Sierra Designs Ice Fall Jacket

This was my fourth jacket from Sierra Designs in five years. I bought my original jacket, a Revolution, in the spring of 1997. I have had continuous delamination problems with all my jackets. So far no SD jacket has managed to last much more than a year before showing signs of delamination.

My most recent jacket was an Ice Fall obtained as a warranty replacement for a delaminated Revolution. It has lasted less than six months. I dread each delamination because it means I have to deal with the Warranty department. They are getting better but on one occasion I waited eight weeks for a replacement jacket. Recent dealings have been much qucker in the 1-2 week range.

I am not overly hard on my gear; I tend to think that I baby it when not in the mountains. I use the jacket for mountaineering, skiing, ice climbing, and the occasion rainy walk with my dog. Within weeks of getting the Ice Fall the Velcro tabs that hold the pocket flaps closed had begun to unravel and now they are almost useless, it is clearly very low quality Velcro.

I have a lot of other Gore-Tex items an much of it is older than the SD jacket and I have yet to have a delamination problem with any of it, including the cheaper brands such as MEC and Taiga.

Overall I would not buy this jacket again; when I bought the original Revolution I really liked its design and construction. The Ice Fall on the other hand has numerous seemingly useless features that simply add weight and weak points for the jacket to fail. I'd buy Arc'Teryx or save some money and get a jacket from MEC if I was looking for technical outerwear.