Demon Flexmeter - Sizing and Proper Fit

[WARPed1701D]

A number of people have purchased the Flexmeter wrist guards by Demon recently and I wanted to ask about how they fit your wrist/hand.

I'm a tall skinny person making finding anything that fits a real PITA. I used the size guide on the Demon website and guess what, I'm 19cm, which put me on the border of medium and large. I ordered the mediums as I have very thin wrists and medium is suggested by Demon for teens and adults with thinner wrists.

They arrived yesterday and the fit feels OK but according the this retailer website proper fit is determined by the "flex zone" being over the wrist pivot (makes sense) and the guard not extending further than the knuckles.

"Check the Fit
When you receive your Flexmeter Wrist Guards, put them on and tighten the straps, then check to see that the “Flex Zone” of the wrist guard lines up with the part of your wrist that bends upward.
And check that the top of the wrist guard near your knuckles does not extend past your knuckles, or it will be uncomfortable when you fall."

When I tried the medium size on I felt that the "flex zone" was actually ahead of my wrist pivot (closer to my fingers) but the guard probably shouldn't be longer as it would extend beyond the knuckle. The "flex zone" still moves when I pull my wrist back but maybe not as well as it should. These are expensive guards so I want to get the best protection from them I can.

I've now ordered some a set of large to try (arrives Friday) but I wanted to ask existing owners where the "flex zone" sat in relation to their wrist pivot. Same for extension over the knuckles.

Trying these on is hard as the damn things are plastic tied to the cardboard packaging. 

I'll post pictures Friday evening when I have both sizes available.

[WARPed1701D]

These images from the Demon website suggest that maybe the "flex zone" should be slightly forward of the pivot. Is this how yours fit?

[Marty Backe]

On 7/19/2017 at 9:08 AM, WARPed1701D said:

A number of people have purchased the Flexmeter wrist guards by Demon recently and I wanted to ask about how they fit your wrist/hand.

I'm a tall skinny person making finding anything that fits a real PITA. I used the size guide on the Demon website and guess what, I'm 19cm, which put me on the border of medium and large. I ordered the mediums as I have very thin wrists and medium is suggested by Demon for teens and adults with thinner wrists.

They arrived yesterday and the fit feels OK but according the this retailer website proper fit is determined by the "flex zone" being over the wrist pivot (makes sense) and the guard not extending further than the knuckles.

"Check the Fit
When you receive your Flexmeter Wrist Guards, put them on and tighten the straps, then check to see that the “Flex Zone” of the wrist guard lines up with the part of your wrist that bends upward.
And check that the top of the wrist guard near your knuckles does not extend past your knuckles, or it will be uncomfortable when you fall."

When I tried the medium size on I felt that the "flex zone" was actually ahead of my wrist pivot (closer to my fingers) but the guard probably shouldn't be longer as it would extend beyond the knuckle. The "flex zone" still moves when I pull my wrist back but maybe not as well as it should. These are expensive guards so I want to get the best protection from them I can.

I've now ordered some a set of large to try (arrives Friday) but I wanted to ask existing owners where the "flex zone" sat in relation to their wrist pivot. Same for extension over the knuckles.

Trying these on is hard as the damn things are plastic tied to the cardboard packaging. 

I'll post pictures Friday evening when I have both sizes available.

The flex joint on mine (medium) looks to be slightly forward of my wrist joint (but there's still overlap of course). The top of the my guard is slightly below my knuckles. They feel 'just right' in terms of comfort.

The larger size would certainly extend over the knuckles.

[radial]

My Flexmeters in size L fit perfectly.  Mediums would have been too small.  

[WARPed1701D]

2 minutes ago, radial said:

My Flexmeters in size L fit perfectly.  Mediums would have been too small.  

May I ask where the flex joint sits in relation to the pivot point of your wrist? How far does the upper plate extend over/ahead of you knuckles (if at all).

[steve454]

53 minutes ago, radial said:

My Flexmeters in size L fit perfectly.  Mediums would have been too small.  

Mine too, just came in today.  The upper plate does not go past the knuckles.  The fabric under the plastic does, barely.

Edited July 20, 2017 by steve454

[radial]

1 hour ago, WARPed1701D said:

May I ask where the flex joint sits in relation to the pivot point of your wrist? How far does the upper plate extend over/ahead of you knuckles (if at all).

When I'm strapped in, the flex joint in the top splint is almost exactly aligned with the center of the area where my wrist flexes back, maybe a little bit forward (toward the fingers), but just slightly.  The hard plastic part of the upper splint ends right where my knuckles do.  Some padding extends forward of the knuckle line, but that seems like a good thing.  If my hand gets cranked back against that plastic lip during a fall, I think I'm going to appreciate a little padding.  

[steve454]

39 minutes ago, radial said:

Some padding extends forward of the knuckle line, but that seems like a good thing.  If my hand gets cranked back against that plastic lip during a fall, I think I'm going to appreciate a little padding.

