The fleece TAD Rager Hoodie may truly be considered one of the most popular and recognizable products by US company Triple Aught Design (TAD). The TAD’s successful designing idea has been taken up by many outsider companies, which used to and still continue to work out various military and tactical goods basing on this idea. Within its quite extended history that exceeds 12 years already, the TAD Ranger Hoodie has undergone several updatings, mainly including some minor details. The present review introduces one of the latest hoodie versions, which differs from the modern pattern mostly by the availability of zipper pulls that had been brought back to the construction design.
Today, if to compare the TAD Ranger Hoodie with a much resembling hoodie Condor Outdoor Sierra Hooded Fleece Jacket (my reference review issued at the beginning of 2012), I may say that the warm item by Triple Aught Design, as it seems to me, is advantageous with all the parameters except the price. Hereby I am going to highlight just the key features.
First, the TAD Ranger Hoodie is simply warmer thanks to the extended length and used materials. The Sierra Hooded Fleece Jacket seems rather dense, but in real fact it is comprised of one polyester fleece layer of unknown origin and a layer of meshed lining. The TAD Ranger Hoodie is manufactured of a thicker polyester type of fleece – Polartec Wind Pro – possessing a two-layer structure and water-repellant finishing. All the jackets’ external pockets are provided with a meshy lining with a soft structure that is enjoyable to the touch.
Second, it’s the quality one cannot find faults with. The Triple Aught Design Company obviously renders considerable attention to every detail and general tailoring style of the item. All the elements are ideally sewn; there are no overlappings, prominences, protruded threads or any visible ruptures and other deficiencies. YKK zippers are perfectly operable.
Third, the TAD Ranger Hoodie, made of fleece, is subjectively more comfortable. In spite of the size equality, almost identical performance and few items difference, the Ranger Hoodie fit better and does not hamper at all. The most displeasing factor with the Sierra Hooded Fleece Jacket is an obvious lack of length and frequent occasions when it’s folding up. Another negative point about its comfort characteristics is the hood construction. The hood is rather hindering than performing its functions. The hood of the Ranger Hoodie, although it’s deprived of adjustments, is granted with a more comfortable construction and occupies much less space in a stowed condition. This factor especially matters when you need to locate the hood under your jacket.
The general construction of the TAD Ranger Hoodie includes a hood with a small visor and a high collar, double coil central zipper, lowered backpiece, slightly extended sleeves with thumb opening cuffs as well as special underarm ventilation openings. If we don’t take into account the materials, hood style and a coarser pocket lining that gets dry in quite an amount of time, the Sierra Hooded Fleece Jacket’s predominant features are large zipped vent openings and reinforcing pads in the elbow areas.
Similarly to the Sierra Hooded Fleece Jacket design that of the TAD Ranger Hoodie is provided with six external zipped slash pockets – one pocket on each shoulder, a pass-through utility rear pocket, a small forearm pocket and a couple of main front pockets. The main slash pockets are provided mainly for hands warning and may be employed as additional ventilation openings. Their design comprises a smaller fleece pocket that serves well for accommodation of a minor multitool or jack knife, a plastic D-ring and a mediaport for passing headphones cords. By the way for the headphones cord compact fitting there a special guideline made of polymer that also keeps the plug-type headphones from slipping under the hoodie. It is arranged in the jacket upper internal part.
The fleece TAD Rager Hoodie really deserves its popularity since it is a good representation of the manufacture’s attention to the details, choice of efficient high-quality materials and ability to create really comfortable clothes with an extended service life. The only Ranger Hoodie’s disadvantage is its high cost that is peculiar for the complete clothes collection by Triple Aught Design.
