Club Obi Wan

Michaelson wrote:

I'll be under the Plymouth. I think I hear some incoming rounds, BOak!

Regards! Michaelson

No kiding.

I couldn't help myself.

binkmeisterRick wrote:Quick! Somebody divert Buff from this thread! Fire in the hole!!!!

Like I said, I couldn't help myself.

I do have others.

HIGH regards! Michaelson

but really, my point was beaver vs. rabbit felt - under the conditions most really wear it for "adventuring" doesn't require all that much difference between the two.

Beaver will keep your head drier for much longer than rabbit. John at Montana Hats did a water test using my pure beaver body , a vintage rabbit hat, and a lightweight felt hat. He suspended each one, and filled them up to the brim with water. He started the timer. The thin 75 gram hat leaked and was empty 2 1/2 minutes later. The next hat that leaked was the vintage rabbit hat, and it took an hour to leak. The pure beaver hat took 2 1/2 hours to leak, and then 3 hours to leak all of the water out. If you are going on a trip and expect rain, please, grab the beaver hat. None of these hats had any treatment added by the way. A dense felt just takes longer to leak. Densely felted hats are also tougher, and last a whole lot longer. Fedora

I have one of the 75 gram beaver felts and can say it's a GREAT summer weight hat, but a dud rain hat (as Fedora states above). It performed admirabily on my trip to Arizona this past May, as is the one I'm wearing in my avatar.

My old AB standard beaver is interesting, though. It has been soaked several times for the past two years, and I've never had a wet head. The hat usually beads the water as well. I finally removed the liner and punched ventilation holes in the side of the crown for warm weather wear, and it's performing perfectly as a secondary hot weather hat. It's what I'm wearing today, as a matter of fact.

Neat stuff.

Regards! Michaelson

Michaelson, will you PLEASE stop taunting me with that 75 gram hat? In all fairness, I'd love to compare it with a vintage Knox Vagabond I picked up a while back. It's a total beater, but it's been great to experiement with and it really does make a good summer hat.

I got caught in a real frogstrangler about a year ago with my AB and had nowhere to hide from the downpour until I got to my destination. It was about a ten minute walk in solid heavy rain. (By that time, running wouldn't have made any difference.) I was soaked to the bone, but it took quite a lot of rain before it started to show signs of leaking through the hat.

AC - Thanks for clarifying, I see what you mean now. The choice of wearing a fedora as an "adventure hat" is undoubtedly inspired by fiction. Make no mistake, if it weren't for Indiana Jones, I wouldn't be wearing a brown Raiders fedora. I'd still be wearing something, as I've always been a hat wearer, but a brown fedora WITHOUT being influenced by Indiana Jones? No, definitely not.

I mistakenly thought you were trying to say that wearing a fedora while doing adventurous things was fiction itself, not inspired by fiction. As if the idea of a fedora being worn and lasting through some kind of adventurous activity was a pipe-dream. Glad to see that's not the case! My mistake! I guess I thought you were trying to downplay the importance of the higher end hats (as I know you're not a fan of the beaver felt hats, given what happened with your AB and all) and I over reacted.

Your HJ really DOES look good, and I'm not just saying that. I've always liked that hat and you wear it well.

-GCR

binkmeisterRick wrote:Michaelson, will you PLEASE stop taunting me with that 75 gram hat?

Hee hee.

Regard! Michaelson

AC, how about some side shots, from behind and above. Lets see it all.

AC - Awesome pics, man!!! That HJ makes me want one for sure.

Thanks for posting some more pics of that beauty!

-GCR

But from an observation of the Raiders hat, there is something about the rabbit felts that appeals to me more - even if they won't last as long.

