[Review] Powerlet Rapidfire Heated Glove Liners

I have recently purchased a set of Powerlet Rapidfire Heated Glove Liners. I am thrilled.

I have owned two pairs of heated gloves in the past. One from Gerbing, one from Widder. (Note, I haven't tried what Gerbing makes now - the gloves I had were purchased ten years ago.) My complaints:
1. I didn't think they were protective enough. The Widders weren't leather, just cheap nylon like a ski glove. The Gerbings were leather, but I didn't think they fastened securely enough to stay on my hands in a spill.
2. I could always feel the wires and they irritated my knuckles.
3. The giant gauntlets were always a problem with the cuffs of my jacket, and trying to keep rain out.
4. They were hugely thick around my fingers, and this was uncomfortable.
5. When they got wet inside because of the stupid gauntlets, they took forever to dry, and the water caused hot spots.

Anyway, neither of my tries at heated gloves suited me. I sold them on, and I have been getting along with just heated grips for some years now. The heated grips are great, but they don't keep my fingertips warm, and I have a tendency to do a bit of death gripping because of that; it's something I have to watch out for.

These Powerlet liners fit inside of normal gloves. They almost fit in my normal size gloves; I can put them on and they're only a little tight. I'm going to buy gloves one size larger to wear with them, I think. But in any case they are meant to be worn under normal gloves, so I can select gloves on the basis of what I find important - protection, fastening, something that fits, gauntlets that overlap properly with my jacket, etc. For now I dug out a pair of gloves someone left here, that are way too big for me.

The liners are soft and stretchy and I cannot feel the wires. They fit my hands very well. I wear size 8 gloves, and I bought the S/M liners. They're stretchy enough that my hands are probably in the middle of their range, as far as the fit.

Today I went for a ride and wore them. The thermometer at the mall said it was 35F. I didn't find them noticeably hot, there was no "ahhh" moment as I reached my hands into them. But my hands felt comfortable and not cold at all, all the way to my fingertips. No spot felt warmer than any other spot. I did not have to constantly remind myself not to death grip the bars. I could just relax. There were no hot spots and I couldn't feel the wires.

I haven't worn them in the rain yet. If they got wet, they might have hot spots, but since they're thin and they come out of the gloves, they would probably dry in a half hour or so.

For $79, I think these are a great deal, too.

Katherine, thanks for the info. I'm going to have to check them out they look much more functional than my old gerbings gloves.

I wore them again today and I found one thing to be concerned about... they are made of a stretchy material and lots of motorcycle gear has velcro, which catches on them just a little bit. They haven't gotten snagged so far, but I think I should be mindful of that, try to keep them off the velcro as best I can.

I think it is time for me to pull the trigger on a pair of these. My morning commute starts at 5:45 AM and the mountain air even in the summer can be brisk. I dress warm enough but my hands suffer a bit the last 15 miles or so. Birthday coming up so I have an excuse. Question that I have tho is how do they wire up to the gloves if you have no heated vest or jacket? I have a powerlet on my handelbar that I would like to use to hook it up, and have seen the control units that you also have to order but where do the wires go in relation to the gloves? Am I wired to the handlebars? I have looked at several gloves on line but I cannot figure out how restrictive my hands will be once wired up.
Thanks for any info on this, I am not ready for heated grips yet...(read too expensive).

Remember when you were five and your mother would attach your mittens to a string that ran up the sleeves and attached them to each other inside your coat? We used to call these "idiot strings". That's how the heated glove harness works. The wires run up your sleeves, and then there's a wire that comes out the bottom of your coat and plugs in to the bike. It doesn't restrict your hands at all. When you take the gloves off you can leave them dangling from the end of your jacket sleeves.

But you do have to order that harness piece separately, and if you don't already have a controller you need that. This kit has the idiot string harness and the controller. Then add this to connect it to the powerlet.

