CCM Eflex3 glove set

[ArdeFIN]

Just to get your attention, I received today the next set that I'll go through that is CCM Eflex3 catcher and blocker. This is my second color mathced "pair of gloves", just don't know why both of my pairs are in white base - red - blue color theme. Red is the annoying part, blue would go just nicely. There is so much red that I'll just have to cope with it.

For catcher I have no special plans, just to take it apart, see what's inside, fix if something is broken (palm plastic maybe ) and maybe some improvements if there are any to make.

Blocker is a blocker, but as I might have a future plan of using this pair myself I was thinking of installing the Warrior palm to get enough size for my long fingers. The palm is a bit worn already as this pair has been in high division use for few years now and replacing the palm skin is even more of a job than replace the whole palm/glove part. And to do that I'll have to take the whole thing apart and while there I'll check the plate, padding and so on.

Oh yes, no pictures yet as they are in package still and I'll complete the Vaughn project first, maybe today to get into these gloves 

[ArdeFIN]

Now few pictures of what I'm up to.

The catcher has four sppots where the Speedskin is broken and needs some fixing. Whats interesting here is how the "normal" jenpro will blend in.  But there should be no issues as the Speedskin is sewn together and so will jenpro too. There is no indicators for palm type or angle, should there be any on Eflex3 or did it appear to Eflex4? The seller actually told me that this pair was sort of demo kit from some CCM sales rep. so I don't know how much of a serial production this set is really. Made in China atleast.

On blocker, the plate has taken some and is quite bumpy but didn't feel broken. Palm is used for it's life and needs a new one so Warrior palm is the way to go there.

As said the color scheme is reddish on the backhand which looks quite angry as the red color is for human eye. In these photos though (Honor mobile) it's way too much towards magenta. 

Seemed very nice to me, nothing that would really surprice while I have never had Eflex on my hand before. The catcher is sort of massive in looks and feel but the size isn't that big when comparing.

I didn't take any on-hand feelings as the gloves smell like they usually do 

One more photo from the inside of the catcher. I wouldn't say from this picture that the glove is so mucch used and smelly... So for the used outlook the inside has taken time really well with almost none of wear or any signs of use.

[Chenner29]

42 minutes ago, ArdeFIN said:

Now few pictures of what I'm up to.

The catcher has four sppots where the Speedskin is broken and needs some fixing. Whats interesting here is how the "normal" jenpro will blend in.  But there should be no issues as the Speedskin is sewn together and so will jenpro too. There is no indicators for palm type or angle, should there be any on Eflex3 or did it appear to Eflex4? The seller actually told me that this pair was sort of demo kit from some CCM sales rep. so I don't know how much of a serial production this set is really. Made in China atleast.

600 break.

There's typically a tab embroidered into the cuff opening

[ArdeFIN]

Yup, seen those but none available. Except for the D3O.

And I'm not saying these are special, but they could be. I actually wouldn't mind if these were all basic Eflex3 gloves. Atleast they seem to be unopened which has been kind of rare with used gloves I've seen through.

[Chenner29]

6 hours ago, ArdeFIN said:

Yup, seen those but none available. Except for the D3O.

And I'm not saying these are special, but they could be. I actually wouldn't mind if these were all basic Eflex3 gloves. Atleast they seem to be unopened which has been kind of rare with used gloves I've seen through.

It's also missing a tag that notates the palm protection (Game Ready, Pro, Practice).

I don't doubt that they could have been a CCM rep demo set.  They've done goalie demo days at Goalie Monkey and I've seen the mountains of CCM gear they bring in.

[ArdeFIN]

Got it apart with nothing special to say. The broken edge on the finger side had some desperate gluing done before which gave some trouble getting the lace out and needed some cutting to get rid of the extra glue. It was some type of hard glue, maybe loctite gel etc, which will not work on something elastic like this. It wasn't actually even bonded very well on the Speedskin.

The wrist-thumb plastic is gone which wasn't a surprise but more of a thing I didn't wish to see. Otherwise things are ok ish there.

Now seeing this one and all the ones before I'm confident that it is the wrist strap that kills the plastic. 

- The strap goes through plastic in two spots that are quite far from each other

- Those through holes are a lot wider than any users hand is which creates a triangle that is willing to go atleast circular shape when the strap is tightened

- the more force is used to tighten the strap the more it'll bend the plastic to a circular form

- the line of breakage here explains the rest, there is so much shape against the bending force of the strap that the plastic will eventually be broken

- added here are environmental effects of cold, sweat, pucks hitting, other bending forces from pushing hand into glove, poke the T open etc.

