Hornee Kevlar Jeans

Bought a pair of Hornee Black Kevlar Jeans the other day for around $220 AU. These look and feel almost exactly like regular jeans. The only visual clue that they're anything but is extra stitching along the upper/lower knees and thighs. This stitching is used to keep in place the thin Kevlar sheets on the inside. These Kevlar pockets are supposed to give the jeans a very high abrasion resistance, i.e. they won't tear if you crash and slide on a gravel road. This will save your skin from severe injury.

The Kevlar feels like normal fabric though, it's not like a solid metal shield or anything. Which means you get abrasion resistance but not impact resistance. So if you crash and you hit the road with your knee, the jean won't tear, but your knee may still crack from the impact. You can purchase knee guards and shin guards and wear them separately on the inside, otherwise if you really want maximum protection you can get designated riding pants with all this stitched on the inside.

The advantage of the Hornee jeans is that they look normal. After getting off your bike you can comfortably go out shopping without looking like you've just parachuted from a plane and are lost in the jungle looking for your way back home. You could even wear these if you don't ride so they could double as your one and only pair of casual jeans, which works out well if on a tight budget. They're quite comfortable and you can't really tell there's anything different about them when wearing them.

There's a large range of styles available, so make sure to go to a riding store and try some out to find the right size and right look for you. There are other brands besides Hornee that make Kevlar reinforced jeans so shop around. This article gives an in-depth comparison between Hornee and Draggin. The brief summary of this is that Hornee have more Kevlar covering more parts and look trendier whereas the Draggin have thicker Kevlar covering less leg and better stitching.

With my Hornee jeans, most of the thigh, knee and shin is covered. The Kevlar comes down to just below the knee but since I'm fairly short (165cm, 5-ft-5 for you yanks) I had to take about 15cm off the bottom, which brought the Kevlar knee pocket further down covering most of the shin as well :-)

I haven't had any crashes in these yet (and I hope I never do) so can't personally speak about the level of protection offered. I did drop my bike once during the initial learner training course though. I was wearing a mid-priced pair of jeans and managed to tear them at around 5 to 10km/h, which gave me a nice, deep scratch on my shin. Had I been wearing these I'm sure I would've been fine. Well worth the money in my opinion.