Exactly! Nothing looks like rabbit, more than rabbit. And only in the UK would one have found that rabbit hat, IMHO. If they had of sourced in the USA(they sourced in the UK because of the sets) they would have ended up with more than likely a blended felt. And of course, who knows what it would have looked like, but I think Deborah already had the "right shape" in mind when she went shopping. She had a vision of what she wanted, and she was able to get it from HJ. I tend to buy her story more than the one told by Swales. The reason being, the hat WAS HER JOB. Not Ford's or Speilberg's. And her vision of Indy's hat has never been topped IMHO. Pure genius. Fedora

Fedora wrote:I think Deborah already had the "right shape" in mind when she went shopping. She had a vision of what she wanted, and she was able to get it from HJ. I tend to buy her story more than the one told by Swales. The reason being, the hat WAS HER JOB. Not Ford's or Speilberg's. And her vision of Indy's hat has never been topped IMHO. Pure genius. Fedora

Hear, Hear!

Johnny

This is a heck of a conversation to walk in on, to be sure!! If I may add my own blanket statement, "To each their own". No doubt about it, AC's hat looks great - on him. It fits him, literally and figuratively (it's just what he prefers). So many opinions are espoused in this forum that they are bound to clash (think about pick-up drivers, and the great Ford vs Chevy vs Dodge debate), but to say one is overall better than the other is kind of ridiculous, IMHO.

Besides, baseball caps are the only true adventure hat...

Merely commenting on the comfort and wearability factor. Trust me, I know about that; I have hats and shirts and pants that are the most comfortable things in the world, but my wife won't let me wear them in public cause they're "unpresentable" I can admit I have better looking duds in my closet, but there's just something about that one item that makes it my favorite! Not that your HJ is unpresentable, by any means.... Quite the contrary!!! I think you know what I mean....

Didn't intend to throw more fuel on the fire, AC.

yes AC, that work very well. Thank you.

Noticed the "comfort factor" in that video - WOW that thing'll do just about anything you want it to! But, just for arguements sake, wouldn't a higher-end hat like an AB/Dlx, PB, etc break in like that the longer you have and work with it? Not having a decent hat currently, I'm just hypothesizing here!

Nevermind

AC,

The HJ looks good.

G-MANN

AC,

I was just wondering, I wasn't sure if it was an appropriate question that's why I pulled it. The reason I was wondering was that I read you almost bought another from Todd.

Aeris_Canon wrote:
GCR, thanks. For a costumey beater, it's a decent close-enough. It really is a bit more comfy for me out in this heat, too. I expect it'll probably go back to shrinking in - "What time is it, now, actually?"

Close enough? I hate to correct you, but that thing is SCREEN-ACCURATE any day of the week. All things considered, beater or no, that is one SWEET HAT.

-GCR

That HJ looks good AC...I also like that first table you have it on, very Indyish.

Aeris_Canon wrote:

airforceindy wrote:Noticed the "comfort factor" in that video - WOW that thing'll do just about anything you want it to! But, just for arguements sake, wouldn't a higher-end hat like an AB/Dlx, PB, etc break in like that the longer you have and work with it? Not having a decent hat currently, I'm just hypothesizing here!

For argument's sake, that is the assumption. Though I don't think they bought a bunch of HJs years in advance hoping they'd break in to look nice and worn by the time Raiders started filming. They probably helped things along. And when you help weather a new hat artificially, you probably get fairly different results than you would just waiting for one to age on its own. (It's kind of like keeping an authentic brown Wested lamb untouched and waiting for it to age into the part and wondering why it might never quite have the nuances it's supposed to.)

But yes, in a speculative sense, if you were to let an HJ, AB, or AB Deluxe age naturally on their own through the course of time, the AB line is most certainly going to have retained its features longer. They'll all lose their stiffener over time, but that doesn't mean they'll naturally wither into an automatic Raiders look, either. They'll wither into a hat that looks like it really nees a reblock most likely but if the bash wasn't there to begin with, it's probably not going to show up automatically just from time passing.

With the new process of killing the felt on the ABs introduced, the hope is that they'll retain the shape you put into them for a very, very long time. But hypothetically, waiting for a hat to age and expecting it to one day just look like a Raiders because of time alone, seems doubtful.

