Teflon Safe for Clothing?

[Wilhelmson]

I bought some STAR BRITE Waterproofing Treatment with PTEF to apply to our tents and am wondering if it is safe to use on ski outerwear. Goretex has some type of teflon so it must not be too hazardous, but of course searching on the internet it's easy to find the health issues posed by teflon, bok choi, and of course the dreaded sugar in organge juice. I usually go through a bottle of TX Direct every year, but this could be a less expensive all purpose waterproofing product.

btw it's on sale at west marine

 

[Slim]

I believe the EU recently forbade fluoro based DWR treatments of clothing, so they must consider either the health or environmental risks too high. Since there are great Fluoro free options now like Nikwax, why bother?

 

[Wilhelmson]

Goretex has PTFE but isn't usually exposed to the skin so it's probably ok unless your jacket catches on fire, and all those teflon cooked grilled cheese sandwiches probably do more damage to the ateries than anything else.

It seems like whenever we camp in the fall the end of a hurricane dumps 3 inches of rain on our tent, so I bought this stuff which has worked well so far.

 

[EricG]

NikWax TX-Direct works so well and is safer. Im always up to try new things, but I don’t want fluro closer to my skin than the bottom of my skis.