And the last, CCM is the only one that I know of, who routes this strap through the plate. And has most of the problems with plastic breaking.

Plastics are prone to break in time as while the strap is not giving pressure the other effects on environment are there still.

CCM is the only that I know of to use good old Styrofoam as a padding. It's lightweight and cheap, but I'd still use something more suitable here. Which leads me to the weight of the thing. A whopping 1140g! Comparing to the Simmons UL @ 970g or Vaughn 7000 @ 1000g. It's quite a lot more at the end of arm to be moved quickly and quite precise also. What is heavyweight in Eflex3 to begin is the broken plastic plate. It's about 5mm thick on the middle of it. And still not strong enough to take the forces given.

The next weighty thing is felt which there is quite a lot too. And some of it is located at places where there is no need for any protection. I'll see to these later on, if something could be done without affecting the gloves performance.

 D3O is one interesting thing. I usually have been seeing it next to skin or as padding atleast. Here it is the first thing after Speedskin in the surface. Below it there is a sturdy plastic sheet so I don't totally understand the D3O use here. Is it that D3O has an effect on the impact energy and maybe even more of that than anything else afterall? That is something I'll leave to be but just thinking of it as some have been complaining these gloves give stingers through. And atleast this glove has no evident problem with padding. 

I didn't take any good photos of the felt so I'll return to that later. 

One thing that I've been curious about design for a long time. It's used widely over brands and designs but I've yet to understand whats it for.

The loop that are next to each other in the middle, why are they so tight and lined as they are. In Vaughn/Simmons design those are in line with the break line, but with CCM and Bauer to mention they partly in line and partly not even close to the break line. What is the purpose of this tight lacing here? I just had to get this out of my head if some of you had an idea to this.

Did I mention that the parts are in vinegar bath at the moment. It was so awful that I had to use a pair of rubber gloves here. And after all done I just had to throw the gloves to trash right away as that stink got in to the gloves so badly. But luckily that is close to being history now. Actually I think this was the worst part of a project to restore a glove. After it's bathed and clean it's all of a pleasure to work with. 

[ArdeFIN]

Parts have now had 5 hours of vinegar delight and it might just be possible that for the first time ever I'll have to change the vinegar mixture to a new vinegar mixture. It is almost none vinegar but mostly filthy smelling anymore and yellowish colored fluid. But that then again only shows that there is effect and things happening.

While nothing else to do I took apart the pocket lacing and fixed the T cut which was from the spine plastic broken. The plastic is sewn in between all around so I hope it'll go for a long with this fix. What I did in detail is opened the cut so much that I could clean the sharp edge from the plastic and then a few sews over the cut. The original seam was cut by the sharp plastic edge I think. Productional saving that there is no binding on the inside edge there.

Then I took over the lip and plastic sticks in there. The original ones were very short having a 4cm of gap between. What I was really amazed and never seen before with such a used glove is that the plastic is still not cut in two. The finger side is cut but thumb is from structural reasons taken the stress which is sort of unbelieveable that not even the lace hole has given up and broken.

Make some new ones from sheet plastic? Normally yes but now as the thumb was ok and finger side long enough I'll reuse these only changing them from side to side and cut a little off. Now the gap at the break is about 2cm which should work well and keep the break tight when closed.

After all this done and happy with result I did some "break in" and messed around with the lip. I noticed that the lip actually requires a noticeable amount of force from open to close and back. This is something I don't remember from any catcher before. While it's not like bending a plastic stick but it's much more than few sheets of Speedskin should be. And not being much but added to all the other restrictions closing and opening the glove I'd get rid of this extra right away if only I knew how. Closer look revealed that the thick leatherlike material that reinforces the spines is continued to the lip on both sides of the break (diagonal shapes between the seams lined with my thumb) and it feels like those are just too close to each other and make the break operation kind of tight. I don't know why or the idea behind these slides and I couldn't figure it out. I didn't want to open the whole lip to get to these slides so I'll have to live with them for now.

[ArdeFIN]

A few more things that I wonder. Why is the break line of plastic cut like this? What is the reason or idea behind that cutout at the pliers? I've made some new plastics to this area and always made them with straight line on the break edge and everything has worked as good as before. This style is not CCM only but actually all of the catchers so far if remember all of them. Maybe Warrior didn't have that shape but those were differing from "normal" in many ways.

Here's a comparison of Eflex2 and Eflex3 might any of you be interested to see. Very similar breakage too 

Eflex2 on the left.

[ArdeFIN]

Looking into the soup, kind of weird is that foam that is forming from nowhere and floating on the fluid. Yep after three flushing rounds I had to give another run of vinegar. It's not at all bad smell anymore, but it isn't the materially smell either. But the progress is going on very nice.

