Arm length - Ultra Heavy Flannels (UHFs)
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I think people tend to forget that IH is a brand that was dreamed up with riders in mind, that denim hipsters happened to fall in love with…..
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^This
Personally, I purchase the shirts/jeans because of the particular emphasis on motorcycle appropriate clothes, and not so much for the fashion appeal.
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Some of the recent UHF's were too short for me; 25" on the Large 101tg stopped me buying it, would have struggled with the sleeve length even without washing it.
That being said, the 131bb sleeves are over 1.5" longer on most sizes than the 101tg, which seems slightly overkill.
It's hard to make much of a call until the seasons shirts have all been released. Like the 101tg was the shortest sleeves in a while, the 131 might be the longest sleeves, and it's just unfortunate that this was the first of the new batch that we all got a look at.
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Just looked at @PattyCakez pictures in the latest UHF and IMO the arms look too long. Now they might be perfect when he riding his bike but who see's that?
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I don't wash the UHFs often so it doesn't seem to be much of a problem-that said I can wear and M or L depending on the look and the shoulders. I will say that if the shoulders on the M stayed around 17-17.5", longer sleeves would make this a perfect cut for me. And because I am the warm center of the universe, you should probably do that. ; )
Un saludo!
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I think people tend to forget that IH is a brand that was dreamed up with riders in mind, that denim hipsters happened to fall in love with…..
I'm not sure anybody has forgotten this. Nor do I think it's particuarly relevant. I think most people are commenting based on what suits them, understandably so.
IH has riding and bikers in it's DNA and that's great. Lots of design choices are made with this in mind, many of them are great for non-bikers too. But lots if IH clothing is not obviously biker friendly and little of it meets technical/safety specs for riding. A lot of it is designed with Japanese biker fashion in mind. I'm pretty sure 14oz white satin finish jeans aren't very practical from a bike riding stand point.
It was Giles that asked for longer sleeves, not Haraki-san, who makes most of the biker orientated design decisions. I love that bikers in the west are discovering IH but the majority of customers outside of Japan are not bikers. Giles is asking this question to get a sense of how the many people on the forum feel about this, so he can make a strategic decision about it that might affect future sales. And good for him.
I'm not worried that IH is going to lose it's biker identity over an inch of sleeve length.
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The only shirt from IH I've ever had an issue with in regards to sleeve length is my 136, which came in at a whopping 28.2 in. in the XXL. I almost exclusively have to wear it with the sleeves cuffed, which is fine on this shirt in particular because it's got a nice selvedge detail under the cuff. But I think that a sleeve that long on a XXL UHF might look a bit silly on my frame.
The UHFs that I do have are the recent ones, and I didn't really have any problem with the sleeve length on any of them. I'm a big guy, about 6'3" and 225 pounds with normal to longish arms and I haven't found myself looking for extra sleeve length personally. But I don't ride a motorcycle or anything like that either.
I guess I would say split the difference or keep them the same as recent releases, but my only hope is that I don't see too many 28 in. sleeves on the upcoming UHFs! -
I have to cuff my sleeves once, regardless of length, so I'm a bit of an outlier. From what I've seen with other brands, a (USA) M or L typically has a sleeve length of 24.5" - 26". I have noticed that the heavier fabrics that IH uses tends to exaggerate the length, since the fabric doesn't stack as readily.
I buy IH shirts knowing the sleeves will always be too long for me, but that doesn't turn me off to future purchases. I buy the shirts because they're beautiful, robust, warm, comfortable and made with great care and attention to detail. Even though it isn't ideal, tailoring is always an option.
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Yeah, I buy my buffalo check UHF´s in XL and shrink them at a 60C wash. 0.5 inches more could be cool, but not a must.
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Please bring back the glory days of the shorter length, compañeros - the new one is really much too long. The shirt is gnarly and pretty cool as every release - unique, beautiful & timeless. But the sleeves destroy all of this. TrickHell said it before: "..there's no way I'm buying a shirt and hoping it fits after I shrink it. Not for $300."
