Fitting a life jacket made easy

Author: Marieke Vogt, Team Leader at SOURCE TO SEA

Life jacket and helmet are essential safety equipment in whitewater. But even the best helmet and life jacket won't help if they're not used properly. Here's a summary of what you need to look out for and how you can customize your helmet and life jacket.

Marieke Vogt

She explains the most complicated things to her kayak students and the world to us in a very Marieke-specific visual language.

Customize life jacket

The point of your life jacket is that it has to fit snugly enough so that it can't slip when you swim. Above all, it must not slide upwards. Of course, you should still be able to breathe, after all, you are doing sports! Different life jacket models have different adjustment options. As an example, we show you the Palm FXr life jacket, which we have been using for our courses for years.

With the side straps, the width of the life jacket is adjusted.

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The Palm FXr has two straps on each side that tighten to prevent slipping. In the pictures, it's the two orange ones. The black chest strap is not used to adjust the life jacket, but to attach a cowtail to it, or to secure yourself - we explain it in the next paragraph.

The length of the shoulder straps of the life jacket is adjusted by pulling on the straps.

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Most life jackets also have an adjustment option on the shoulder straps. Adjust the shoulder straps so that the life jacket is pulled to your body.

Marieke pulls the lifejacket up. She doesn't want it to slip off over her head.

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Finally, pull yourself up vigorously by the shoulder straps. Then you can see immediately if it is well adjusted. It should not be able to slip over your head under any circumstances!

Adjust chest strap

Firstly, the black chest strap is used to attach a cowtail to save kayaks. Secondly, you need it if you want to belay yourself, e.g. if you need a jumper safety as a safety. It is threaded differently for the different applications:

The strap of the chest strap is only threaded through the plastic nal.

Cowtail attachment

The chest strap as a cowtail attachment is the standard case. You simply thread the strap directly through the plastic buckle. You don't have the metal deflection. This means that the belt has minimal friction. So if the boat you have attached gets jammed somewhere, you can easily release it by opening the buckle.

The strap of the chest strap is also deflected by the metal buckle.

Self-belay

The chest strap as a self-belay is rare. If you need that on the river, just rethread it. To do this, this time you go through the metal deflection before the strap is threaded through the plastic buckle. This increases friction and thus somewhat reduces the load on the buckle.

The chest strap must not be too long so that you cannot get caught on it. When you buy a new life jacket, the chest strap is often very long. Adjust the vest and then cut it off (preferably with a rope cutter) so that it only protrudes about two hands wide over the plastic buckle. Don't have a rope cutter? No problem, we do. Just let us know and we will be happy to take him to the course/camp!

Customize your helmet

A helmet only protects if it is properly adjusted.

A woman tries to push the chin strap of her helmet forward over her chin.

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Make sure that you can't slide the chin strap over your chin.

A woman tries to push her helmet back at the front of her forehead.

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It is also very important that your forehead can never be free. See if you can push the helmet up the front (like in the picture).

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If this is the case, shorten the front of the two straps on your ear.

Back of the head of a woman adjusting her helmet in width with her left hand.

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Last but not least, most helmets have a mechanism to adjust the head circumference.

This blog post explains how to customize your helmet and life jacket. If you are wondering why all this should be the case, just give us a call (at +43 512 546710) or take part in our safety training ! Also, if you have any questions about your special life jacket or helmet model, please feel free to contact us!

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Customize life jacket

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Adjust chest strap

Cowtail attachment

Self-belay

Customize your helmet

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