Here's the image of felt I took in the middle of flushing. What I don't understand here is the extreme sewing over the palm area? What it does is the tight pressure to the felt which takes away the "airpack" of it and thereby there's less protection. On the break lines those seams have a job as there is a need to press the felt tight to form a line where it bends nicely. 

Other question is, why is that quite heavy material being used so extensive? I'd put that only to where the protection is needed, fingers, palm, thumb area. All other is just useless extra weight. As I mentioned earlier this glove looks massive, but is it worth that weight at all? I can't think of this massive look to stop any puck.

In this image at the bottom on the thumb side break line are those holes for the lace. Those are not in any line compared to the break, while finger side they are nicely at the line to make it work. If I remember right this area near the wrist and boot of the thumb has been somewhat problematic against closure on CCM gloves? There might be something to redesign there?

 

Edit: Have to correct myself, that is not actually felt at all but the 1mm layer on top is that brown woolly deer hair like material and under it is about 1/4" of HD foam. Why the brown layer at all? It's all very interesting as there must be a good reason for that but I'm not able to figure out what that reason is. Atleast it absorbs in a lot of moisture / water to weight a lot and the same will propably happen with sweat and melting snow/ice. I'd use materials that don't absorb water as those are available but well, yeah.

Just wonder what kind of glove would result if I was to design it. From scratch it would be nothing to say about but if it would be a collection of best parts from whats here already it might become something useful.  

[Dumpy]

This stuff is fascinating for me and the end result is satisfying.

[wvuviv30]

How's the D30 implemented?

[ArdeFIN]

Super quick Paint work. I'm not 100% as those are closed pockets but from shape and thickness it's in those areas. Right behind the Speedskin shell.

While I got the washing done and all the parts to hang out and dry I had inspiration for the plastic job and this is what I came up with. Holes are to be done later when I can fit in with the shell and some shaping is sure to be done then too. It seems quite good on hand but on the picture the angles are very different and the original is in two parts so there is some optical disorientation. "Do it yourself; you get just what you do"

[ArdeFIN]

Today was the fixing day. Mostly completed but the perimeter of the fingerside is halfway.

Let's see that first and it's nothing new but just using the good tricks used before. These are not tested to go for decades or even years but I have some confidence these should last.

So an used piece jenpro from some T lip to the inside to add an extra layer for the plastics edge to go through. Need a similar slide to the outside also and that is still to be done. I'm looking for blue jenpro to give it a little extra color over the whole white. 

Next to the boot of the T. There was no damage but the lace was beginning to tear it's way through. This is the spot that gets most force from the puck hitting bottom of the pocket.

At the thumb side there was a small rip strated from the edge cuts that are to sorften the sewn edge to get it around the shapes better. Problem is that when it's only sliced it'll rip when some force is applied. Much less force is needed than on clean edge. Something good but something worse too.

[ArdeFIN]

Biggest tear was at the breakline. After taking it apart I looked at the seams and looked like there was a little miss done in sewing. Seam had gone about 2mm off, but as that seam was done on dipped edge it took nearly 4mm of material off and at that spot there is no extra available and heavy stretching might occur at times. Took the necessary seams open enough, a bit too large jenpro piece to overlap enough on every direction and back together again. And while doing this I took care that there is that needed extra material now so there shouldn't be this problem anymore.

From inside:

And how it looks outside:

Jenpro is a bit itching to use but the Speedskin is not available at the moment and I'm quite sure it won't be in any time soon. Luckily the whites are equal so it's not that much popping out. And at the perimeter the jenpro white would be notable is why I'm looking for some blue colored there. Red might do well too but I'd like the blue more.

[ArdeFIN]

I had some extra time and enjoyed the progress I heated the fingerplate up and removed the small curling that was coming up. Then I cut the break line padding almost through with sharp knife to make it softer. And at the same process added a few sewing lines (left on picture) to give the breakline even more softness. Atleast on hand it feel better now. The glove was quite well broken in so it wasn't stiff by any means, but it could be softer so why not try to get there. The foam here is 1/4" thick and layered with that felt like brown material that is 1-2mm thick. The foam is slowly getting released from pinned down position where I cut out the sews under the fingers earlier.

Regarding to the https://ingoalmag.com/gear/ccm-extreme-flex-3-glove-bigger-deeper-double-t-pocket/ review this one should be "Game ready palm" as it's 5/16" 'felt'. Which thickness is there calculating together the foam and felt over it. So no wonder if the previous owner had some stingers through the palm as he was playing in second highest level here in Finland with league level players under farm contracts.

