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Douglas Padding


Jbpump15
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@MadMax doing a little late night Douglas forming. Here is Jeff’s reply to the padding question.

 

 

Joe,

As of right now here at Douglas, we have not seen anything that is better
than what we have right now.

We get calls regarding this foam or that material, on a regular basis. We
look into them, and have still not seen anything that is as protective, and
cost effective as what we have already.

Our Air Management System is all about dispersing the energy of the blow,
and having the least about of transfer of that energy to the Umpire/Player.
If we go to a thinner cushion, which will make it slightly lighter, you will
give up protection. 
Thinner Cushion= less dispersion of energy, and what remaining energy that
is not dispersed, will then be transferred to the Umpire. Hence feel the
blow more with the thinner cushion, than if the cushion was at its regular
thickness.

Overall our shoulder pad technology hasn't changed too much, the styles have
changed allot, but our Air Management cushioning system, which has been
proven over our 31 seasons in the protection businessm, to work well.


Thanks,

Jeff

15A8BF5A-5D65-47D7-898E-18E92FF6AA75.jpeg

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26 minutes ago, blue32 said:

Yeah, um, that’s great info and all, but this picture is creepin me out a little. Lol

The down side to Douglas, it’s like strapping a sheet of plywood to your chest. You have to heat those massive plates up and hold them in place until they cool. Since I only have two hands, I had to improvise.

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3 minutes ago, blue32 said:

Oh ok, I figured you didn’t include your face in the shot was because you didn’t want us to see the ball gag in your mouth. :D

:WTF

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9 hours ago, blue32 said:

Oh ok, I figured you didn’t include your face in the shot was because you didn’t want us to see the ball gag in your mouth. :D

Tough but fair...

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10 hours ago, Jbpump15 said:

@MadMax doing a little late night Douglas forming. Here is Jeff’s reply to the padding question.

 

 

Joe,

As of right now here at Douglas, we have not seen anything that is better
than what we have right now.

We get calls regarding this foam or that material, on a regular basis. We
look into them, and have still not seen anything that is as protective, and
cost effective as what we have already.

Our Air Management System is all about dispersing the energy of the blow,
and having the least about of transfer of that energy to the Umpire/Player.
If we go to a thinner cushion, which will make it slightly lighter, you will
give up protection. 
Thinner Cushion= less dispersion of energy, and what remaining energy that
is not dispersed, will then be transferred to the Umpire. Hence feel the
blow more with the thinner cushion, than if the cushion was at its regular
thickness.

Overall our shoulder pad technology hasn't changed too much, the styles have
changed allot, but our Air Management cushioning system, which has been
proven over our 31 seasons in the protection businessm, to work well.


Thanks,

Jeff

15A8BF5A-5D65-47D7-898E-18E92FF6AA75.jpeg

Is that an extension or the original way the CP was made?

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2 minutes ago, wolfe_man said:

CP looks normal, but did you add straps to keep it closer to your midsection?

Nope, after I got the plates warm, I strapped a belt around the top and bottom plate to form them. They rebounded a little bit throughout the night, so i’ll Probably repeat the process again in a week or so.

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4 minutes ago, Jbpump15 said:

Nope, after I got the plates warm, I strapped a belt around the top and bottom plate to form them. They rebounded a little bit throughout the night, so i’ll Probably repeat the process again in a week or so.

Just keep bending every time you put on.  It will stick.

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I used a nylon strap and strapped my plates to the water heater.  Then heated them and let them cool over night.  It was a lot less of an entertaining visual.  Just saying there are a couple of ways to accomplish this. 

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22 minutes ago, boyinr said:

I used a nylon strap and strapped my plates to the water heater.  Then heated them and let them cool over night.  It was a lot less of an entertaining visual.  Just saying there are a couple of ways to accomplish this. 

I don't know @boyinr, I would have enjoyed a photo of this and the look on the face of SWMBO when she walked into the garage and saw this. Lol

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1 hour ago, BT_Blue said:

I don't know @boyinr, I would have enjoyed a photo of this and the look on the face of SWMBO when she walked into the garage and saw this. Lol

Especially the look he would give her when she says, "Bring out the gimp." 

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14 hours ago, Jbpump15 said:

Per Douglas: We look into them, and have still not seen anything that is as protective, and cost effective as what we have already.

There it is, the operative term I was looking for that defeats roughly half of any good design endeavors. I wouldn't call Douglas chickensh!t for being aware of and adhering to their profit margin; you have to give them kudos and respect for keeping production here in the USA... despite all the regulations, OSHA hinderances, USDoL power mongering oversight, EPA extravagancies compliance oversight, insurance and taxes. So too, there isn't much incentive for increasing the aggregate cost of your products (and shrinking the profit margin) when your market share is rather small, and you have no visibility and/or advertising opportunities so as to generate interest in your products, beyond word-of-mouth (and that only gets you so far).

Sure, Douglas could invest in obtaining a new, modern, latest-gen foam (or laminate of them) but to what end? A bunch of us umpire-gear-geeks will rave and fawn over it, but will it translate to dramatically increased sales? Very likely not. Us umpires, we are a tough crowd.

3 hours ago, Jbpump15 said:

Nope, after I got the plates warm, I strapped a belt around the top and bottom plate to form them. They rebounded a little bit throughout the night, so i’ll Probably repeat the process again in a week or so.

 

3 hours ago, boyinr said:

I used a nylon strap and strapped my plates to the water heater.  Then heated them and let them cool over night.  It was a lot less of an entertaining visual.  Just saying there are a couple of ways to accomplish this. 