It'd be great for Harrison to reach into his closet, pull the thing out and show us what that hat looks like after all this time so we can all say, "Ooooohhhhh." And probably, "That thing needs a reblock."

Thanks, AC. I definitely see your point(s). Do you think, though, if you worked the felt enough over a few weeks/months that an AB (or similar quality) could come out somewhere close to that level of 'floppiness', while still maintaining a more flexible version of the original bash? Or would the bash just pop right back out due to lack of stiffener?

Bink, let me know if I should move this to another thread please
Thanks, Andy

Thanks for the concern, Andy, but it seems like a logical question to me at this point, seeing as it's specifically in response to the post you quoted. No worries.

Do you think, though, if you worked the felt enough over a few weeks/months that an AB (or similar quality) could come out somewhere close to that level of 'floppiness', while still maintaining a more flexible version of the original bash? Or would the bash just pop right back out due to lack of stiffener?

I am not AC, but I can enlighten. If I ordered my bodies with no stiffener, they would be so floppy, you could not get a brim break to stay for long. The purpose of stiffener, in beaver anyways is because it is the softest felt of all of the felts. Without some stiffener, it would look like the hat Indy has on in the water as he swims to the plane in Raiders. Rabbit fur is stiffer, naturally, so you can get away with using less of the stuff.

The reason Marc and I use stiffener in our hats is because we are building them for the long haul. That was thought out before we ever had our first bodies run. At the time, both of us were sick of low quality felt, regardless of how it looked, that is, how well it looked like Raiders felt. We moved in the opposite direction, to provide a hat that would indeed end up being an old well worn friend 20 years from now. Over time the stiffener will finally leach out, but it takes time. We could have went the other route, but we were looking for what we wanted in a hat. This is all here somewhere on COW. We sure talked about it enough if I recall correctly. And we named them aptly(with the help of sharpetoys) Adventurebilt, that is, built well enough to last "the adventure".

A pure beaver body with no stiffener would have brim droop, right off the flange stand. The 90 degree break where the brim becomes the crown would not stay on a beaver hat with no stiffener. Rabbit either for that matter. There are tradeoffs in hats when you build them to last for a long time. Face it, most Indy fans, are concerned with their hats looking new (shapewise)for a long time. And the traditional hat makers make them to look good for a long time. You can move in the opposite direction and make them where the first heavy rain will morph the hat into something it did not originally look like. It's a hard call when you make and sell hats. Some would like it, many would not.

The first body Marc sent me was absolutely non stiffened. Zero stiffener. He quickly added the tradtional .04 degrees to his, or his felt factory did.

Now, a zero stiffened beaver body would be the softest hat you ever saw. Too soft for a hat IMHO, and it would lose its creases with a gust of wind, or have them changed. You would spend alot of time keeping the hat styled. Most people don't want to do that.

It is no accident the AB line is like it is. We planned them like that. We traded off, sure, but we are from the quality side of the tracks, and then try to make the quality felt look as Raideresque as we can. And of course, it comes up short as our felt is just such a higher quality felt. But honestly, I could not make and sell an AB hat using what it would take to replicate the Raiders fedora in the felt department. I would have to use 10 dollar bodies, and I can't do that. We are about quality first, even if the hat suffers in the softness seen in the Raiders fedora. A trade off for sure.

But the good thing about this is this. There is a wide open market out there for a hatter to go to his feltmaker, request the cheapest rabbit body he makes, and then specify .02 to .04 degrees of stiffener, and then find the right block and start making and selling these hats. Optimo used to have that pure rabbit hat(I bought 3 at 450.00 a pop, and it did as well as the HJ in the softness department. And the workmanship was top notch. The trouble of course was once they started to taper, they tapered fast and they tapered alot. It was not a hat you could wear out in the rain very much. The trade off again.

Aeris, do us a favor and wear that hat in a good rain,(and not just a fast run to the mailbox and back, but get it soaked) and then let it dry at room temp. I want to see how it looks then. I think you will see why WE had to move on to a high quality felt.

