Down hood - useful? Or more kit to manage/lose?

[Wollemi]

I have 4 down jackets
- Quechua - 1% aluminium
- Mont - orange - and dirty/stained. Go-to survival jacket
- Macpac - stylish matte-black, excellent fit
- Aldi - $60 Have worn it as pants to sleep in sleeping bag when XC skiing - to good effect. Thinking about making it into a vest - would look terrible as street-wear then.

None of these have a down hood. I sleep cold - I sleep in the Mont down jacket in my down sleeping bag and have often been cold. Also often wake with upper edge of sleeping bag hood cord pressing hard on my scalp. My $10 (Roman, new from CC 20 years ago) summer bag is more comfortable in the hood than my Mont down sleeping bag.
Anyone acquired a down hood to better their 1. Sleeping bag 2. Down jacket

https://zpacks.com/products/goose-hood Says 37 grams, or 42g in Features... yet photo of model shows a real puffy characteristic of more like 150g

[Moondog55]

Hoods do not need much down to really loft up. Looks like an ounce or so to me. All my parkas have hoods as do most of my cool weather tops and jackets

[andrewa]

Any hood is good. I won’t buy a jacket without a hood these days.

My best find ever was Roger Caffin’s site regarding sleeping stuff. Now I sleep under a home made quilt, and warm up very quickly when I have the hood over my face....much better than any other configuration I’ve had in the last 35 yrs

https://bushwalkingnsw.org.au/clubsites ... .htm#Hoods

A

[keithy]

I've got a down hood had it for about 10 years, but its not the lightest material. It only has 600 duck down and weighs about 100g. Has chin buttons and a hood cinch cord. Packs down reasonably small. I used it to supplement my hoodless 800 goose down jacket, and occasionally to supplement my sleeping bag. Only my UL down jackets have a hood, but they don't keep me as warm as my 800 goose down jacket.

I only used it when it below zero. Especially around -10 I really can't feel my wingnut ears even with a merino or fleece beanie and I start copping a big headache. The down hoodie gives me back the feeling in my ears.

If you want a cheaper option than the Z-packs. Aegismax has a down hood - weighs about 75g and about 35g fill of what they say is 800 goose down. I considered getting it when I got my summer down quilt from them, but I haven't used my 600 down hood that much so decided against it.

It was around USD$15 when I saw it back in 2017. Likely gone up now but I suspect still cheaper than the zpacks.

[slparker]

I have a down beanie for snow camping - ridiculously warm and I combine this with a polarfleece neck warmer and so get the same coverage as a hood. I prefer a more versatile system but I do see the appeal of a big puffy hood and have a synthetic puffy with one - instant warmth.

[Warning - Hood rant and thread drift follows]

I have very few garments with a hood because I hate it when i don't have my hood up and I have accumulated one or more hoods stuffed down my back or pushed up my neck.
Either my windshell has a hood, my midlayer or my base layer has one. My hardshell, of course, has one. A peruvian hat or beanie achieves any extra insulation. If I need my hardshell hood on then I don't need more than one insulating layer on my head as I overheat. Which makes any extra hoodage really, really uncomfortable.

Most hood design is awful anyway, very few companies get it right and I'd prefer a beanie or cap than a monk's cowl draped over my eyes because a designer can't be bothered designing a hood properly.

[Moondog55]

Reply to hood rant.
You can't mislay or lose an attached hood, while I agree with you about multiple hoods being a PITA sometimes I think the benefits outweigh the fiddle factor. Hoods for climbers won't suit walkers , but with more and more skiers wearing helmets all the time expect bigger hoods on some garments. In the same vein I wonder why so many designers put collars on layering insulation pieces when inner garments layer best without the collar. Good hood design is activity related and quite specific. Look at Musto jackets designed for Off-Shore yacht racing where peripheral vision is important and think how bad they would be in an Alpine blow in winter.
I like my hoods big enough to take my baseball cap plus my balaclava plus my warm hat so bigger hoods suit me.
I have needed to add adjustments to several of my parka hoods tho, even the Goretex ones

[Turfa]

I use a Z Packs hood with my UC Mike quilt and find it much better than using a sleeping bag with built-in hood as I can toss and turn in my sleep and the hood will move with me. With a sleeping bag I inevitably wake up with my face twisted around into the hood.
A separate hood is a great system.

[ChrisJHC]

I'm with slparker and personally hate hoods.
Maybe it's because I have two teenagers at home who live with their hoods up?
I prefer a good beanie/neck warmer (usually just a buff).
Mind you, my lower limit is around -5C (can stretch to -10C in emergencies) so I don't go really cold.
I'm also a warm sleeper.

[Walk_fat boy_walk]

I'm in the 'no hood' camp for a down jacket. Obviously have a hood on the waterproof jacket but find it redundant and just extra weight on other garments. As someone else said, the flexibility of adding a neck warmer and/or beanie is preferred over the extra weight of a jacket hood for me.

[wildwanderer]

As a cold sleeper and sleeping quilt user(no hood) I use a down jacket with hood as a combined camp warm wear and sleep wear solution.

Works great for me. I typically have a light weight beanie on as well.

Using a rain jackets hood as a camp warm wear solution doesn’t work for me, as I’ve found that when the jacket becomes wet it becomes cold and doesn’t insulate sufficiently. When moving this is not much of an issue but when stopped I feel the chill of a wet rain jacket.

[Petew]

I like a combo. If I take a down jacket with no hood, I'll take a powergrid baselayer with a hood.. I always take a lightweight cap too, often helps with unruly hoods.

If it's super cold I take everything with a hood.

[crollsurf]

I'm a warm sleeper and not into kit being multi-use. I like kit that is UL and fit for purpose. So my puffer jackets don't have a hood. Hoods can get in the way. I use a beanie but when sleeping it must pull down and cover my ears and nose.

Actually when it's warm I don't bother with a beanie and use a buff. Duh, that is one of the few multi-purpose bits of kit I use

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