Triplette Lame tearing up jacket...

[Windsor]

I'm starting to see a whole bunch of rips and tears along the bottom arm areas on my jacket and I'm suspecting its my crazily abrasive lame, the question is...how do I fix my jacket?

[sir alasdair]

Is this a sabre lame' ? Or a foil lame'? I'm trying to picture how the "bottom" of your sleeves is being damaged. Is the bottom referring to the bottom side of your entire arm or are you referring to the cuff end of the arm being the bottom when you have your arms hanging to your side? All I could guess is to patch the affected areas with similar material.

[KD5MDK]

A foil lame would tear up the jacket arms. The sabre lame will just wear itself out, not affect the jacket at all.

[penguin_2000]

I have an old Triplette lame that I use for practice, and it kind of messes up the threads of my jacket. It also shredded the bib of my last mask. I'm hoping that Infinity lames are brought back so I can get one of those and use my Allstar lame for practice...

[CvilleFencer]

A friend of mine had this problem. She had a lame die at a NAC, bought one from TCA cause they were the closest vendor and used it for a bit. Until of course she realized that her $100 lame was shreading her $250 Uhlmann FIE jacket. She is not the only one I know to have had this happen. Just another quality product from TCA...

In all fairness, how you hold your arms and how you move seems to play a large part in how badly the lame sandpapers your kit, but I have never seen or heard of it happening with any other quality lame such as Uhlmann, Leon Paul, PBT or even the super cheap Chinese made lames.

[KD5MDK]

I wouldn't be surprised if Allstar/Uhlmann lames had a similar effect to some degree. (I have a sabre one so I don't know) If you want a smooth lame, the Infinity or LP look like your best bet.

[PeterGustafsson]

Hi!

Is this wearing/sandpapering effect limited to a specific place, or is it happening all over the jacket?

If it is going on in a specific place, why not try the cheap throwaway principle?

Would it be possible to cut out the appropriate part from a cheap undershirt, tape it to the jacket, and let the lame wear out that patch? One undershirt for a few bucks should be good for several protective patches. If it is not legal for competition, one could do it for training, and at least limit jacket wear.

Any problems with this approach?


Have a nice time!

Peter Gustafsson

[CvilleFencer]

Originally Posted by KD5MDK

I wouldn't be surprised if Allstar/Uhlmann lames had a similar effect to some degree. (I have a sabre one so I don't know) If you want a smooth lame, the Infinity or LP look like your best bet.

I wore an Uhlmann lame for a couple of years. Most of the people I know were Uhlmann lames or the JL lames. Never once have I seen this happen with any other brand. The TCA lames, or at least that run of them, were very abrassive. You could have used them to clean dirty pots kind of abbrasive! The fencer I was mentioning had used Uhlmann before for 3 years and never a problem. A couple months with the TCA and she was shreading her jacket. This may be an issue that was only with a certain batch (or they may have changed what they are made out of) but I don't know.

Peter, the damage is almost always, at least that I have seen, contained to the underside of the upper arm. Also the people that I know who have had problems tend to keep their arms tucked in fairly tight/close to their body. Your idea would work after a fashion, but trying to tightly stitch a large patch of material onto an FIE jacket is a pain (literally) and I am not sure how well repeated patchings would hurt/damage the material. Much easier to just get a lame that will not eat your jacket!

[PeterGustafsson]

Hi!

Originally Posted by CvilleFencer

Peter, the damage is almost always, at least that I have seen, contained to the underside of the upper arm. Also the people that I know who have had problems tend to keep their arms tucked in fairly tight/close to their body. Your idea would work after a fashion, but trying to tightly stitch a large patch of material onto an FIE jacket is a pain (literally) and I am not sure how well repeated patchings would hurt/damage the material. Much easier to just get a lame that will not eat your jacket!

Very well then - the problem is in one spot. Since a new lame costs much more than a old t-shirt, I thought that I had figured out a method of using that costly lame until it has run its course, without wrecking a costly jacket. My idea was not to stitch - I thought that one should tape the patch to the jacket!


Have a nice time!

Peter Gustafsson

[CvilleFencer]

Oh, yeah that would work. For that matter a fabric glue that could be pealed away with a hair dryer would work very well to. Sorry, I thought you were suggesting stitching a 9x4 inch patch on the inside upper arm of each side of an FIE jacket. Now that would be hard on the fingers!

[Ordway]

Wow, I thought I was the only one to have a TCA lame that ate my other equipment. The sandpaper collar ate the inside of my mask bib, and the arms rubbing against the body (this was a sabre lame) wore bare patches on the lame itself. Plus, the upper edge of the collar would rub against my throat, too, irritating the skin sometimes.

My advice would be to get a new lame. Unless you are the 1 in 100 people whose body is shaped like the Triplette clothing model, your lame probably doesn't fit all that well anyway... I use Uhlmann or Allstar lames now, but Absolute makes a pretty decent budget lame that I recommend to my friends who are trying to stretch their fencing-gear dollars.

[fencerbill]

It is not just a question of the Lame material but of the jacket material also. I have a Startex jacket and have not had any problems. But I have seen other Allstar/Uhlmann FIE jackets made from other synthetic fabrics that have the same wearing problems. I have repaired an FIE jacket for a club mate that absolutely wore completely through his off arm wrist area.

I am not familiar enough with the jacket model names to be able to tell you which model it was.

Similarly, it is quite often the Lame material that wears through the liner of a Foil or Sabre bib. Epee fencers very rarely have that problem.

[parryDoh]

I was wondering how I was getting holes in my jacket's armpits, using a Triplette heavy duty lame.

Originally Posted by penguin_2000

I'm hoping that Infinity lames are brought back so I can get one of those and use my Allstar lame for practice...

This website still shows infinity lames on its site: www.thefencingdude.com

[rsy]

Originally Posted by penguin_2000

I'm hoping that Infinity lames are brought back so I can get one of those and use my Allstar lame for practice...

You can try contacting the company, Infinity Electronics, directly. I am not sure they are still manufacturing the lames. I dealt with them directly several years ago and they were very difficult to get a hold of, they were very slow to fill the order, and as I remember they didn't charge my credit card until a few months after the order arrived.

-r

[D+F+P=Hadouken!]

A lame should not damage your uniform. On the occasion that I fence a lame weapon, I always use the JL lames. They're tanks, and they're cheap. Yet another reason to stay away from triplette.