The good news is this leaves a market wide open for those who want a soft rabbit hat. Someone needs to make one to sell. You can get that same sort of felt from Portugal. Probably for less than 10 bucks a body too. But don't expect for it to hold up in looks past your first encounter with a rainstorm. They seldom do. If the first rain doesn't do them in, the next one will. So many of us have already been there, done that and bought the t-shirt. But there are plenty new guys here who would jump on it, perhaps. I would also bet that most of those guys would gravitate back to another hat. I honestly think any hatter who did it, would have a bunch of disgruntled customers and bad press. And many hatters would not risk tarnishing their good name. So, it might take a new guy learning hatting to offer an accurate Raiders fedora, down to the felt he could get to use for the hat. That would be a good way to get into the Indy niche market. I won't do it, Marc won't do it, and Art is too quality obsessed to even consider it. So it might take a new guy. We have some aspiring hatters here, and if you can't top the AB in quality, you could get a start by using the rabbit felt. The type HJ is using now. I know there is a market for that sort of hat. Someone needs to step in and see if they can do it. Fedora

Thanks, Steve. That explains a lot, as I'm still learning this hat jargon. Don't get me wrong, I'm not planning on working my AB until it'll hold a dent from the slightest touch of a finger once I get it; not at all! I was just kinda curious, in light of the discussion of floppy HJ's, and blah blah blah.

Thanks
Andy

BendingOak wrote:I had to share this beauty.


We have a saying around the firedepartment.........If you can't take the heat .......become a cop.

Oh here we go, its the old everybody loves a hosedragger everybody hates a cop!

That's ok; those who can't be linemen become firedawgs

You know, a Fed or Fed Deluxe off a Bushman block might work to fill that void within the acceptable price one would expect to pay for rabbit without feeling horrible when it started to taper.

I don't know if that felt is soft enough, out of the box. I have seen loads of Federations over the years, heck, I think I must have bought a dozen of them myself(I figured it up once and I think I had spent 7500 dollars on hats when I started making my own) But, I have seen some regular Federations that were worn in the elements as work hats, and when I reblocked them they were pretty close to the HJs we are talking about. The stiffener had just been leached out over time.

I think if you were wanting to start out in making Raiders fedoras, in that more accurate felt, do it like I did. The block shape to pull it off is available from Lamode. I have it on file there. Then buy the pure rabbit body from Portugal, with .02 degrees of stiffener, use an economical liner and sweatband and you could make one of these for.........let me go to the calculator......for around 16 dollars per hat in materials cost. (You could buy the Schiff ribbon and dye it a dark brown. )

If it were a hobby, you could sell it for 76 bucks and make 60 dollars for each hat. A hobby that actually pays you money. Not bad. I think this hat would sell, and sell well enough to keep you as busy as you want to be. Heck, I will be your first customer. I pay 76 bucks to go out to dinner with my girlfriend! I know there is a market for a cheap but accurate hat. I hope someone here jumps on it. Put me down for one right now. I am serious. Fedora

Aw, this really makes me miss my old HJ.

Does anyone know whether the HJs from Magnoli are soft and floppy rather than stiff?

whiskyman wrote:Aw, this really makes me miss my old HJ.

Just curious, why did you sell that HJ in the first place? I remember how happy you were with your vintage one.

Aw, this really makes me miss my old HJ.

Well, at least you should have that AB any day now if you have not already recieved it. Fedora

Fedora wrote:

Aw, this really makes me miss my old HJ.

Well, at least you should have that AB any day now if you have not already recieved it. Fedora

Oh my God...that worked?!? Thats all it takes?

Aw, this really makes me miss my new MC/AB HJ. ...

No? Nothing? Oh well...

Just kidding Steve... really.

Johnny

So...... this has been a very interesting discussion! But my original post remains somewhat unanswered....

Is it possible to get a BETTER quality hat made, but with an HJ liner?

(this is a bit like the re-soled Alden thread...)

ANZAC_1915 wrote:So...... this has been a very interesting discussion! But my original post remains somewhat unanswered....

