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What jacket(s) are you wearing at the moment?

Pa12

Well-Known Member
Hmm. I know wz takes the same size as me and that original Dubow 42 fits him better then my 46 Platon Dubow. Starting to wonder about the accuracy of the Platon.
 

mulceber

Moderator
Hmm. I know wz takes the same size as me and that original Dubow 42 fits him better then my 46 Platon Dubow. Starting to wonder about the accuracy of the Platon.
The thing is, sizing was all over the place, even within a given contract. Makers were assigned to make a different size each week to avoid a situation where they might sew, e.g. a size 38 sleeve on a size 46 body. There’s no danger of doing that if, on week one, you’re making all 38s, then next week you’re only making 46s.

Folks who worked at the companies, however, have said that, if the government didn’t deliver them enough leather for the size they were making that week, the standard practice was to run the numbers, see what size they DID have enough leather to make, and just make that, and then use the size tags for the size they were supposed to make. As an example of how far off this could leave you, my size 44 Monarch original fits like a 40.

So Platon’s sizing isn’t wrong, per se. None of them are. He’s just trying to achieve consistency where none existed among originals. He likely took his patterns from one or two 27798s and extrapolated the rest of the sizes from the jackets he had in hand.
 
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mulceber

Moderator
Could be! It’s also probably part of the reason most makers’ sizes tend to run a little small and we routinely tell people to “order one size above your chest measurement.” I doubt the government was giving them a lot of extra leather (in case of screw ups, or bad materials) at the best of times.
 

Micawber

Well-Known Member
By and large decent repros are a hand produced garment using hand produced patterns sized up or down from whatever the original source so there are bound to be variations from maker to maker and between individual garments due to differences in pattern and making up.
The population at large has become accustomed to modern mass produced clothing where individual parts of a pattern are not cut singly but as part of a large stack of material, the end result being panels of the same size which are then sewn within certain tolerances. While there are still bound to be slight variations in any given size, computer control and desire for less wastage means off the rack high street clothing has become less variable in a given pattern.
 

Kermit3D

Well-Known Member
I have a question about jacket sizes.
In the "Flight Gear" book, there is a list of sizes that were available for B-3 jackets. This list mentions variations for each size. For example:
40L, 40R, 40S, 42L, 42R, 42S, 42 Stout, 44L, 44R, 44 Stout,...

Should we conclude that some jackets (like the B-3, but maybe others ?) were available with several size variations ?

Capture d’écran 2022-10-13 093750.jpg
 

Smithy

Well-Known Member
Sizes of these jackets must be all over the map. Elc 46 fits me , good wear 44, and my Platon 46 is a bit snug and short. Guess it fits but just.

Platon's jackets are incredible for the price but it's been noted already that if you're tall forget about them. Several of us have moaned about the lack of the options of long and extra long sizings a la ELC but alas that is not to be.
 

mulceber

Moderator
@Kermit3D, regarding the sizing issue on B-3 jackets, I dimly recalled there being a thread on this in the past, so I did a little digging. I think this provides (some?) answers:

 
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