Carbon Fibre + Dyneema® Shorts

To make the Carbon Fibre + Dyneema® Shorts we weave thousands of strands of both supermaterials directly into a lightweight base material of nylon and elastane. The Dyneema®, which is up to 15x stronger than steel, is woven horizontally. And the carbon fibre – which is normally used to reinforce components in missiles, jet engines and the world’s fastest cars – is woven vertically. Together they create a high strength, highly elastic ripstop that reinforces every square centimetre of the shorts by increasing their tensile strength, abrasion resistance and elasticity.

Over the last few years we’ve made extraordinarily tough things – like our Indestructible Hoodie that’s just 1 millimetre thick but can withstand a 75kmph fall and drag on concrete. And we’ve made extraordinarily light things – like our 100 gram Graphene T Shirt. But the Carbon Fibre + Dyneema® Shorts are the start of the next step: combining the two, to create lightweight yet super high strength materials. It’s the start of a journey where the ultimate endpoint is bulletproof materials just a couple of microns thick.

More than a quarter of the shorts are built from elastane, which is incredibly high. The only place you’d normally find this is in high performance compression gear. And it means the shorts can stretch in absolutely every direction at the same time.  

The high strength ripstop works with the nylon base material to add high levels of abrasion resistance. The material scores over 100,000 revolutions on the Martindale abrasion resistance test, which is the same as our toughest 100 Year gear. Not only does this protect you and the shorts from friction caused by impacts with rocks, trees and dirt, but it also makes them durable against regular wear and tear over time.

Every detail of the shorts is designed for comfort. The shorts are built with an elasticated waistband that tightens securely with a rubberised, metal tipped rope. We’ve coated the outside of the material with a water repellent treatment so that light rain rolls off its surface. And the shorts are fast drying and breathable when you’re working hard.

While lots of the technology we use in our clothing is invisible to the naked eye, this time it’s really easy to see. The grid of white Dyneema® strands, and black carbon fibre strands, gives the shorts a micro check pattern if you’re up close. From all other distances, they’re a plain grey, making them really easy to wear with a classic black or white t shirt. The grid also rises slightly out of the material, giving the shorts a subtle textured feel on the outside.

To weave the Dyneema® and carbon fibre into fabric we start by engineering them into spirals, before wrapping them around an elastane core. Together they work like high-strength springs, expanding and compressing as the shorts stretch and move. This increases the shorts’ stress resistance and tensile strength, which is the force needed to break fibres when they’re pulled in opposite directions.

Dyneema® is the single strongest fibre known to man today. If you’re into chemistry, it’s an ultra-high molecular weight polyethylene that combines extreme strength with very low weight. Weight for weight Dyneema® is up to 15x stronger than steel. Which is why it’s used to make bulletproof vests, anti-ballistic vehicle armour for tanks, and the ropes used to tie down giant ships and deep-water oil rigs in violent, icy seas.

The material we know as carbon fibre is made up of thousands of these individual carbon filaments bundled together and protected by a coating. These larger carbon fibres are classified by how much pulling force the fibre can exert without breaking – known as tensile modulus. Whereas steel has a tensile modulus of around 29 million pounds of force per square inch (PSI), carbon fibre ranges from around 30 to 145 million PSI, which is 5x stronger than steel.

Carbon fibres are typically combined with other materials to make a composite. That’s why the classic image of carbon fibre is the black and grey checks on a bike frame or supercar. These are carbon fibres impregnated with a plastic resin and baked to create carbon fibre reinforced polymer. If your shorts were made from that it would be completely solid, so we’ve done something different.