Riding gloves have a difficult job of striking a balance between protection and comfort. Since the hand operates most of the controls on a bike, sensitivity is important and so is breathability. And as it turns out, protective armour does exactly the opposite! So today let us see how this balance is struck. For better understanding purposes, I will be enlisting the example of the riding gloves sold by us.
The Tech That Goes Inside!
As I said before, the more direct protection you add, you also add extra bulk, which takes away some of the feeling while operating small switches and even touchscreens in some cases. To overcome this issue, or more like, to work around this requirement, HD foam has been added in all the places where protection is most needed. HD foam stands for High Density foam, and is hard but malleable. You can see that this foam has been used liberally near the knuckles and wherever possible.
Since our instinctive action while falling is to use our hands to ‘stop’ ourselves. In the riding gloves sold by FK-R, you can see a tiny sliver of HD foam added near the bottom of where the palm would be for the same reason. Proper abrasive protection is also needed. So the fabric material used has to be of good quality, and should be quite resistant to abrasion, so that the fabric does not tear up in case of a rough fall.
Keep in mind that all of this has to be done while leaving perforation for breathability of our hands. In this case a mesh fabric has been utilised, like in some shoes. To make the gloves more usable, and not stiff, flexible material has been used near the actuating parts of our hands like our wrists and fingers. Add all of this, plus seamless and durable stitching, and you have a riding glove!
Conclusion
While it may ‘just’ be a glove, there certainly is more tech that goes into making one then what one might think! My favourite part about this particular gloves are the tiny pieces of cloth present in the index finger that help wipe the visor of the helmet and the thumb and index finger inserts which are touchscreen-friendly. Not being able to use capacitive touchscreens while wearing gloves can really get on your nerves, if you wear gloves often!