Brown JB2000 comeback

[ArdeFIN]

First a set of "new" pictures, Brown as it was when I got it. Didn't have very good pictures of it but I'll try to get some more.

IT's very basic JB2000 with nothing extra or special. XL base size with shortish sleeves. Very good for my hands though. 

Previous owners had made some small fixes like buckles and narrowed the shoulders.

Shoulder floaters are a bit loose as elastics are worn out. Sternum plate is off too. Nothing major problems.

Both elbow floaters are loose with a more than 5cm of gap to bicep protection. 

Brown replied "it's normal and shirt sleeves will address that." Well I don't like it that way.

One photo of a shoulder plating. Integrated to sleeve there is a plastic cup with LD foam under. Over it is a pocket (White/Blue) filled with LD foam. White string is to cover the gap between bicep plate and shoulder cup. Includes a 1mm PE sheet and 5mm HD foam. A bit loose on my opinion.

One photo from inside the shoulder cup. Nothing much but a lot of sewing is involved. These things are actually pretty cheap considering the amount handcrafting that is needed to complete one.

[ArdeFIN]

I started with hands, those were the ones that bothered me a lot with my previous R/GT C/A and I visioned some problems with this Brown too as in the previous posting says.

Here's one picture to compare the worked out hand (left hand, right side in the picture).

It's not completed as the project evoluted while doing these modifications. The elbow floater is renewed as are bicep and forearm protection. Yellow jenpro was added on the wrist because of worn out nylon. There was a reason for the wear, more about that later.

Tried to set both sleeves in equal standing position but the renewal made things so much more firm which doesn't really show in this picture.

Same setup from the inside. Here you can see more of the modified things at that point. Left one is the modified. List of things, shoulder cup removed, one elastic strap removed from wrist, elbow elastics postitioned at edges of the elbow floater to keep it controlled, Elbow floater pulled inwards 20mm, inside padding cutted about 10mm, wrist plastic and padding narrowed by 15mm, added padding to both sides and moved the original wrist flap to under the wrist, Bicep plastic was cleaned and moved towards shoulder about 20mm.

Quite a lot of things but I have to give kudos to Brown for this construction. It's super easy to make this kind of changes if you have or can get the sewing done somehow.

Similar length adjustment as on shoulder is the behind the elbow cup. I can see the production standpoint of this construction, they have one readily half assembled sleeve model at factory and then they modify that to meet the customers order. Plastics and padding are cut per needed length and sewn in, elbow floaters and cups are one size for all.

One image of the sleeve with nothing attached to it. The attachpoints are for the elbow cup. This is clever too, this way you can adjust the tightness of the sleeve and still with the elastics you can adjust things a bit different as the elastics attach to the edges/binding of the sleeve.

One attachment point is far off, which I noticed only when already putting the sleeve together. I think it wasn't from Brown that way but then again I cannot be sure. All of the modification done before me were speedstiched and this looks as it is machine sewed. It's also sewn differently than the other attachments so I think it's done afterwards. For what reason it was moved from original(?) position that I cannot imagine. 

[ArdeFIN]

Time for some plastic works. As said before the production is simplified to just cut the protective parts to fit the order, modify the sleeve and sew in.

What I don't like to see is some hand made things that look as follows.

Those terrible edges after cutting! No, don't do it. Well those edges had already came through the nylon on wrist too. But not too bad yet so a little of matching color Jenpro and clean the edges of the plastics. At the same time I narrowed the plastics by 15mm to give a little more space for added side protection.

Few photos of the elbow cups, where there are those rough edges too but I didn't do anything on them.

[ArdeFIN]

After sleeve work done on both hands with same recipe except the additional flap on my left hand (cathcer) I moved to shoulder area. Previously I removed the cup as it interfered with the bicep plastic and pushed the whole thing down to my elbow and hindered the arm mobility badly. Now I was to replace that cup with something else. To make it simple and use what was available I took the shoulder flap (white) that was originally only including LD foam. Whats the use of that over a plastic? It should be under the hard plate to have effect. Unless it was only to lift the floaters outer edge. I added 3mm thick PE plastic in the flap and now it does protect. Afterwards I've been thinking of adding some HD foam into that flap too to make it thicker and lift that floater at the same time. But it'll wait for the motivation as it is not priority job.

 

Then I had the bicep area ready and it was evident I needed to modify the original white string to be a lot wider and add some protection to it too to close up the gap between shoulder cup and bicep plate.

So I opened the string to see whats in and it actually was very wide fabric and enough to be used in the new protector. Cut some 1mm PE for lightweight and flexibility, add some HD and LD foam for 15mm of total thickness and sew back together. I had to add some fabric underside the plate and got that from an old Koho Revolution C/A floater  HQ materials! The plate is narrowed to the inside to prevent it from any possible effect into mobility.

