Cleaning My ‘Stich
Before washing it, I had to remove the impact pads. I put the suit on my bed, unzipped the jacket from the pants, emptied all my pockets, and started taking out pads. I began with the pants with the zippers all the way open. The knee pads are each in a pocket-the mother of all pockets. The pocket flap is "full length," so that there are two layers of lining fabric covering the pad. I reached down, then snaked my hand up under the flap, felt the pad, and tried to extract it. Have you ever grabbed the tail (or head) end of a feisty night crawler that is mostly back in its hole and doesn't want to come out? Well, now you have an idea of what it's like to try to extract the knee pad. I grabbed and pulled, it slipped out of my fingers.
I tried again and again without luck. I folded the pad the long way and tried. No luck. I folded the pad from top to bottom (by the way, it doesn't fold very much), without success. I knelt on the pants in the hopes of holding them down and getting a better grip. While I didn't get bucked off, I also didn't make any more progress. I tried to find the instructions (when all else fails), but no luck. I did find RiderWearhouse's number and called customer service. She did admit the pads are in there pretty tight, and that it is a bit of a struggle to remove them.
I asked if she thought a hair dryer might help. She thought it might, especially since the ambient air temperature in my house was about 65 degrees and the pads were stiff. Now there's the problem-the cold!
So, after thanking her, I brought the pants into the bathroom, placed them on the bathroom counter, and grabbed my hairdryer. The pants kept trying to escape by slipping off the counter, but I pinned them with my hip so they couldn't get very far. After a minute or so, I put the hair dryer down and snaked my hand up into the pocket, folded the pad from top to bottom, and pulled. It tried to get away. It really didn't want to come out of its hiding place, but I finally succeeded! I won! Phew-one pad down and five more to go. The other knee pad came out of my other pant leg relatively easily.
Now, on to the jacket: I brought the jacket in the bathroom and stuck the hair dryer down the sleeve a little ways, aiming at the shoulder pad. The pocket that holds the shoulder pad is side to side with less overlap and is not as much of a challenge. With a little warming, the pad came right out. Then I stuck the hair dryer further down the sleeve for another minute or so. There were tight quarters down there and somewhat more difficult, but after only a bit of a struggle, I got the elbow pad out. I was really making tracks now! I thought I had this down pat. And I did-I repeated the process on the other arm, extracting first the shoulder pad and then the elbow pad.
I had some heavily soiled areas that needed some pre-treatment. I sponged straight Techwash onto the still dry suit, let it sit, sponged again and used a nailbrush on some stubborn spots until I was happy with the results. The riding suit went in the washer with the rest of the bottle of Techwash, I started the wash cycle, gave it a long soak about 6 minutes into the cycle, finished the wash cycle, set the wash cycle timer back to 18, then rinsed and spun dry, followed by a full wash/soak/rinse cycle with a bottle of Nickwax to waterproof the suit. My 'stich still looks like new-and bright and clean, and it has about 25,000 miles on it.
Yes, I did procrastinate putting the pads back in. I warmed each pad with the hair dryer and then inserted them into their snug little pockets. My floor is big enough that I ought to be able to pin the suit down so it can't get away. People say that it's hard to get any exercise in the winter. I even got to ride-my suit-almost as challenging as a GS ride on Class IV roads.
In case you wondered, I wouldn't trade my 'stich for anything. Here is one last helpful hint to anyone else needing to clean a riding suit: To insert the knee pads, slide the long end, face up/foam side down under the pocket flap, then bend them in half top to bottom to make it easier to turn them into the pocket itself. The shoulder and elbow pads go in "sideways." Use the same technique of foam side down, bend them the long way, and then slide them into the pocket. This is much easier when the pads are warm and pliable.
