Tool Tuesday - PPE Deep Dive on Pants & Chaps
It’s Tool Tuesday, and time to continue our deep dive into the Personal Protective Equipment that helps keep our crews safe!
Today we look at Chainsaw Pants and Chaps, a critical layer of protection that is essential for ANYONE running a chainsaw!
Chainsaw pants and chaps are unique in that they offer a far better ability to protect the user from injury due to contact with a spinning chain. Chainsaws spin their cutting chains around 100 km/h - that’s 28 meters every second! Needless to say, denim jeans or cotton dungarees just won’t give you the protection required from something moving that fast! Chainsaw pants and chaps include a special layer incorporated between the outer shell and inner liner designed to clog up the chainsaw upon contact and stall the chainsaw out before it has a chance to cut into your leg underneath.
This layer is comprised of long loose fibres of polyester or a specialty nylon or Kevlar material - every manufacturer has their own special name and blend. When the saw comes in contact with the pants or chaps and breaks through the outer layer, these fibres get picked up by the chain and pulled out of the pant, wrapping around the drive sprocket and preventing it from continuing to spin.
The key to this is the long nature of the fibres and their ability to pull out effectively. This means YES - you need to wash your pants! Oils and resins from saws and trees and sweat from the user can gum up the fibres and prevent them from pulling out properly. This in turn greatly reduces the effectiveness of the pants. Make sure you refer to the manufacturers washing instructions, as it’ll likely be a bit different then your normal clothes.
Pants come in an incredible variety of styles ranging from inexpensive (and heavy) pants for those staying on the ground to high-tech, lightweight and flexible materials designed for the climbing arborist at height. The prices vary greatly as well!
Technical Chainsaw Pants Designed for the Climbing Arborist …. vs……
…. Chaps Designed to be Put On and Taken Off Easily through the Day
Pants also come with a variety of ventilation styles and materials to help keep the user cool, as overheating can become as important a safety concern as running saws themselves. If you run your saw primarily in summer months, you’re likely better off looking for something with some ventilation to help keep you comfortable.
The Blue Pants on the Left offer No Ventilation, While the Green Pants on the Right have a Mesh Material Incorporated in the Seat to Keep the User Cool
These Technical Climbing Pants Feature Zippered Ventilation
If you plan on running a chainsaw all day, pants are your best bet. They’ll be lighter and more comfortable than wearing regular pants and strapping chaps over top. But if you only run a chainsaw for a short period of time here and there, chaps may be a great option for you. Chaps feature the exact same protective middle layer and feature an ability to take them on and off easily depending on what your task involves. The important thing to ensure in a pair of chaps is that they offer protection that wraps around the back of your calf. Most folks will grab a pair of chaps from the hardware store or online that only cover the front of your shin. The challenge here is if the chainsaw DOES make contact with your shin, the material will spin around your leg as the fibres pull and work to stall the saw. Without a protective layer wrapped around your calf to help keep fibres engaging, the saw will simply move the chap out of the way and find your leg underneath. We always recommend at an absolute minimum a wrap-around chap for ANY chainsaw work!
These Chaps Feature a Wrap-Around Calf - Providing Far Better Protection to the User
Finally, let’s look at chain speed. We mentioned the average chain speed can be around 28 meters per second at full throttle. Pants and chaps are all rated for specific chainsaw speeds, varying anywhere from Class 0 through Class 3. The absolute minimum to be considered PPE is Class 1, which gives protection up to 20 meters per second. For a full and proper protection up to 28 meters per second, you’re going to want to look for a Class 3 pant or chap. This information MUST be included on the pant or chap by way of a certification label like in the photo below. Make sure ANY pant or chap you get includes a certification label affixed to it that confirms the class of protection it offers.
A Certification Label Affixed to a Pair of Pants Detailing Protection to a Chain Speed of 28 m/s
If your pants or trousers become damaged, they can be repaired provided the middle protective fibres haven’t been pulled out or affected at all. If you do poke a hole in the outer layer, it’s imperative any stitching you do to repair them NOT incorporate the middle layer and your thread only captures the outer layer. By stitching through the middle protective layer, your are again stopping the fibres from pulling out as designed. If your middle layer becomes damaged at all, your pants or chaps should be retired and replaced.
For more on the protection chaps offer and for a demonstration of chaps in action, check out this video from Stihl:
Written by Sean Sterna - The Rocky Mountain Arborist & Used with Permission