Home Made Cycling Reflective Vest For Cheap!

Good old Illuminite Wind Vest

Since the old Rando Belts are frowned upon (and no reflection after several washings) it's time for some new reflective night gear. Best deal going is the basic reflective vest from RUSA for $6. Ditto that for a ANSI approved Harbor Freight vest for under $6.00. Both these vests will work, but aren't really wind vests and are real open in the front for the wind to catch. RUSA has the answer for $60. Nice looking day/night reflective wind vest. John Mestemacher has one of those and it looks good.

Harbor Freight ANSI vest

Since I don't like the lime or orange look while cycling and didn't want to blow off $60, I came up with the idea of remodeling an old Performance Illuminite Vest. These were the ones that the reflection was in the total fabric. They really worked good under car lights. But after multiple washings they fade away into a solo wind vest. I'll take that and sew on some reflective stripes. Good idea, huh?




I searched locally for some fabric reflective tape. Craft stores, JoAnne's, Fabric Shops and everywhere else. Onthe web, I located several rolls of 3M tape. This is real good stuff... will take 60 washings! Problem it cost $16 for 10 feet + shipping. Nope. IDEA! I'll go to Harbor Freight and get 2 ANSI vests and take off the reflective fabric stripes! Two vest for under $9 with a 20% coupon. Bingo!

Sewing along with Bernina

Easy work to unpick the 2" stripes from one vest. Then I unpacked the Bernina sewing machine and had at it. Had to get some thread out of the sewing box to match the tape. RUSA/ACP like to see 30 sq in of reflective material on the back of your vest AND 27 sq in on the front and shoulders. Local US ANSI rules require much more reflective material: 70 inches of 2" wide reflective stripes total!

Back is finished! WOW!

I played around with the layout for a while and even put one piece on wrong side out! Quite difficult to sew those on, as the vest had "raglan" cut shoulders. These are curves seams instead of straight ones. I managed to sew a triangle thing on the back with a bar for a total reflective area of 40 sq. in. Hopefully, the front will be much easier to sew onto with straight stitches! Might try this out on the Kitchen Creek Brevet on Saturday!

Total Cost: $4:50 for reflective tape from one Harbor Freight vest.

-randorides