Cooling vests tested in action: more power for heavy creasing
Our cooling vest got into real use when Ylöjärvi VPK (voluntary fire brigade) chairman Marko Konttinen tested the vest for a week in the summer heat. The mongoose mascot also got to try out how the vest cools under the costume.
Hot sunshine and heavy protective clothing
Fire brigade protective clothing is necessary for work safety, so they cannot be opened or reduced
even in the harshest heat. "The cooling vest test came at a suitably hot week and sufficiently demanding work," says Konttinen. He used the vest with both a heavy fire suit and a light rescue suit at the fire brigade youth training camp in road rescue training.
The training sessions were about 2.5 hours long and consisted of heavy road traffic accident rescue work, mainly using hydraulic rescue equipment – seven passenger cars were dismantled during the week. When working in the sun for several hours continuously doing demanding work in heavy protective suits and heavy tools, the heat load is considerable and reduces work efficiency. The training session was therefore optimal for testing the cooling vest.
Easy to use and unobtrusive
Marko Konttinen found the use of the cooling vest easy and was surprised at how small it can be packed: "For hygiene reasons, I packed the vest in a one-litre freezer bag before taking it to the freezer." Although the durability of the frozen vest was doubted when unfolding it, the concern was unnecessary. The vest retained its elasticity even when cold. Konttinen cooled the vest in both the refrigerator and the freezer. Surprisingly, the vest did not feel too cold even when taken out of the freezer, after having aired the vest for a moment and shaped it for use. The surface of the vest did not feel freezer-cold, but released the cold slowly and therefore felt pleasant to wear. "If you took a cold pack out of the freezer, it would feel icy until it warmed up," says Konttinen. After both the refrigerator and the freezer, the user experience was very pleasant, although the cooling was shorter after the refrigerator.
The cooling vest was easy to use and you didn't even notice it while moving. Although the construction of the vest is simple, it stayed in place very well. "During the week, I crouched, bent over, and did hand work above the shoulder line, but I didn't have to adjust the vest during work," Konttinen reports.
The cooling vest is suitable for both wildfires and traffic accidents
"Based on the test use, the vest is suitable for fire brigades in summer heat for wildfires and traffic accidents, where protective equipment must be buttoned up to the collar", Konttinen assesses and continues: "There is a lot of new research information about the exposure that occurs in wildfires, and according to that, the equipment must really be worn at those gigs, so that the skin-borne exposure is minimized. Even under a light suit, it is recommended to wear a long technical base layer, so heat load is inevitably generated without heavy work."
And during the test period, a third work situation was found where the vest brought pleasant cooling. The mongoose mascot also got to be a test subject. Under the thickly padded role-playing suit, the vest brought a nice cooling even to the normally painfully hot work.
Based on the test period, Konttinen considers the cooling vest to be an excellent aid in maintaining operational capability in warm conditions: "Without the vest, I would not have been able to endure such long continuous work periods in the sun in a heavy fire suit."
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