I've been wondering why Cordura wasn't used more in boots and shoes and such, was looking into making a pair of moccassins out of uncoated cordura  (coating the bottom with barge cement / rubber shavings)  when a friend sent me these today.

Cordura, highly breathable, a super lightweight  (weigh 2 ounces less than my mid-height Merell Moabs)

I'm already a fan of high-breathable shoes for backpacking and such, and wear mid-height trail runners usually  (using goretex socks added when needed)

Any thoughts on Cordura in shoes?  This concept?  These specific shoes?  anyone have experience with them?

https://originalfootwear.com/collecti...e-assault-mid-1

Some OTB hi-tops are in my future for sure, other options are the (imported and likely lower quality) Palladium (pampa TX maybe?) boots that use a ballistic nylon shell. Only thing I've heard about the OTB is that it runs narrow, a wide version is supposed to be on the way that I may wait for. I always get a bit nervous about "grippy rubber" soles as they tend to wear faster, but hard to say until people have more time in these.
There are quite a few boots that use cordura in strategic places (think issue desert boots) but many boots with nylon panels have them laminated to so many layers of foam and waterproof fabrics it is hard to isolate the performance of the cordura by itself. I have made some uncoated cordura moccasins and the one pitfall is how little seam strength there is with an uncoated fabric, you can't be stingy with your seam allowances and you have to finish seams carefully.

I figure there are gobs of cotton canvas shoes out there (vans and converse in particular) that last far longer then they have any right to, in a typical street shoe I would expect a cordura upper to outlast the sole, especially with a rubber toe cap.

Fowler - yea, I was wondering that about the uncoated cordura vs coated, whether it changes durability. Thanks for the tip.

And yea, I figured Cordura would outlast the sole, I've been trying to figure out what I wanted to do with a sole for the moccasins I'm wanting to make, just do the barge cement / rubber shavings or go with some kind of thin vibram sole or something.

Hey, I saw your build of those boots on some forum board while looking for info on this subject. Didn't realize it was you.

One of the ideas I was throwing around was a layer of 3M 5200 Marine Adhesive for durability and a minimal structure (you can make little treads with it), then a layer of the barge cement with shredded rubber in it for traction. Maybe I'm overthinking it though.