Advice on cold weather gloves.

Sealskinz hands down
Or some cheaper alternative
www.sealskinz.com...

Very very good
Swear by them, done me good on ops to -26, easy to throw on an over pair when you don't need finger dexterity

It would help if you could be more specific as to what you need them for. You said operating tractor/ snow blower/ vehicle controls. I'm going to assume then that you mean mostly sedentary activities that put you outdoors. First off, cotton kills. Cotton absorbs moisture and retains no heat when it becomes damp. Then it starts evaporating creating an evaporative cooling effect that will cause hypothermia and could kill you if you either can't change into dry clothes go get back indoors to warm up. So nothing that contains cotton. You also have to remember that gloves can only insulate and retain heat that is circulated in your blood. The activities you're describing will raise your heart rate little, if at all. That means you're not generating much heat in the first place. I run, fatbike, cross country ski into single digit temps. I wear different gloves depending on the activity. Running generates a ton of body heat. I start out a bit chilled, but I'm warm before the end of the first mile. Riding the fatbike, I wear heavier gloves that are windproof and insulated with 100g thinsulate. My hands are fine, but my feet get cold. I have to use chemical toe warmers, even in heavily insulated boots because your feet do virtually no flexing cycling, compared to running or hiking. Cross country skiing is somewhere in between. I always wear glove liners. Glove liners make so much difference, and they're washable so your gloves get less nasty inside. I had the outdoor research ones someone's else posted. They were awesome the 2 times I wore them, until my wife put them in the dryer! Cheap polypropelene liners work well too. I shovel my driveway manually now, but when I was an overweight smoker, I used a snowblower. Even wearing pac boots, arctic lined carhartts and Goretex lined, insulated gloves, my hands would get cold because the just wasn't much heat being generated. Sitting on an open cab tractor would be even worse. I know that OP said no mitts, but I honestly think the cheaper, but heavily insulated snow mobile mittens about one size too big with some medium to heavy weight rag wool gloves as liners are the best option. The combo will keep your hands warm and you can pop the mitts off for a second when you need more dexterity. The thicker liners will protect your hands until you get the mitts back on. That my $.02

a reply to: Tangerine

That is a factor I would have thought.

The other thing about the sand, is that because the sand particles have little pockets of air in between them, your body heat gets trapped in there, rather than being immediately sucked out of the glove by the coldness of the wind. That creates a thermal barrier between your hand, and the elements.

My 20 dollar walmart snowmobile gloves just assisted me in shoveling my building with windchill down to -50...
My finger tips actually got cold at the end of it all...lol

Still not bad for cheap gloves.

a reply to: Oaktree

My grandmother bought these for me nearly ten years ago! I would be lost without them, they are so warm and awesome. They are just lined leather, but they are the warmest gloves I have ever owned.

As a disclaimer: I live in Oklahoma, so we may have a warmer climate than you. But it does get to below freezing here and I wear these to scrape the ice off my car, pump gas in below freezing temps in sleet with no problem. And since they are pretty thin, I can still grab and manipulate just about anything I want. I don't even have to take them off to flick my lighter on. And these are the only gloves I've ever been able to wear while working a lighter.

Eta: the lining is kinda fuzzy - the tag says it's polyester.

a reply to: Oaktree

Some of the gloves offered up don't appear to fit how you describe the way they're needed to perform - not bulky and ally freedom of movement. These are the step-up version of the gloves I have and suggested. ProFlex 818OD Thermal Utility Gloves with OutDry. Also available on Amazon. The gloves I have keep my hands warm in weather approaching zero and are entirely waterproof. They are designed exactly for the purposes you mentioned.

a reply to: projectvxn

These are flight gloves I wear while holding a machine gun out of a UH60 going 170 MPH over Afghanistan in the high mountains in winter.

While blasting "Flight of the Valkyries" through the speakers. Right?

originally posted by: Scaevola
a reply to: projectvxn

These are flight gloves I wear while holding a machine gun out of a UH60 going 170 MPH over Afghanistan in the high mountains in winter.

While blasting "Flight of the Valkyries" through the speakers. Right?

Won't let us hook up the IPODs anymore.