A little jump then to rib protection. While this is a tank the seam between front and side protection is a weak spot, nothing but multilayer of fabric there. This is familiar from many C/As and I had this issue with R/GT already.

To give it a little extra and at the same time straighten the stomach area I added slides of MD foam covered with Vertex fabric. Slides are from 50x50mm cut into triangular shape. MD is a large cell but harder plastic foam. Kind of hard to describe but I'll take some pictures of what I use when I remember.

These came out very nice, no additional feeling of them, front of the C/A is very straigth now and I don't think there will be any stingers through there.

[ArdeFIN]

Back plate had some to itself too. First I added two nylon loops to attach the rubber cord. IDea with two loops is to balance the pressure over to the shoulders and get some more surface to nylons. Maybe I got a little over with that but those should last for the lifetime of this C/A.

I added a matching nylon cord to my pants to attach to the hook. Just to mention it separately the cord is inside the pants going around the spine protector and inside belt to make a good distributed attachment there too. This way the spine flap is free to move and the whole setup allows upper body rotation (C/A vs. pants) better than to attach the C/A to suspender buttons.   

Then some fuzzing with the wings of the backplate. First I just routed them inside of the side/rib protection but that felt very annoying. Next thought was to cut the excess of the wings which there is quite a lot for my slim shape. But hesitated to cut anything if there was a better solution. Cutted ends of the wings would have a possibility to feel odd against my back and they still might interfere with the side/rib padding. 

Tossing it around a few times I realised that the rib/side padding is again quite smartly composed from separate flaps which allows Brown to modify these to meet customers wishes. So a little opening process for seam on both sides and job well done! Wings end nicely between badding, don't interfere anything and everything is easily redone later if even better ideas will arise.

 

In the above photo there's that little flap over the buckles to protect them but that didn't work well so I'll make a new and bigger one later on.

And one from inside where the end of the wing goes, plenty of room there.

[ArdeFIN]

Then I got it on shoulder and more will come 

Added some photos after todays ice where I got a nice slap shot from the arch of the B point up to my right shoulder. Not a stinger as I uderstand it, ther is no pain but more of a stun. Made me wonder what the heck did happen as there should've been enough protection there. Then again it was a good slap shot from close distance so I think it should be felt atleast. But as can be seen on photos, there's a huge gap between padding at the lacing of the arm to chest.  

About 4cm of space to hit with a puck. Dang it's my luck to get beat even to the tiniest spots. But luckily I can fix the problem too, only have to figure out how and what should I make there. I'm thinking of 20-30mm of LD foam with some sort nylon pouch over and attach it to the lacing already there. It should not have any effect on mobility that way either. 

[saitagoalie]

I'm pretty sure that's the c/a I brought to Finland from Edmonton, CAN. (Me juteltiinkin Facebookissa). Happy to see it went to a loving home   Nice work.

I just couple days ago cut the back piece wings off from my current Brown. I have no idea when I'll be able try it on ice, but I think the feel is better without the wings. Saw you posted some pictures of the back piece in another thread.

[ArdeFIN]

Jep, this is the one. Had an XL tag in one seam, and it was quite big actually. 

I'll post here the whole story but it'll take some time.

Then there are things that are done quickly.

Some Vertex fabric and 20mm thick LD foam that is layered with thicker layers both side and a lower density layer between. No real reason for such material just that it was on hand. About 50mm x 150mm in size.

After a sewing operation it came out pretty nice, punch some holes and add 4mm rounded rubber cord. Attach with that to the lace and done. Doesn't affect movement or increase any weight. But adds a huge amount of protection. 

Quess I was lucky after all as the puck was only 5cm from collar bone. I'm not overly confident of the protectivity there. No real gaps there but not really tested yet either.

[SaveByRichter35]

I'm confused.  Are the first few posts supposed to be place holders for posts you're going to go back and edit or am I not seeing pictures that are supposed to be there?

[ArdeFIN]

Yes, sort of that. I've had too many tasks for past days so it's on hold but will be done when I get things under control again.

Sorry. 

[SaveByRichter35]

4 minutes ago, ArdeFIN said:

Yes, sort of that. I've had too many tasks for past days so it's on hold but will be done when I get things under control again.

Sorry. 

No need to apologize it was a legitimate question.  It has happened before where pictures didn't show up so I was just confirming.

[ArdeFIN]

Being polite. I'll add some text always too because it'll give better idea of whats going on in the picture. And in this topic some methods of doing things might give ideas and generate some discussion. Hopefully. 

[ArdeFIN]

While took some new photos for this story I got annoyed by the elbow cup straps that were overlapping each other and the velcroes were a bit outdated for some reason. I don't believe these have been opened and adjusted all the time.