Is it possible to get a BETTER quality hat made, but with an HJ liner?

(this is a bit like the re-soled Alden thread...)

This scenario, of getting an HJ made from better quality materials (or a better quality hat with an HJ liner, as you put it) would probably require someone to go to HJ and try to convince them to upgrade their offerings and methods of construction. Good luck. And even if someone WAS successful in getting HJ to agree to make a higher quality hat, chances are you'd pay a premium for it, considering what they charge for basic rabbit felt.

I think seeing guys like Marc and Magnoli get the rights to at least custom make HJ's using the current materials is probably the closest you can get to having a "quality HJ" outside of a vintage one. Or do like Tone did, and have one of Todd's reblocked / reworked.

But getting a high-quality product straight from HJ? A product on par with some of the other offerings out there? I just don't see it happening, personally. Who knows, maybe they will step up their game when Indy 4 hits?

-GCR

ANZAC, the easiest thing to do would be to get a better hat and swap out the liners yourself. I'm not sure most hatters would want to sell their own hats with the label of a lesser quality hat inside of it, or the label of another hatter, period. It'd be like a Porche putting a WV ornament on the hood. Seriously, you're probably best off finding the quality of hat you want and then scouting out a separate HJ liner.

Forgive me, but, is the brand name REALLY that important?! I mean, the only people who are going to see the liner of the hat are you and... and... :idea: the person you to whom you say "See my new Herbert Johnson?" That person, if they know anywhere near as much about hats as some people in this forum, is going to reply "That's no HJ, unless they've started having sombody else make their bodies." On the other hand, they may not know squat about hats and say "Okay, you just spent $300 on a HAT. Wow. And, who the heck is Herbert Johnson?"

If it's that important, then more power to you. First of all, you'll probably wind up with raw fingers from sewing the new liner in because no self-respecting hatter would put somebody else's label in his product. For that matter, any self-respecting hatter would probably balk at the idea even if it wasn't his hat. Second, YOU will know that it's not the product it claims to be, while you tout is as an HJ. A little depressing, don't you think? But, once again, if that's the end result you want, then more power to you.

I'm done ranting now...

people are craving the HJ name primarily for the screen accuracy of the piece of gear....at least that WAS my justification. its the same reason why we destroy our new wested's, purposely scuff up our $300 boots and buy gloves from todd that looks like its time to throw the pair away and reach for a fresh pair.....we want what indy had and in the condition he had it in.

it took a while but i learned to accept herbert johnson for what they are. i can't make a raiders hat out of it without a reblock so i keep my HJ on the TOD and LC pile of gear as that is where it should be.

i am however still contemplating on a IMHJ....waiting for him to get back from vacation.

Andy, there are at least two basic types of gearheads -- those who want the look and feel of Indy by assembling general repro or "close enough" gear, and those who want their gear made by the absolute original vendors and costumers that were used in the movies. The thing with HJ is that they provided the orginal hats for the movies, so there are plenty of gearheads who want the HJ simply because of its legacy. True, most people won't see the liner, but the gearhead wearing the hat will know, and that may be all that matters.

The obvious problem is that current HJ's are nothing like they were when the movies were filmed, yet folks still want an HJ because they made the movie hats. So the Catch 22 is that they want a high quality hat that looks exactly like it did on screen, yet has the original liner. Unfortunately, it's very difficult (though it CAN be done) to get the HJ to replicate and hold what it did during Raiders.

Bingo!!! Use the HJ for what it is! If you can't get the kind of hat you want out of it, get a different hat and accept that it's not an HJ. Or, you could do like GCR suggested and go after Herbert Johnson (or SAB) to start making a better hat. It's a fairly good bet that they make enough from the royal family and British upper crust to not worry about one lonely yankee Indiana Jones fan. But, if they were to get a petition requesting a return to the made-the-old-fashioned-way Poet (or Australian, whatever it was originally, I still can't get it straight), signed by the full strength of COW/TheRaider members, who knows... they may actually listen.

binkmeisterRick wrote:The thing with HJ is that they provided the orginal hats for the movies, so there are plenty of gearheads who want the HJ simply because of its legacy. True, most people won't see the liner, but the gearhead wearing the hat will know, and that may be all that matters.

