Skiing and snowboarding are extremely visual. The kinesthetic sense of flying down a mountain, the rhythm of finding your path, it’s all part of it. But more than anything, snow sports are beautiful. The deep line behind you, the forest on either side, the kick of powder by your feet as you sail into a scene worthy of a postcard. But wind and the bright reflection of sun off of snow require goggles, and fogged goggles are the Achilles’ heel of a powder day.
You can take goggles off for a while, waiting for your face to cool, for the water to evaporate. But then you get halfway down the mountain the blur begins to creep back from the peripheral. This blurring is caused by heat and moisture on the inside of the goggle that condenses on the inside surface of the lens, which is cold from the winter air. Many other new goggles promise to keep moisture away, some via hydrophobic coating on the inside of goggles, others via electric fans that cool down the air inside the goggle. But Dave McCulloch found these methods ineffective and set out to make his own fog-free goggles, named Aboms, designed by his company Abominable Labs.
With the help of lead designer Tory Orzeck, who worked for GE Plastic and Nike, in the advanced design department, McCulloch and his team designed the Abom, whose secret weapon is patented KLAIR technology. The technology is actually a thin, transparent heat-conductive film that rests between the two-part lens. As soon as the goggles start to fog, wearers can simply press the button near their temple once and power will come on, heating the lens and eliminating fog within one minute. The current remains on for 10 minutes before powering down to save battery. And for particularly foggy days on the slopes, hold the power button down longer and the goggles will remain on until they run out of battery, about six hours later. No other goggle can guarantee such effectiveness throughout an onslaught of testing. For a price comparable other to high-end goggles, you have one less thing in between you and the beauty of snow sports.