Simple project, some 50mmx20mm hook side of velcro, sewing and done! This done to all four straps ofcourse and now they don't fly around. Not that they had ever got loose but to make it sure they don't in the future.

[ArdeFIN]

I like the possibility to adjust things to make them work well. This is useful if things were to change occasionally but for a C/A that only me is going to use it's in a limit of usefulness. When I get the setting good then I don't need it anymore. But as the parts were seprated already the extra job was reasonable.

So some Jenpro slices with holes (well holes to be made). Reds go to sleeves, black L shapes to chest shoulder and the straight part is for back plate.

Here's one image with parts tested together, you can see closeups in other photos too.

I laced everything tight as the measurements are so that I shouldn't need any extra lenght but that is easy to have with loosening the lacing.

The shoulder floaters were done already by this time, there was a slight off the line which I had to repair. The left side to riser (yellow bank) was sewn in odd angle and very low compared to the right one. This was shown with floaters aligning in uneven symmetry. It needed to open the top end and redo sewing but was actually completed quite nicely with only the old line of holes showing there was something done. "Brown" and "Elite" texts are a bit here and there...  Hand made that is right? Not affecting the performance.

As in size XL the basic lenght of the body too long afterall while I first thought it would go. It was actually so long that I was close to not need any jock at all..

But as I tuck it had to be fixed and that was done by removing one and a half of the padding from the bottom. Half was sort of extra that had to go as there was no reserve material to sew things back together. But with that removed it's actually perfect so I think I got lucky afterall having to get that extra half away.

What's in side those blocks is from top 1mm felt, 2mm PE, 10mm HD glued together and then 5mm HD sheet covering the whole chest area, layer of cottonlike fabric and 15mm soft LD foam to make that air bag and finishing touch is the blue nylon fabric. 

Again very nice and simple construction that makes it easy to adjust the lenght of the chest to customers order. Adding the glue is unnecessary weight I think but maybe Brown has a reason for that.

Image of a cutout of the chest padding. Makes a very good protection which seems a lot like what is commonly used. No exact knowledge on what's inside of for example in Warrior but Brown protects better.

[Dumpy]

My buddy needs to read this and get a Brown to redo like your doing! 

[ArdeFIN]

One more flap to keep my cathcer arms wrist protected.

I do have to change something with my catcher positioning or angle as I repeatedly get these hits under arm. But maybe this flap is enough for no stingers. And that recent dang shot went in too 

 This flap is made from side plate of a Bauer knee flap.

[SaveByRichter35]

Great work!

[ArdeFIN]

2 hours ago, SaveByRichter35 said:

Great work!

Thanks!

This is an ongoing process as I'm planning to add an elastic "belt" under the back plate to pull the sides closer together. The ribplates are a bit on fly at times and I hope that would fix it. I've thought they are in some way contacting the pants, belt and top of the jock but haven't looked closer yet. And now as I'm getting the new pants in L size I'm at the same time going to try without the inner belt or atleast leave it more loose than before. There is quite a lot going on in that area so I'm rather a bit slow in changing things than hurrying around to get everything messed.

[jeantodt]

Have you sew those jenpro slices with normal sewingmachine or do you have somekind cobbler sewing machine?

[ArdeFIN]

1 hour ago, jeantodt said:

Have you sew those jenpro slices with normal sewingmachine or do you have somekind cobbler sewing machine?

Pfaff 335 for all the hockey gear work. Some very thin fabric pre-sewings I do at home with "normal" Pfaff sewing machine.

[ArdeFIN]

Again yesterday I got one at my left wrist, it's kind of frustrating now as it's happening almost every ice time. This time though it was different as I got it on palm side of wrist but on the padded side of the sleeve. Just that the sleeve wasn't long enough and puck hit at the wrist strap where there is just few layers of velcro and jenpro and 3/8" foam. At first I thought that was it for today with wrist barely able to move, but it just went away in few minutes and now I have no signs of that hit, no bruise, hurt, nothing. 

Oh well now thinking it through I was to open the sleeves and get the lenght from the elbow where the basic sleeve is shortened. It's an option to do but I was using my V6 1100 glove and that didn't fit at all so good than before for some reason that I'm yet to discover. And figuring that out I'll leave the sleeves to be for now because it might've been glove related problem. I'll have to reopen that V6 and have a little study. It's with new thumb plastic which I noticed to be a bit tight and there might be a de-shaping issue on that plastic. 

Learning, that is.

Well to say it out loud, I didn't catch about anything with that glove either, but on the other hand I got more C/A saves than ever before in one hour of ice. And the Brown did manage that test with cheers and added my trust to this unit a lot.