I think that is good design also.  But the material between the top and bottom sections seems very thin and if you have a jagged nail, might rip while pushing the hand in.  Probably doesn't matter much, the straps are plenty long enough to hold everything together.

[WARPed1701D]

I appreciate the responses. My large set arrives tomorrow. I'll compare and report back.

[WARPed1701D]

So the large size Flexmeters arrived today and I think that is the size I am going to go with. There is significant difference between the length of medium vs large. More than I was expecting anyway. Width is also significantly wider with large but that doesn't seem to affect the comfort or fit considering my wrists are stick thin (the upper plate curves around the wrist when tightened so the width is largely irrelivant.

The official size guide only has you measure your middle finger to wrist pivot. Nothing to do with wrist circumference or anything like that. However, it does have footnotes that suggest medium size for adults with thin wrists and large for those with a beefier build. To me however you just need to go with the length measurement.

I was 19cm fingertip to wrist which is right at the cusp of the medium/large size. Initially I ordered medium based on those footnotes about thin wrists but my recommendation is that if you find yourself in the same size boundary predicament then just size up. Doing this puts the "flex zone" in the right place. I also noted that the mediums were uncomfortably pushing on the knobbly bone that pokes out the wrist at the pivot point on the upper outside part of your wrist. The larges do not do that for me. I suspect due to the different forward strap placement. The final observation was that the mediums seem to sit lopsided on the top of my hand with more coverage over towards my thumb and leaving much of the outside of my hand with nothing over it. Again the large size seemed/felt like it was more centrally placed over the top of the hand.

This is all just me feelings but I hope it helps someone looking to buy these.

In summary go by the fingertip to wrist measurement. Ignore the footnotes on wrist width. If you find yourself at the boundary of two sizes then go with the larger of the two.

On a side note the two sets of protectors I received had some minor design/packaging differences. I think the mediums are older while the larges are newer. For packaging the cardboard design is different. On the older medium guards the D3O blurb is a sticker that has been added. On the large it is part of the printed design making me think it is newer. The newer larges have a little D3O booklet while the older mediums just have a little info disc talking about D3O lite. The newer larges have the D30 symbol printed on the upper flex plate below the Flexmeter logo but more importantly though the skid plate on the newer large size has 3 circular bumps on it. Not sure what that is about but I'm guessing an improvement. I think the mediums were produced just after D3O was introduced into the design and the packaging hadn't caught up. 

Images below:

Medium guards are obviously the smaller ones in the comparison pictures. In top down images large's can be identified by the D3O logo printed on the upper flex plate. For the side images while fitted to my hand the large guards are the ones with the larger gap between the Velcro straps (thumb curved inward more). In the image with the skid plate shown the larges have the 3 bumps on the skid plate. 

[Marty Backe]

50 minutes ago, WARPed1701D said:

So the large size Flexmeters arrived today and I think that is the size I am going to go with. There is significant difference between the length of medium vs large. More than I was expecting anyway. Width is also significantly wider with large but that doesn't seem to affect the comfort or fit considering my wrists are stick thin (the upper plate curves around the wrist when tightened so the width is largely irrelivant.

The official size guide only has you measure your middle finger to wrist pivot. Nothing to do with wrist circumference or anything like that. However, it does have footnotes that suggest medium size for adults with thin wrists and large for those with a beefier build. To me however you just need to go with the length measurement.

I was 19cm fingertip to wrist which is right at the cusp of the medium/large size. Initially I ordered medium based on those footnotes about thin wrists but my recommendation is that if you find yourself in the same size boundary predicament then just size up. Doing this puts the "flex zone" in the right place. I also noted that the mediums were uncomfortably pushing on the knobbly bone that pokes out the wrist at the pivot point on the upper outside part of your wrist. The larges do not do that for me. I suspect due to the different forward strap placement. The final observation was that the mediums seem to sit lopsided on the top of my hand with more coverage over towards my thumb and leaving much of the outside of my hand with nothing over it. Again the large size seemed/felt like it was more centrally placed over the top of the hand.

This is all just me feelings but I hope it helps someone looking to buy these.

In summary go by the fingertip to wrist measurement. Ignore the footnotes on wrist width. If you find yourself at the boundary of two sizes then go with the larger of the two.

On a side note the two sets of protectors I received had some minor design/packaging differences. I think the mediums are older while the larges are newer. For packaging the cardboard design is different. On the older medium guards the D3O blurb is a sticker that has been added. On the large it is part of the printed design making me think it is newer. The newer larges have a little D3O booklet while the older mediums just have a little info disc talking about D3O lite. The newer larges have the D30 symbol printed on the upper flex plate below the Flexmeter logo but more importantly though the skid plate on the newer large size has 3 circular bumps on it. Not sure what that is about but I'm guessing an improvement. I think the mediums were produced just after D3O was introduced into the design and the packaging hadn't caught up. 

