Tool Box Buzz

GearWrench Heated Work Jacket Review

Heated jackets are becoming more popular these days especially with outdoor enthusiasts and construction workers. We recently took the GearWrench heated jacket to our job site to see how well it held up.

First Impression

The jacket is well made of quality materials. Its outer material is a canvas and it made me immediately think of my old Carhartt jacket. The inner lining and padding are polyester.

The zipper is a YKK zipper which is a Japanese brand that has set the standard for durable quality zippers. I’ve always said, a zipper doesn’t make the garment but it sure can break it! The jacket is water-resistant and has an adjustable hood and hem with elasticated binding. It’s also machine washable, as long as you remove the battery, which is a plus.

Note – The material is not fire retardant.

GearWrench Heated Jacket Fabric

• Shell: 100% Cotton
• Padding: 100%Polyester
• Lining: 100% Polyester

GearWrench Heated Jacket Features

• YKK zipper
• Water-resistant
• Machine washable
• Adjustable hood
• Adjustable hem with elasticated binding
• 1 x Lithium-ion Battery (5200 mAh, 7.4 V)

Let’s Heat Things Up

The jacket has 3 carbon fiber heating elements that generate heat across core body areas:

1. Left chest
2. Right chest
3. Mid-back

The heat is controlled by the left chest logo and has 3 heating settings (High, medium, low) with just a simple press of the button.

The Battery Is Where It’s At

The first impression on the battery was I loved the shape and size. It’s square and flat, not round or brick-like. The heated apparel battery is about the size of your palm (3.74” long x 3.34” wide x 0.98” thick). The battery weighs 8.47 oz. It stores in an inner left, lower, front pocket and it doesn’t dig into your body. It’s an easier to carry form factor for sure

As far as heat runtime the GearWrench jacket provides heat up to:

• 10 hrs. of long-lasting warmth on low
• 6 hrs. on medium
• 3 hrs. on high

Jacket Battery – A Friend With Benefits

A depleted battery takes approximately 8-hours to charge. All versions of the ORORO brand battery work with all styles of GearWrench heated clothing.

There are three ports on this battery.

1. A USB port on the battery can be used to charge your phone and other electronic devices.
2. The USB Type-C port is used to charge the battery.
3. The circular DC port is plugged into the apparel to provide power for heating

Powering On The Jacket Heat

To activate the jacket’s heat, hold down the GearWrench logo (located on the chest of your garment) until it blinks red. Once blinking red, it takes approximately 5 minutes to preheat.

Cycling the GearWrench logo provides the following:

• Preheat (Blinking Red) The preheat setting is only available when the jacket first turns on.
• High (Solid Red)
• Medium (White)
• Low (Blue)
• Turning off the heat: press and hold down on the GW logo. When held down, the logo should blink once before the light turns off.

How’s It Feel?

We wore the jacket in hockey rinks, watched games, and on the job site, during the coldest day of the year, so far. It takes a few minutes for the jacket to heat up but once it does it’s toasty. Setting the jacket to the high setting in the morning and right after lunch worked well to heat things up quickly, but most of the time the low setting was all that is needed for low activity work.

Having a 10-hour runtime on the low setting is perfect, and this means that I can wear less layering clothing. This is a plus when I find myself working inside a heated home and out in the cold elements. Normally, that back and forth with all the layered clothes makes me start to sweat, and taking off and putting back on clothing layers is a pain. The heated jacket helps eliminate some of those pain points.

Improvements To The GearWrench Heated Jacket

GearWrench needs to add zipper pulls to the jacket’s zippers, which we think will be useful when wearing gloves. The main zipper tab on the jacket is quite small and difficult to grab with medium and heavy gloves.

Another improvement is to eliminate the hood drawstring and create a different method for the hood. Drawstrings are dangerous near power saws and drills. I pulled the drawstring out.

Conclusion

We like the GearWrench Heated Jacket it’s a no-frills, comfortable and tear-resistant jacket that is perfect for job site environments. The ability to quickly heat up and then apply consistent low heat all day is a plus, and it allowed us to wear fewer layers.

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