2011 SHOT show is here
This year there will be several new Eotac products coming out. The new Direct action smock and the Recce pant along with the new A-tacs cam pattern that will be made for the Style 201 lightweight pants and the Style 407 long sleeve tactical shirt. We got a glimpse of the A-tacs pattern last June at the Police and Security Expo in New Jersey and got a lot of good feed back on the pattern. Digital patterns have come a long way in recent years and it really has good darn good. I remember as a kid thinking that most of the woodland cammo made you stand out just as boldly as if you were wearing regular clothing and it all didn’t make sense to me.
You can ask many of those serving in Iraq and Afghanistan what they thought about the camo they had back in Desert Storm vs. the stuff that is now. The Style 201 tactical pants are lightweight combat pants that are very much meant for a Carbine operator. These 100% cotton ripstop pants have a unique fitting that gives you more maneuverability over similar designs. There are some really cheap knock of pants that look like this and go for under $30, but they will not feel the same. If you have a chance to stop by the Eotac booth this year. Check out the new A-tacs pattern camo. If you aren’t in the military, you may want these for hunting. Very good for the American bow hunter.
I’ve been wearing Eotac tactical pants for almost 2yrs now. We got a hold of some of the early production that were slightly different in fit from what is being produced now. There were originally a few complaints coming from customers that were almost always weight lifters or body buildings. Some of the pants were getting a little tight around the thighs so Eotac quickly changed the production. Now that the pants have gone through several productions, we’ve gotten great response from our customers on the design of the pants. Many of our customers are not happy about the 5.11 tactical pants that they have been wearing for years and wanted something new, a few of them were Woolrich Elite Series customers the wanted to try something new.
We have been waiting for the Eotac womens pants for almost a year. We expected them to arrive in June of 2009, but there were production delays which we suspect we’re due to re-design changes. Later we were expecting them in the Fall of 2009, but once again, there were shipping delays. We’ve been holding backorders for the Style 702 pants and just got around to fullfilling the orders in April of 2010 and we were crossing out fingers that the design would be well accepted. When the tactical pants first arrived, we shipped a lot of them out to associates as beta testers to see what there opinions were before we started stocking the product. We have carried other brands of womens pants in the past, but we dropped them because statistically speaking, the return and complaints about them were about 85% complaints about fit and sizing. You may think that is a really bad stat, and it certainly is, but desigining womens tactical pants are much harder than designing mens.
If you are looking to carry mace or pepper spray, I would absolutely have to urge you to do some research on the Kimber Guardian Angels also known as the Life Act. At first you might get sticker shock, and I think you may want to consider buying 2 of them and test firing 1 of them before you really get comfortable carrying one. I’ve earned my merit badges in seeing evil in the world I know walking around with the smallest pepper spray bottle to fend off a potential rapist, robber, or worse isn’t going to give you much of an edge. There are many reasons to consider carrying a less lethal defensive measure. You can blast someone with something like this without much of a worry about legal ramifications. I’ve seen pepper spray used against 0bnoxious drunks which in my opinion were justified.
The Eotac Style 202 pants are basically an improved pocket design over the Woolrich Elite 4429 pants. The Eotac 203 are similiar to Woolrich Elite 4441 and the Eotac 201 are similiar to the Woolrich Elite 4447 styles. Each may look the same at first look, but try stuffing the pockets with various items and you’ll quickly notice the design differences. The ID pocket on the Eotac pants have a pull tab that make it easy to open the pocket and I have absolutely zero problems using my gear with this design. The side cargo pockets are bellowed and although not as wide as BDU pants, you will be able to use these for mag dumps much easier.
For most of the United States, we are moving towards warm weather. It’s time for us to think about our summer CCW and for those of us that were tactical apparel for work, time to switch to lightweight tactical pants. The military learned this the hard way in the Pacific Theatre during WWII. Wearing the wrong type of clothing in certain environments can mean freezing to death or unneccessary sweating. We don’t recommend wearing shorts in the winter for obvious reasons, but sometimes we still need to wear pants even though it’s pretty darn hot out.
Eotac pants have an elastic waistband that give some versatility to users especially for those carrying a firearm IWB. The pants sizes from Elite Operator Tactical are consistant with regular clothing sizes. The shirts and vests are all gun generously to give a little more room. Eotac lightweight pants have a gussetted crotch that give them superior durability. The Style 204 Concealed carry pants have side zipper pockets that can hold a small firearm, wallet, keys or something like a Kimber Guardian Angel. The most tactical of the are the Style 201 Lightweight Operator pants that are based on the Army Combat Uniform Pants. These pants can hold up to 6 30rd M16 or AR 15 magazines as well as other gear. The new Style 702 Womens pants is a big step forward for Eotac and we’re waiting to hear from our Female Operators on what they think about them. These pants should be available in March of 2010.