Walter Klassen Rain Cover

[Simeon Geyer]

Hey guys, 

I hope this is the right place for this. I’m looking for a rain coat or jacket that I can throw over me and the Walter Klassen vest when it comes pouring down. Being in the Uk that’s a rather daily situation. I know there are big ponchos etc but I never liked them without operating gear, so I know the extra material will only be annoying me even further. 
 

I’m considering just getting a rain coat a few sizes bigger than I would normally wear and see if I can make an opening on the side of the arm. Maybe even the pocket will alight and I could just make a cut for the socket lock to go through?! I was wondering if someone done something similar and if so if you have recommendations for coats that seemed to work well.

 

cheers

[Lawrence Karman]

I use a poncho. No problem with the extra material and I wear a goretex rain jacket underneath to keep my arms dry. For cold weather I have a long insulated coat with a slot tailored in the side for the arm to poke through.

[Tom Wills]

I purchase a rain coat, usually a relatively inexpensive one since I’m about to slice it up, one size larger than I usually wear. You may have to go 2 sizes up if you usually wear tighter coats. Then I take the rear arm off of my Klassen harness, put the harness and coat on, and have someone trace a line with a sharpie up the back of the aluminum mounting block on the harness. I then add soft side velcro on the outside of the jacket along that line, and slice it in half. I then add a piece of hard side velcro to one side of the interior of the coat along the cut, so that when overlapping the two sides they velcro together. The velcro allows you to tighten it around the harness arm in any position and also strengthens the coat to prevent the cut from tearing further up into the jacket (especially if it is a lightweight jacket, which I prefer since we often do rain tower work on hot summer days!)

I’ve attached a photo showing how the arm of the harness juts out. This was a previous version of the jacket that I hadn’t yet applied the Velcro to, and my assistants hadn’t tucked the jacket around the arm well, but it shows the general premise. I’ve worked with this type of jacket for years, and never had any issues with getting wet underneath, even in really crazy rain tower work so hard that one of our other cameras failed!

[Simeon Geyer]

I like the idea if the jacket with the back opening. I’ll try if I can do the same but with a side opening so the arm of the vest itself is also covered from the rain. But the Velcro addition is worth implementing :)