[ArdeFIN]

Whats up today. Nothing much just one new velcro and few jenpro support pieces added for a planned upgrade.

The hook side was still very tacky so it'll go for some more time.

The nylon surface and some foam and thin fabric beneath were all more or less ripped around by the wrist strap so jenpro tabs added for longevity. And there is a plan for upgrade but that needs to be tested before anything more about that.

[saitagoalie]

Very cool stuff again, thanks for documenting! I've also wanted to take a part a more recent CCM/Lefevre glove. I did do a refurb on a Premier 1 last year. The design hasn't changed that much. Cool to see what the EFlex looks like

Why I think that the palm plastic is cut/shaped like the way it is:

- Better stickhandling, when that part of the glove is soft

- Why have plastic where is is not necessary to have? The goalies palm is not in that spot.

I myself am curious why the manufacturers still use felt in their gloves. Probably because of durability. My Smith glove has no felt in it. Just foam. I wonder if the Warrior gloves are without felt?

Also check Instagram and Factory mad.. Lots of before/after videos of the repairs they do. Check out what they do with the catcher T's. The part of the T that connects to the fingers looks super stiff (probably firm piece of plastic, no break). And the part connecting to the thumb is really soft (there definitely is a break). Probably one reason why the gloves close so well in the after videos. There are soooo many videos of poorly closing CCM gloves. I wonder what is the main reason that the gloves don't close properly. And I'm interested to see if the Lefevre gloves will have the same issue.

About the missing palm / break markings on the glove.. Wouldn't be the first time that the stuff for the European market is a bit different.

[ArdeFIN]

Just checked through hockeyreviews.ca review on Eflex3 and that glove didn't have those tags either. It might be something that is changed while Eflex3 has been in production? This my unit and I think that HR.ca unit are both quite old, close to the first out of production line.

3 hours ago, saitagoalie said:

Very cool stuff again, thanks for documenting! I've also wanted to take a part a more recent CCM/Lefevre glove. I did do a refurb on a Premier 1 last year. The design hasn't changed that much. Cool to see what the EFlex looks like

Why I think that the palm plastic is cut/shaped like the way it is:

- Better stickhandling, when that part of the glove is soft

- Why have plastic where is is not necessary to have? The goalies palm is not in that spot.

I myself am curious why the manufacturers still use felt in their gloves. Probably because of durability. My Smith glove has no felt in it. Just foam. I wonder if the Warrior gloves are without felt?

Also check Instagram and Factory mad.. Lots of before/after videos of the repairs they do. Check out what they do with the catcher T's. The part of the T that connects to the fingers looks super stiff (probably firm piece of plastic, no break). And the part connecting to the thumb is really soft (there definitely is a break). Probably one reason why the gloves close so well in the after videos. There are soooo many videos of poorly closing CCM gloves. I wonder what is the main reason that the gloves don't close properly. And I'm interested to see if the Lefevre gloves will have the same issue.

About the missing palm / break markings on the glove.. Wouldn't be the first time that the stuff for the European market is a bit different.

Stickhandling is one, you get your palm touch to stick "directly", but then the short curve towards the heel (pinky end) ruins that, and with Eflex ruins the closure atleast to some level.

Well, that's not much of a plastic, and well, I do get occasional hits to that spot and even further to the heel and pinky.

Felt I think is a material that holds its shape and the air pillow effect very well over time. Foams are prone to stay thick once those are pressed long time enough. That's also something to do with selecting the right materials. The Simmons I made had all foam structure with no problems at all.

I've seen those closures and always interested to see the results and learn something from them. The main reason I use this style of mine with both ends cut is that I get a really good opening too, that is where the finger end is getting in effect when it is stiff. Closurevise the stiff finger side is very good. But I have to note that I've none of my gloves with poor closure, stiff some are but that is different than good closure.

Always have to remember that every selection has pros and cons so this is always in the thin line of balance between.

[saitagoalie]

1 hour ago, ArdeFIN said:

I've seen those closures and always interested to see the results and learn something from them. The main reason I use this style of mine with both ends cut is that I get a really good opening too, that is where the finger end is getting in effect when it is stiff. Closurevise the stiff finger side is very good. But I have to note that I've none of my gloves with poor closure, stiff some are but that is different than good closure.

Always have to remember that every selection has pros and cons so this is always in the thin line of balance between.

