The accepted practice for affixing the various patches, badges and grade insignia to a flight suit is to use Velcro.
Most of the items can be ordered with the Velcro (also known as hook and loop fasteners) already affixed to the item. Typically, the "hook" is already affixed to the item, and a correspondingly sized piece of "loop" (sometimes called "pile") is sewn to the flight suit in the proper location. The significant exception to this, at least for the Civil Air Patrol, is the grade insignia, which are encased in plastic. The options are to either sew the plastic directly to the flight suit, or glue the hook Velcro to the insignia and sew the loop Velcro on the shoulders.
I believe that overall, the use of Velcro is preferable to sewing the items directly onto the flight suit. This way, when you need to launder the flight suit, it is easy to remove all of the items so they don't get messed up in the wash. Also, it is easier to deal with changing the insignia due to promotions.
So, the challenge I faced was finding Olive Green - or as we used to say, Olive Drab (OD) - Velcro.
I ended up finding a number of sources:
www.flightsuits.com (Gibson & Barnes) does not sell Velcro through their web site - but you can call them at 800-748-6693 to order it. They stock different widths - 1/2", 1", 1.5"", 2", 4" - and they sell a minimum of one yard.
Emdom USA have widths from 1" to 4" ranging from $1.00 per foot to $3.00 per foot.
Williams & Williams sells 2" x 4" pieces for $0.50 and sells 4" wide Velcro for $2.00 per foot.
The Hock Shop offers 2" x 4" pieces for $0.30 each.
Vanguard Industries sells 4" x 12" sheets:
One 4" x 12" sheet of male (hook) Velcro is $2.35 (part number CAP0599W )
One 4" x 12" sheet of female (loop) Velcro is $2.35 (part number CAP0599X )
I ended up going with Vanguard, since I've dealt with them before to purchase various CAP items, and I've always been satisfied with them.
I did read some discussion online regarding whether Olive Green or Sage Green more closely matched the color of the green Nomex flight suit. I guess I'll see when the Velcro arrives.
UPDATE: the order arrived from Vanguard this week and the color matches perfectly. One other thought for the future is that even though for my needs at the moment, the 4" pieces will work fine, for those applications where I truly only need a 2", 1 1/2" or 1" piece, it is probably better to order it as such, as that way, the pieces are properly edged; when you cut a larger piece down to size, you end up with the pile going to the very edge, which I imagine might cause it to unravel a bit vs. using a piece that has finished edges.
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Posted by David at November 10, 2009 06:33 PM | Categorized under: Reference