This is exactly the case. For me, the quest has always been the hat. The rest of the gear will fall into place, or close enoughs will work but I've always wanted the hat. And ever sence the hat was identified as a HJ, I've always wanted one. But what kept me from ordering one in the past was the look of the (current HJ) hat. Yuck.

binkmeisterRick wrote:The obvious problem is that current HJ's are nothing like they were when the movies were filmed, yet folks still want an HJ because they made the movie hats. So the Catch 22 is that they want a high quality hat that looks exactly like it did on screen, yet has the original liner. Unfortunately, it's very difficult (though it CAN be done) to get the HJ to replicate and hold what it did during Raiders.

And so we come again to the Magnoli/Delk HJ. It's this exact hat that got me to jump off the fence and finally into the hobby with both feet. It's simply the best of both worlds.

Johnny

Poor Wincy...that first hat of his looks just like a Dorfman Pacific, and that second one...way off.

Johnny

AC, it's a good thing I wasn't drinking anything when I saw that! I take it that's from the Finger Lakes outtake reel?

GCR wrote:This scenario, of getting an HJ made from better quality materials (or a better quality hat with an HJ liner, as you put it)

OR licensing the name/logo to someone else. It is owned by SAB, and this is not unheard (look at the other hat/jacket companies).

Now, would it make sense for another manufacturer like AB or whoever to do that, maybe not so much.

Kind of like Hatco making Stetson hats...It's not a bad idea. Hurm...

Johnny

This scenario, of getting an HJ made from better quality materials (or a better quality hat with an HJ liner, as you put it) would probably require someone to go to HJ and try to convince them to upgrade their offerings and methods of construction. Good luck. And even if someone WAS successful in getting HJ to agree to make a higher quality hat, chances are you'd pay a premium for it, considering what they charge for basic rabbit felt

I talked to the gal responsible for the site where they make the Poets and we had a long chat, in which she kept claiming that the Poet is exactly the same hat as 30 years ago. I've got vintage HJs here and I told here that this would be two completely different hats and why they for example didn't put in their sweatbands by hand? - First I though she had hung up... then, after 30 seconds: "I'm not sure if you're serious about this to start with, but a fully hand made hat, such as you describe it*, would cost several thousand GBP"

*I only described how Steve and I do it every single day

Regards,

Marc

Marc wrote:

This scenario, of getting an HJ made from better quality materials (or a better quality hat with an HJ liner, as you put it) would probably require someone to go to HJ and try to convince them to upgrade their offerings and methods of construction. Good luck. And even if someone WAS successful in getting HJ to agree to make a higher quality hat, chances are you'd pay a premium for it, considering what they charge for basic rabbit felt

I talked to the gal responsible for the site where they make the Poets and we had a long chat, in which she kept claiming that the Poet is exactly the same hat as 30 years ago. I've got vintage HJs here and I told here that this would be two completely different hats and why they for example didn't put in their sweatbands by hand? - First I though she had hung up... then, after 30 seconds: "I'm not sure if you're serious about this to start with, but a fully hand made hat, such as you describe it*, would cost several thousand GBP"

*I only described how Steve and I do it every single day

Regards,

Marc

Please don't let her give you ideas

Aeris_Canon wrote:But...getting back to the HJs. Has anyone received their IMHJs yet? Chewie? Anyone? Indy M's back from vacation, right? Anyone else get theirs yet?

I ordered mine on May 16th & was told at that time it would take about a month because IM was out of my size; I haven't been updated yet, but I knew about AB making the Indy 4 hats, so I assume that's the reason for the longer wait.

Jack

Aeris_Canon wrote:It's an open door policy on hat preference, I guess. Everyone's got different views and reasons. Glad they can be debated so objectively still.

heheheh

been missing your gifs brilliant man !