The Aerostich Roadcrafter was an all-new type of rider's gear introduced in 1983 - the world's first lightweight armored all-weather coverall intended to be worn over street clothing.
Since then, we've released several other suits, jackets, and pants that help make motorcycling an easy choice for your every day ride, paying careful attention to the details that really matter.
There have been only four generations
of task-specific rider-protective gear since motorcycles were invented:
First there was leathers. Both jackets and pants, of cowhide and horse hide. Today the survivors of that gear exist in products from brands like Shott, Langlitz and Lewis. Leathers were often worn in combination with worsted wool knit sweaters and gaberdine shirts and trousers.
Next, starting in the thirties and forties, there was waxed cotton rider’s gear. This stuff was first developed for commercial fishing and sailing as ‘oilskins’ and then for hunting and other outdoor applications. It is available today in original rider’s gear form from British gear companies like Belstaff and Barbour.
Then in the early 1980’s we came along with synthetic fabrics, delrin zippers, reflective materials and visco-elastic impact armor. Aerostich did a lot of pioneering. The Roadcrafter, R-3, Darien and AD1 are embodiments of an original recipe which virtually all of todays ‘high tech’ gear was derived from. There were no existing reference points when these garments were created, which is one reason why they are light and simple compared to the universe of derived copies.
You can own the original.
Verschlimmbessern
A wonderful German word that means “an attempt to improve something that only makes it worse in the process”.
We believe in incremental, meaningful updates and refinements.
Many products and processes can be greatly improved by applying newer materials and advanced digital technology, but when it comes to armored synthetic-fiber textile rider’s gear, more complexity is not necessarily better. Today, Aerostich items remain lighter and more comfortable-wearing, are easier to use, and are still functionally superior to all the copies. Aerostich has been fortunate to have been first to create so much of today’s very best gear.
Aerostich messenger bags were the world’s first bags of this type to be made with modern fabrics, modern hardware and reflectives. (All prior messenger bags used cotton canvas, cotton webbing, and steel buckles, and did not have any reflectives.)
The Aerostich Darien suit was the world’s first advanced-technology ’adventure’ and touring suit. Today there are literally hundreds of similar suits. (Prior gear was either leather or waxed cotton.)
Aerostich gear was the first outdoor gear of any type to feature vertical-zippered chest-area pockets. (Years later Patagonia, North Face, Arctyrx and countless others incorporated this type of pocket into their products.)
Aerostich’s unlined armored Darien, AD1 and R3 gear was the first of this type by more than three decades.
Aerostich’s range of TF impact armor introduced energy absorbing visco-elastic foam armor more than twenty-five years before others began offering this technology.
Aerostich was first to make abrasion-resistant armored rider’s gear in Hi-Viz lime yellow.
The Aerostich Roadcrafter was an all-new type of rider’s gear, introduced in 1983 – the world’s first lightweight armored all-weather coverall intended to be worn over street clothing.
Aerostich gear was the first to offer zipper-adjustable vent openings.
There are dozens of other detailed examples. The Roadcrafter Classic suit has now been reverse-engineer-copied four or five times and the Darien jacket and pants have been reverse-engineer copied at least a couple of times. Many other Aerostich products and details have also been copied. Even Aerostich’s pioneering Tank Panniers were once reverse-engineer-copied. Incredibly, that copying company even plagiarized the catalog description word-for-word.