Well said, TrickHell -
Of all the shirts I've bought over the years I only consider one to be a bit on the short side, so I say stay as they were!
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This. -
Exactly. Can anybody of those complaining about too short sleeves post an actual fitpic that illustrates the problem? I've browsed through a lot of pictures and found non with too short sleeves (when the Shirt was sized right and not too small from the start).
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I'm firmly in the sleeves are fine as they were camp, but I roll up my sleeves 90% of the time anyway
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I voted to revert back to the shorter sleeves. This is just my personal preference, nothing else.
However, I must agree with @neph93 with regards to the practicality of IH wear for the motorcyclist. As someone who used to ride motorcycles, there's very little I would have worn from IH with regards to protection. I was very reluctant to even wear a pair of jeans when riding, although I have done, as it provides little protection if one has a spill. Plus there are few IH cuts that would even be practical when riding a motorcycle, ie 634/1955. Most other cuts would be just plain uncomfortable to wear when riding.
As @UnTucked mentions that IH was dreamed up with bikers in mind that denim hipsters, (fuck I hate that word), have fallen in love with. I respectfully disagree. IMO, IH make great clothes for biker hipsters, military-clothing-wearing hipsters, train-driving/house-building hipsters, dudes-on-horseback-roping-cattle hipsters etc etc. This is not a slur on IH, just the way I see it. Hell, I fit into at least two of those categories, & quite happily so. The Lord, & IHHQUK, knows how much I've spent on IH clobber in the past due to its exceptional build quality, & it looks good! Just my $0.02.
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For me, @Max Power said it best, and arm length was acceptable as it was; for reference, I'm 5'11" 205lbs and I'm happy with 25.8-26.4" arms on XL/XXL shirts.
So, a range of 26-26.5" on XL/XXL would be great.Extra room in the forearms would be welcomed as well
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@Max:
Exactly. Can anybody of those complaining about too short sleeves post an actual fitpic that illustrates the problem?
I think the website fitpics on the 130 are too short, even more so when it would be washed. I returned this shirt for that reason.
That being said, there are a lot of great fits on the 130 thread. And I think the web pictures on the 131 are too long. Would be interested to see @sam in the 131 to see if they still look long.
I think there is a sweet spot somewhere on the middle of these two examples.
Hopefully the 131 is a bit of an outlier, and that they are not all quite this long.
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Thanks, you're right. But looking at the size chart the 130 has among the smallest of all UHFs (XL: 25,6"). If you add 1" to those measurements you still have shorter sleeves than on the 131 BB. Like I said: Aim to get a length not below 26" and not above 26,5" (speaking for XL) and it will make 90% of people happy.
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The Max Power way is the right way…
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@Max:
Thanks, you're right. But looking at the size chart the 130 has among the smallest of all UHFs (XL: 25,6"). If you add 1" to those measurements you still have shorter sleeves than on the 131 BB. Like I said: Aim to get a length not below 26" and not above 26,5" (speaking for XL) and it will make 90% of people happy.
sounds reasonable! +1
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OK. It's sit on the fence time.
But, just to frame this discussion, Haraki loves the new length.
I spent a long time chatting (pissing Tom-san off) and measuring until there was virtually no print left on the tape measures, about this today.
We agreed that some of the UHF's that we had released had arms that were definitely too short. Needless to say this was unintended. It is not like Tom and H sit around architecting stuff that people won't like/buy.
Here are the issues that we have to contend with. Although the yarns used in the UHF's are the same, the weaves (Buffalo, Crazy, Ombre and plain) and colours are different. Each weave behaves differently and even the colour we dye with affects yarn shrinkage characteristics. So we can only, at best, get an averagely perfect end size (without exhaustive sampling, which would mean 2017 release not 2016).
That said, we do believe that the cookie monsters did end up longer tan we had projected.
When I get back to the UK, I will measure the 131-BB's and give Tom my ideal arm lengths for each size. And guess what? That'll likely be between the shorter examples and the longer examples.
We will then make all future UHF's target those arm lengths. But be aware that some will end up shorter than target and some longer.
