ProView – Mountain Hardwear Men’s High Exposure Gore-Tex C Knit Bib

These bibs are made of the best material I have ever used!  They are super thin and light, yet stop 50 mph gusts in their tracks and breathe like they aren’t there. It has most of the features that I need and with just a few small tweaks would be the perfect pant.

The material seems high quality with good stretch and breathability. The pants are super light and super thin, but the fabric feels durable. From a quick check, it has all the features I want, a perfectly placed beacon pocket, bibs, and a full-length zipper down the side of the legs.  They fit my legs perfectly but are gigantic around my stomach with no drawstring or belt loops (and I’m not that skinny compared to most backcountry skiers I know). 

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Testing Ground

I tested this setup backcountry skiing at a local glacier ski spot at the end of November. It was 38F and sunny at the parking lot and 28F, snowing, and 25 mph winds with 50 mph gusts at the summit.  As of right now, there aren’t too many other spots to test, but this was enough to evaluate the performance across this large range of conditions.     

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Features

My favorite thing about this bib is its new fabric. I really can’t say enough good things about it. It was stretchy and allowed full freedom of movement.  It is thin and light, yet impressively stopped the 50 mph gusts perfectly.  I didn’t feel any sort of draft passing through like I typically do with the other pants I wear.  I did open the vents in the sunny part of the climb, but when it got windy I closed them and never overheated even though I mistakenly wore fleece pants underneath.  I wore the fleece pants thinking that the thin light fabric wouldn’t keep the wind out, but learned quickly that these pants are up to any task.  I think they would work across all temperature ranges based on their windstopping and breathability. If you do get too hot then they have the full-length side zippers to dump heat out the sides or take them off without removing your boots. The beacon pocket was also the best beacon pocket in any of the pants I’ve had.  It sits in the right spot on my thigh and is well held in place. 

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Room for Improvement

Despite the amazing fabric, some of the features of these pants are not quite designed perfectly.  If there were a few improvements to these pants these would be my favorite pants and would be the only thing I wore.  Currently, they have a few problems that feel like Mountain Hardware’s designers didn’t ever test the pants with a backpack and ski boots on. I should say I am picky when it comes to well-designed features.  I am a backcountry ski patroller that knows what I like, and I have my masters degree in product design and work full time as an engineer. I just feel like Mountain Hardware got so close to being the best pant in the market, but fell just a tiny bit short from not putting in the time to get an adequate voice of the customer. 

In the C-Knit bib the zipper for the fly comes all the way up past my belly button, making it impossible to take a bathroom break without taking my pack’s hip belt off.  Not a huge deal with a normal pack, but this was designed for backcountry users, a lot of which have avalanche packs with fussy metal fasteners.  I have other pants that get around this with a few snaps at the top and then a zipper that starts below the hip belt.  The same problem arises with the zippers on the sides.  When I got hot I wasn’t able to unzip the bibs from the top without taking my pack off and pulling my coat and layers way up.  Luckily, in November, I could unzip the bibs from the bottom- something I wouldn’t do if breaking trail in powder. There are no inseam vents (although advertised on their website as of November) which also could be added to allow for a small vent that is easily accessible when the large side vents aren’t needed. Additionally, the snap-button cuffs of the pants are too small to roll up and down over my boots so I need to undo and re-do the velcro and stretch it across my boot.  This was a pain during every transition and something I’ve never had to do before in any other pants. This would also mean I would not wear these in resorts where I loosen and tighten my top two buckles at every lift ride. Lastly, the fit around the torso was gigantic. This was probably done to allow for layers to be tucked in or for larger people to fit, but it would be really nice to have a drawstring or some other small way of tightening at the top — the way it is now the bib part is almost useless at keeping heat in and keeping snow out.  If Mountain Hardware fixes these gripes these would be my go-to pant for everything and I would recommend it to every backcountry skier. If these small feature differences don’t seem like a big issue for you I also can’t recommend the fabric of these pants enough.

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Final Word

This bib is made of an amazing material that will do well in all weather types.  Some of the features like the beacon pocket, the instep protection, and the gusseted knees were perfect.  Some of the features like the front fly and the side zips and snap bottom cuffs just aren’t up to industry standard to be considered an amazing pant. 

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