Patches are a tricky thing, so forgive me if a waffle back and forth on the pros and cons here. This guy is still one of my favorite BCs that someone shared with us after purchasing.
This was done by the user, not us, so it absolutely can be done at home. The material we use is a pretty hefty Cordura nylon on the outside with a layer or two of foam material at the core, so it gets pretty tough to punch a hole through at times, let alone a few hundred of them. The inner bladder is also (relatively) tough and could most likely hold up for years with the stitches from those patches rubbing against it. However, if it did end up damaging the inner bladder it would not be covered under warranty.
Segue to
warranty coverage and personal responsibility! I'm going to assume if you're going to the lengths of personalizing your vest with your own patches you're ready to accept responsibility for wrecking it yourself. The things you'll need to be aware of are the durability and materials you're working with. If you use cheap thread/patches then you should not expect a great deal of life from them. If you're going to use the BC in the pool and/or leave it out in the sun and/or not rinse and clean it properly you are not going to get a long life from the patches either. As with all things, your mileage may vary.
The other durability and construction thing to consider is how your stitching is going to affect the BC material. If you do what this guy has done improperly (not saying that he did, just using this as an example) the patches and stitching will not allow the material to stretch, particularly in the bladder cover. I see this with my own leather jacket that I've festooned with patches over the years, it simply will not stretch in certain areas. On the BC this means if you were to fully inflate the bladder cover there's a chance that you could tear the Cordura material (remember, you're putting hundreds of tiny holes in the material which weakens that area over time) or pop some of the stitches out. That's your worst case scenario. On the vest or shoulder section this is less likely to happen, it'll just get stiffer in the area of the custom patch.
So what are the advantages? Well you've got yourself a wicked cool, unique BC that you can proudly display with that grin on your face that says "yea, I did this myself
" Since nearly all of our BCs use the
Personal Fit System you can always replace sections that you may possibly ruin if the first effort doesn't go the way you planned it to. Heck, you can get three shoulder sections and put all different kinds of patches on them yourself. Also with the PFS system its simple to disassemble the BC and handle the components
individually as you take them through your sewing machine.
The information I've presented should be taken with a grain of salt, I'm not a professional sewing machine operator (I just play one on the internet) and my comments and observations are purely from insight given by our Service Department and other staff. I'm assuming that anyone using this information is confident and capable in their own DIY abilities and understands that what they're doing
WILL VOID THEIR WARRANTY. As always we're a nice bunch of folks when it comes to helping you all out with your repairs but if we discover that the cause of the problem is the modification that you've done yourself we're going to have to have you pay for the appropriate repairs. That being said, if you do end up customizing it yourself please show us and share it on the
Zeagle Facebook page so we can all admire your handiwork.