I also like to have a very wide opening glove, but I find that if I make the pocket too soft, it will "collapse" or "fold in" on harder shots. Like you said, it's always a compromise

[ArdeFIN]

3 hours ago, saitagoalie said:

I also like to have a very wide opening glove, but I find that if I make the pocket too soft, it will "collapse" or "fold in" on harder shots. Like you said, it's always a compromise

But isn't that, afterall, you catching the puck in a wrong spot/angle if you get the lip of the to fold in? 

Or is the lip already doing so when you open up the glove which is called Brians pocket/T as Brians has had this problem. The pocket won't collapse if the puck is getting inside and not on the lip. 

[ArdeFIN]

And then back to the topic again. Not much for today either as I was driving around the city all day in family and pants business and evening went doing garden works. And some hockey projects too!

Got the palm done and went with the white jenpro after all tinkering. Again ok ish job, had that odd 1/3 of a cut in sewing thread in the middle of that seam. Dang it seems I never manage to get these done with the quality I'd like. Hopefully it'll last for the lifetime but it's not that bad to resew if problems are to occur. The binding got a bit tight as there is now 2 extra layers of material on that edge.

First one with the new surface sewn in.

 Second with all the repair spots in one picture. Some puck marks will complete the job 

[ArdeFIN]

Waiting for some nylon strap and few buckles to continue with the catcher I took the time fullfil the topic of glove set.

Here's the idea of this project in simplicity. Remove the worn out palm, fix and wash the rest of the blocker and add some velcro to attach a Warrior G5 palm.

I don't know what kind of expression would describe the smell of the glove.  It's unbelieveable. With pure determination I took it apart and closed the palm in a plastic bag. And the rest of blocker went straight into vinegar bath. There should be no big issues with the rest of the project, Warrior palm dimensions are nicely very close to the CCM.

The CCM blocker itself is very good product so there's no need to modify anything but just repairs for few worn out spots. I'll get to those later with pictures as I had a rush for the vinegar bath...

The plates are intact, but the plastic has deformed a lot from the puck storm. I'll give it a try with heat blower and pressure between boards to make it level again. There are marks of the seams of the Speedskin top pressed to the plastic. That is heavy!

Last picture is a comparison between G4(?) and G5 palms. Sadly it looks like Warrior has gone down in "quality" of the palm, there's less layers and leather area is smaller in thumb especially. Maybe these palms have been too good and lasted too long so marketing department has taken actions?

The feeling of the palm is still very nice and equal to the earlier model only the durability remains to be seen.

That Bauer One.9 got the Warrior palm earlier this year so this is CCM version is not a first timer.

[ArdeFIN]

Slow on progress as I'm having a lot of things to do at the same time now.

Part of the blocker is still wet after how many days hanging in garage. I made a cut to the thumb pillow bag to get the foam out of there and dry out. And that thing still smells, I'll have to give it a rerun of vinegar.

Thumb protection was todays main target and it got itself fixed and some modification there too.

The pre-project pictures were trash so only the ready side is shown. Top is the pocket for the whole thing, in between are pieces from the foam that I cut off to fit into the new shape. This cutted area was bend over 90 degrees so it was useless protectionvise. Now it's away and should work better against the paddle of the stick. 

Same thing from under / inside. The top edge was frayed through the nylon and that is very common at that spot. I don't understand why this isn't designed like I did, extend the jenpro / speedskin over the top of the pocket and now it should be much more durable. No seams nor nylon there. I was actually going to get more of that overlap but it wasn't that easy to turn the pocket inside out and sew it like that. Well not very complicated either but that needs some practise to realise the 3D and how it will end up when turned out again.

One picture to end this story short, all of the thread that I had to take off to get that thumb protector off the glove. Looking in the glove and all the attached parts, there must atleast a 100m of thread. And the time that is used to get that all sewn in. 

[creasecollector]

Great progress so far. I really enjoy reading this thread! 

[ArdeFIN]

I was to take a picture before doing anything but in a rush and ready to go. Well here is what it was to come.

Here can be seen the amount of thumb protection opened to get the sewing machine in there enough. What is done to the glove is added a velcro strip and jenpro(weave) with opening to attach the thumb of the Warrior palm. What is inside there in the thumb protector is thin HD foam, molded plastic and thick HD foam. 

And here is the pillow to soften the impacts on the sidewall. Classic soft foam. Opening there was made by me to get that foam out. There is no opening originally which is kind of odd, that kind of cutout won't do any harm on anything but now you can change the foam if ever needed. And it can be washed and dried easier. The HD foams inside the thumb protector were still moist from the wash process. How long did people let their gear to dry? 

I'll go meet my material supplier tomorrow to see if I can achive some needed materials. Including a strip of white binding for that thumb. Next step is to add the velcro to the mid section. And modifying the finger protectors.