laminate technology itself in the total function of the jacket. You can divulge yourself into forum discussion about best performing laminates but the differences are minute and it's best to focus on the other aspects of the design such as fit, features, mobility, durability, and affordability. Honorable mentions go to Patagonia’s M10 anorak and pants for fit and mobility, ARC Alpha SV for durability, and North face’s summit series hardshells for features.