Images below:

Medium guards are obviously the smaller ones in the comparison pictures. In top down images large's can be identified by the D3O logo printed on the upper flex plate. For the side images while fitted to my hand the large guards are the ones with the larger gap between the Velcro straps (thumb curved inward more). In the image with the skid plate shown the larges have the 3 bumps on the skid plate. 

Thanks for the comparison pictures. There is a big difference between the two.

[WARPed1701D]

Incidentally here is the size guide. Forgot to add it last night.

[joftley]

From the pictures, it seems that the size of this wrist guard makes it incompatible with wearing a watch?

[WARPed1701D]

3 minutes ago, joftley said:

From the pictures, it seems that the size of this wrist guard makes it incompatible with wearing a watch?

Yes. No way to wear a standard watch with these. @Marty Backe has velcroed his Pebble to the top plate of his guards but I think he uses the Pebble solely for wheel monitoring.

You could maybe get away with it if you have an extended wrist band.

[Scatcat]

I've worn my watch under the flexmeters, but I do NOT recommend it. I was in a hurry, forgot to take the watch off and couldn't be bothered, but I think it will worsen the protection. Plus it is pretty uncomfortable.

[radial]

42 minutes ago, Scatcat said:

I've worn my watch under the flexmeters, but I do NOT recommend it. I was in a hurry, forgot to take the watch off and couldn't be bothered, but I think it will worsen the protection. Plus it is pretty uncomfortable.

Same here.  I would really like to wear my Apple watch while gloved up because I think it would be a lot more convenient for monitoring DarknessBot outputs than fumbling around with the iPhone.  But I don't have a solution yet.  

[Marty Backe]

1 hour ago, radial said:

Same here.  I would really like to wear my Apple watch while gloved up because I think it would be a lot more convenient for monitoring DarknessBot outputs than fumbling around with the iPhone.  But I don't have a solution yet.  

Velcro works great but you pretty much have to dedicate the watch to EUC riding 

[Scatcat]

Some form of pocket, like the ones available for cellphones would be perfect.

[esaj]

I used this sizing chart when buying mine a couple years back:

EDIT: Note that "width" is measured as the circumference of your hand. I ended up in the lower right "M"-section, and that's what I ordered. Never tried other sizes, but the fit was right.

 

Edited July 23, 2017 by esaj

[WARPed1701D]

Interesting. I wonder why they dropped the width measurement from the chart.

[WARPed1701D]

On 7/23/2017 at 5:41 AM, esaj said:

I used this sizing chart when buying mine a couple years back:

EDIT: Note that "width" is measured as the circumference of your hand. I ended up in the lower right "M"-section, and that's what I ordered. Never tried other sizes, but the fit was right.

 

OK. So I wanted to add I last thing to this.

Oddly, despite the Demon website currently having the sizing chart I posted above, the little cardboard info bundle actually attached to my new wrist guards have the size guide @esaj has included (quoted) that is apparently several years old. This clearly suggests that hand width measurement is more than just a footnote in picking the right size but even more confusingly the hand length boundary between medium and large is 20cm on the printed info bundle vs 19cm on the website guide. WTF!

For anyone thinking of ordering these and are confused about size this is my advice as someone who has a hand length on the medium/large boundary (19cm) and has tried both sizes extensively. Use the size guide posted by @esaj but for hand length consider the boundary between medium and large to be 19 cm not 20cm and if you are right on 19cm then size up. This, interestingly, is a meld of the info from the two guides.

My hand length is 19cm and a medium seemed to put the flex point of the upper plate too far forward.

My hand width is 21cm and the medium did not seem to be wide enough to fully cover the top of my hand. The area over my little finger seemed uncovered by the plate which favored coverage of the inside of my hand.

Using @esajs guide and adjusting the length boundary for M/L to 19cm would have landed me the size that felt right. A large.

Hope it helps.

Edited July 26, 2017 by WARPed1701D

[ir_fuel]

On 22/07/2017 at 10:56 PM, Marty Backe said:

Velcro works great but you pretty much have to dedicate the watch to EUC riding 

Won't work. The watch will constantly lock as it thinks you are not wearing it because the sensor doesn't see your wrist.

[Marty Backe]

2 minutes ago, ir_fuel said:

Won't work. The watch will constantly lock as it thinks you are not wearing it because the sensor doesn't see your wrist.

Time to buy a Pebble watch 

[ir_fuel]

Just now, Marty Backe said:

Time to buy a Pebble watch 

They went bankrupt some time ago.

I was a backer for the 2nd generation watch and still have the 1st gen one around somewhere.

[Marty Backe]

37 minutes ago, ir_fuel said:

They went bankrupt some time ago.

I was a backer for the 2nd generation watch and still have the 1st gen one around somewhere.

Actually, they didn't go bankrupt, but were bought by Fitbit. All the hardware and software still works and you can buy the watches from Amazon. The Pebble watch does not "call home" when running so even if the company didn't exist the watch would still work.

I think for $50 it's a low risk purchase with a lot of upsides for Gotway & KingSong EUC owners.