I ordered the controller shown above but I have not actually used it yet. I already have a heated jacket, and a controller for the jacket mounted into the bike. On Saturday I didn't wear the jacket, just the gloves. I put the idiot string harness into my riding jacket, and I plugged the gloves into my exisitng bike-mounted controller. On Sunday it was colder so I wore the jacket. The jacket has plugs on the ends of the sleeves that plug into the gloves, and then the gloves are controller by the same dial as the jacket; I used those. I'm thinking that the controller I ordered may be superfluous, in my use case. However all is not wasted - it might be very elegant used as a heated grips controller, instead of the one I have installed right now. I've been holding it up against various spots near the left grip, and it looks good there. Of course it's only five positions, as opposed to the continuous dial I have now. But it's smaller and more attractive. Hmmmm.

Thanks Elizilla, That answers my questions but the picture of the product does not look like it has enough wire lenth to go down your sleeve. Trust me, I live in a ski area and my 2 boys lost gloves all the time... I was not an idiot stringing there gloves up, it was bad enough with skis, poles, hat, goggles, helmet, etc... Keeping track of that stuff was hard enough for me let alone a couple of toddlers literally running to the chairlift!! Those were the days!

Nice write-up! The ability to select the level of protection in a glove is a real plus.

Just for additional information on the current state of heated gloves, Gerbing's saw the error of there ways about 1-2 years ago and produced the T-5 heated gloves. They have LARGE/long gauntlets (sufficiently sized to fit over bulky winter riding jackets). The T-5 (as all of Gerbing's current lineup) uses the "micro wire". This is probably similar to the wire in your liners. The thin/flat wires are VERY comfortable and don't dig into your knuckles like the older style of gloves did. The bulkiness of the T-5 is much better than the original "classic" gloves that Gerbing produced so there has been improvement there but at a sacrifice of insulation but it is a compromise that seems to work well.

Unfortunately, the T-5 gloves do NOT come in womens sizing. This is a particularly problematic on the width as women's hands are quite a bit more slender than men's. Perhaps Gerbing's will fix that error at some point also. :frown:

Rocky said:

Thanks Elizilla, That answers my questions but the picture of the product does not look like it has enough wire lenth to go down your sleeve.

Click to expand...

The gloves themselves have no wire length at all - there's a fixture on the glove with a socket, and no wire sticks out. The harness that goes inside the jacket is long enough for the gloves to almost touch the ground if I let it pull that far, but if I let it pull that far the end that plugs into the bike won't reach out from under the front of my jacket. So I slide it through to where it balances better. If you need more length, Powerlet sells extension cords.

If, instead of using the separate harness, you plug them into the ends of the sleeves of the heated jacket, well, there's enough wire coming out the end of the jacket sleeves, to reach the sockets on the gloves and plug into them. But there's not enough slack to pull the gloves off your hands without unplugging them.

Rmcapozzi said:

Nice write-up! The ability to select the level of protection in a glove is a real plus.

Just for additional information on the current state of heated gloves, Gerbing's saw the error of there ways about 1-2 years ago and produced the T-5 heated gloves. They have LARGE/long gauntlets (sufficiently sized to fit over bulky winter riding jackets). The T-5 (as all of Gerbing's current lineup) uses the "micro wire". This is probably similar to the wire in your liners. The thin/flat wires are VERY comfortable and don't dig into your knuckles like the older style of gloves did. The bulkiness of the T-5 is much better than the original "classic" gloves that Gerbing produced so there has been improvement there but at a sacrifice of insulation but it is a compromise that seems to work well.

Unfortunately, the T-5 gloves do NOT come in womens sizing. This is a particularly problematic on the width as women's hands are quite a bit more slender than men's. Perhaps Gerbing's will fix that error at some point also. :frown:

Click to expand...

Glad to hear they have fixed these issues. The reduced insulation is worth it to me, to not have that bulk. With my slender girly hands, a bunch of thick insulation forcing my fingers apart, hurts more than it helps. Fingers simply get too cold when forced apart like that; a bulky pair of ski gloves could freeze my hands if I wore them sitting here in the heated house. I have a pair of Held Warm&Dry gloves that strikes a good balance of insulation vs bulk - they have thick insulation on the outside, but they are thin betweem the fingers and on the palms, for use with heated grips. If they go on sale after the cold season, I might get another set, a size larger to wear with the liners.