There’s only one way to know if a pair of tactical pants are worth owning. Put them on and then go beat the crap out of them. So when Blauer sent me a pair of their B.DU Tactical Pants that’s exactly what I did.
Cave Sliding Pants Testing
Of course, the pants meet all of the tactical requirements for this category. They’re complete with:
- Breathable rip-stop fabric: Don’t sweat your ass off
- Stretchable waist band: Go ahead and eat that second Mountain House
- 10 Pockets: Stuff your trash, blowout kit and all the spare cell phone batteries you want
- L-Pocket: Carry a killer knife with you.
- Silicone shirt gripper: Ya – it’s nice to have to keep the shirt tucked in
But all this doesn’t matter if they blow out when you take them to the field. I only had a few weeks to test them out so I thought I’d take them into some local caves and do so some crawling, climbing and sliding with them.
The verdict? No rips or tears!
They’re light weight
This might have something to do with having been at SEAL Team 3, a desert team in my day, but I like pants to be lighter weight. They help keep you cooler and they dry faster after swimming in them.
Well Thought Out – except one little thing (which I fixed)
It’s clearly been awhile since I’ve worn any tactical pants so at first, I wasn’t sure what the “L-Pocket” was, but I was pleasantly surprised to see how well it was designed and built to take my knife. No more wearing out pocket edges!
My only critique here, or anywhere, was that the clip of my knife went past the available space. I ended up using said knife to cut through the seam and was successful in making the extra space required.
I Made Sure I Sweat In Them
Okay, I get that might sound a bit nasty, but I’ve suffered too often in too many pants not take these things out for a spin. It was a pretty warm day out, and I don’t wear any underwear, so they got their fair share of… well, lets just call it use.
Again because of their light design they performed well. I sweat, they dried I sweat again and they dried again.
Zip it
These pants differed from most cargo type pants by using zippers instead of buttons or velcro. I actually prefer zippers over velcro because they don’t make all of that noise when you open them. You just need to make sure the zippers don’t get hung up with salty wet sand.
Overall
I like the pants. They’re simple, light weight, perform well and comfortable to pack and wear.