I like you two's engineering approach. I myself brandish an industrial paint-stripping heat gun. Soften the plates up just a bit and then bend them and hold them until they set. Invariably, some do creep back to their original molded state. There is an advantage to the Douglas plates being individually removable, if you think about it... they can be put in the freezer! I did this with Honig's K-1 plates... I heated them up, bent them, held them for about a minute, and then put them in the freezer.

IMG_2799.thumb.jpg.f13fc19e07eba43638751ad5c4419020.jpg

Both of those ailettes are cardstock-flat when you get a new K-1. See how they're now curved, and help define the shoulder arch properly? With them stock-flat, the PU looked like a samurai warrior. Now, this gives a much more streamlined silhouette.

The heat of Arizona does give me a hand on this. I'll often (be forced to) leave my XV in the back of my car and get it out only to bobble it in my hands like a hot pop-tart. After the shock wears off, I remark at how well-contoured it has stayed.

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1 hour ago, MadMax said:

I like you two's engineering approach. I myself brandish an industrial paint-stripping heat gun. Soften the plates up just a bit and then bend them and hold them until they set. Invariably, some do creep back to their original molded state. There is an advantage to the Douglas plates being individually removable, if you think about it... they can be put in the freezer! I did this with Honig's K-1 plates... I heated them up, bent them, held them for about a minute, and then put them in the freezer.

I thought about getting a heat gun, instead I used a trick I learned building composit components for the F-18. Took my wife’s hair dryer and covered up all but a small portion of the intake vents. (Think of a radiator the less air that moves through, the warmer it gets) the tricky part is not burning up the hair dryer.(I would have really been in trouble.) This gets the plates hot enough that you can barely touch the heated part, but not so hot as to melt all the glue off the Velcro.

 

Today I have done a little research, and I wish I had the capital and equipment to improve upon the champion. If anyone wants to undertake this I will lend as much skills and knowledge that I have. ( doesn’t equate to much.) 

 

Its a shame +pos has such hit or miss customer service lately, the cobra looks pretty legit. And I’m pretty upset I missed the train on the new Adams/Schutt. Maybe this summer.

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25 minutes ago, Jbpump15 said:

Its a shame +pos has such hit or miss customer service lately, the cobra looks pretty legit. And I’m pretty upset I missed the train on the new Adams/Schutt. Maybe this summer.

Ask @rjdakin... he bought two Cobras. He even did a video review of it before I was able to (I'd have set it in a batting cage, or on one of our mini-fields here on a calm day, instead of in my living room, but I'm not going to jab Robert about that too much ;) ), and then went and sold off one of them to a fellow U-E member.

I just haven't been in a position to buy a brand-new CP yet, whether by need or by capital. My current MaXV is holding up just fine, despite doing over 600 plate games since I bought it. My fellow Vultures haven't expressed a need yet either, and the only one who has (currently using a DaviShield... doing MiLB -level games alongside me... because he's a masochist Marine) is planning on getting an Adams XV-HDX or a Champion P2xx. He's tried my MaXV and he likes it, but it's a bit broad on him, so if he did get it, I'd have to take it apart and shave down the width of the chest plate and walk in the shoulder arch plates. I would like him to consider a Cobra, but like most people, they have to see it first before they'll start to consider it. Maybe after this summer of Expedition League baseball I'll pull the trigger and get a Cobra, provided +POS is still around.

The real shame is the XV-HDX might not be here in quantity until late summer... but by then, its shining advantage over all other CPs – the ventilation – is nearly over!

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4 hours ago, MadMax said:

Ask @rjdakin... he bought two Cobras. He even did a video review of it before I was able to (I'd have set it in a batting cage, or on one of our mini-fields here on a calm day, instead of in my living room, but I'm not going to jab Robert about that too much ;) ), and then went and sold off one of them to a fellow U-E member.

He’s who I got my Douglas and matching shins from. And the reason why I ordered the cobra 3 weeks ago. You’ll appreciate this. I have decided that this Douglas is going to take some work, I need to add a strap to hold the 15” plate down. I can’t belive they’ve been able the have that hanging down there with no anchoring.  And I’m going to scavenge my local re-sale shops for chest protectors I can tear apart and try to make one ultimate chest protector.

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1 hour ago, Jbpump15 said:

He’s who I got my Douglas and matching shins from. And the reason why I ordered the cobra 3 weeks ago. You’ll appreciate this. I have decided that this Douglas is going to take some work, I need to add a strap to hold the 15” plate down. I can’t belive they’ve been able the have that hanging down there with no anchoring.  And I’m going to scavenge my local re-sale shops for chest protectors I can tear apart and try to make one ultimate chest protector.

I thought the same thing the one time I have worn the Douglas I bought from Keith last year on here. That bottom plate could be a real nuisnce. 

I've ot a guy on my Facebook that Frankensteined a Mizuno catchers CP and put on the chest plates from a Gold and the shoulder plates from a Force3. It was a pretty sweet looking rig!

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7 hours ago, BT_Blue said:

I thought the same thing the one time I have worn the Douglas I bought from Keith last year on here. That bottom plate could be a real nuisnce. 

I've ot a guy on my Facebook that Frankensteined a Mizuno catchers CP and put on the chest plates from a Gold and the shoulder plates from a Force3. It was a pretty sweet looking rig!

That's why I ended up selling it.  The 15" is just too big and my gut pushed out the bottom plate more than I liked.

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Left my new Douglas CP in my hot car two days in a row...just bent the plates each day. They are staying shaped fairly well.

Yep, here in Boston we went straight from weeks of forty degree days to high 80s....

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18 minutes ago, GerryB said:

Left my new Douglas CP in my hot car two days in a row...just bent the plates each day. They are staying shaped fairly well.

Yep, here in Boston we went straight from weeks of forty degree days to high 80s....

LOL - us too in OH.  No spring - straight from Winter to Summer.

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