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welcome to boot spy my name is william today we got ourselves a mocktoe massacre a full battle royale it is the redwing classic mock versus the thursday diplomat versus the thorough good makto versus the danner bull run let's get into it [Music] guys thank you so much for joining me as i said today we're comparing four of the most popular mokto boots against one another that is the red wing classic mock the thursday diplomat the thorough good motto and the danner bull run so i've run some pretty cool scientific tests on all four of these boots i'm going to mix that in with some of the subjective things like style and discuss how these boots stack up against each other so you can figure out which one is worth your hard earned money take it off i'm going to introduce all of these boots one by one let's do this really quickly first off we have the red wing classic mock this is in the slate mule skinner but the most popular version is the 875 oro legacy leather this has a 360 degree goodyear welt has puritan triple stitching along the upper and then the insole and midsole are entirely made with leather and cork next up we have the thursday diplomat this also has a 360 degree goodyear welt it has a vibram christy outsole it has a poron insole with cork in the midsole as well as a steel shank at the bottom here we have the thorough good makto first of all it's got this tiny nylon american flag it has a 360 degree split storm welt so it's a little bit more weather resistant than your standard goodyear welt we have three speed hooks which is a little bit unique we have a maxwear wedge sole which is custom only throw goods have this and then again we have synthetic insole and midsole materials in there and it has a fiberglass shank which cuts down a little bit on weight last up you got yourself the daner bull run this has a hand stitched upper this is a little unique compared to the other boots it has a stitch down construction which offers a little bit more weather resistance but if this part ever wears out along this edge like if the leather wears down then you can't really end up resoling it but most the time you can and that's kind of a rare part to to break and then it has a custom dander outsole right here ortholite insole again synthetic fiberboard in the midsole and what it's got a steel shank i actually went ahead and weighed all these boots side by side just curious which one's the heaviest which one's the lightest the thorough good was the heaviest it weighed in at 847 grams per boot the thursday and red wings surprisingly enough were exactly the same weight per boot at 777 grams and then the danner will run was 702 grams so that was the lightest now the weight itself doesn't actually tell you anything about the quality of the boot but it does speak to the different way these have been constructed and so when i start to break into like leather thickness and how some of these boots have been constructed well then that weight is actually going to start telling a little bit of a story so stick around for that here at boot spy we like the fashion aspect of boots so we're going to kick it off by comparing the styles of these boots the footbed of the red wing classic mock and the thursday diplomat are actually the same width so that the width of the sole is not any different but as you can see there's a massive difference between the height of these boots now the red wing is also as tall as the banner they have the same profile in the toe although the danner is much more chunky along the instep it's basically the same height all the way across whereas if you look at the red wing classic mock it kind of curves up at the toe so the banner is a little bit chunkier but they're both just as tall as one another and then you have the thorough good which kind of like the danner pretty chunky uh definitely looks a lot more like a work boot kind of like the dander bull run but also it's a little bit shorter it's about a half it was about a centimeter shorter in the toe than the red wing classic mod my favorite one for style between all of these is the thursday diplomat i like it because it's a smaller profile it's very narrow through the foot and it just looks better with a slim pair of jeans that said the red wing classic mock has more of a classic aesthetic that workwear aesthetic so if you wear something with like a straight cut jean or anything like that it's going to probably look a lot better with the red wing classic mock than the thursday diplomat just because it has a taller more like traditionally masculine size to it so if you're looking for a classic mock toe look well then the red wing classic mock to me has definitely the best style it's still pretty not not necessarily slim but it's a lot more tapered in the middle a lot more contoured to your foot whereas you get into the thoroughgood and the dander bull run and these are just like big old bricks that you put on your feet the cooler can uh if you're you know like construction worker and stuff like that but uh but in terms of like pure fashion pure style i'm definitely going to give the points to the thursday diplomat or the red wing mocto now we're going to discuss the leather quality and that's where things get pretty interesting i went ahead and measured all the thicknesses of the different leathers that we have in all these boots the redwing classic mock had a leather thickness of 2.3 millimeters when i measured the thursday diplomat it has a full leather thickness of three millimeters but it also features a liner in there so the outer leather is more like two and a half or two millimeters thick whereas the liner is a millimeter thick but you still have three millimeters of leather between your foot and the outside world the thorough good makto has two millimeters of leather thickness and then the danner has the thinnest leather at 1.5 millimeters in terms of how the leather feels and ages the red wing is definitely the winner in this category they have some really excellent leathers i have mine in the slate mule skinner and i'm a huge fan of this leather thursday diplomat objectively has the thickest of the most amount of leather in this boot and it does take a little while to break in because you have that liner and it's a little bit stiffer but that's going to help the longevity with that three millimeters of leather in there so that's also a pretty big benefit when i look at the thorough good mock toe you know two millimeters that's pretty standard so that's not like a pro or a con or anything like that that's a pretty standard leather thickness i think two millimeters is enough to hold up to if you're working in a shop or you know anything where it's pretty tough work the thorough goods and you look at all the reviews and stuff like that people say that these boots this leather thickness can really hold up to and take a pretty good beating there's only one boot that actually really surprised me in the leather category and that was the danner bull run with 1.5 millimeters of leather thickness for a work boot considering the fact that the thoroughgood the danner they're pretty much the same price thorough goods 20 more but getting a whole half millimeter you know like the good side like uh 33 thicker leather in the thorough good compared to the banner well that was a little bit surprising and so that makes banner the clear loser in the leather category as far as a winner goes i'm gonna have to give it to the red wing classic mock again this leather is just higher quality it's quite thick at 2.3 millimeters and then the runner up in that category is going to be the thursday diplomat so they're going to get a half point red wing gets a full point next up we're going to talk about the soul of these four boots now in an attempt to make an objective assessment i created a little bit of a test where i put some oil on some concrete and i used a force gauge pull to basically pull on the boot put a 25 pound weight on it pull it across and see how many pounds of pressure it takes to move the boot when it is placed on concrete on oil now across these tests the red wing with its custom crepe sole took 14 pounds of pressure to move across the oily surface the thursday diplomat with the vibram christie outsole that took also 14 pounds of pressure to move across the oily concrete the thorough good mock toe with their own max wear wedge sole their own custom that took 15 pounds of weight uh to move across the oily concrete and then the danner with their own custom wedge sole that took 13 pounds of pressure to move across oily concrete comparing the slip resistance across all these different boots thoroughgood performed the best danner performed the worst and then red wing and thursday performed the same of course you're not always going to be walking on oily cement that's a pretty rare thing so that's just a more extreme sort of event looking at the insoles of these things that's where you're really gonna some some choices need to be made the red wing the classic mock that is all leather and cork so those are pure natural materials now that doesn't have it has probably the worst shock absorption of any of these boots because it's all natural but it also has the most longevity the thursday diplomat has a poron insole helps with a little bit of breathability they don't stink and then it also still has a cork midsole and a steel shank in it so you're getting a good mix of shock absorption comfort and then you still have some longevity and a little bit of where it's going to break into your foot and really mold to the shape of your foot now both the thoroughgood and the danner have these synthetic removable outsoles which i think is pretty cool especially for a work boot because if you want to add your own custom insoles you have that option with thoroughgood and with dander and you don't have that option on red wing or with the thursdays that said the midsoles on the thoroughgood and the danner those are both made with synthetic materials like fiberboard and that tends to break down quicker and it just doesn't have the same longevity as the midsoles you're going to find in the thursday or the red wing when it comes to overall soul quality i'm not really going to pick a winner here because there's different case uses they're different uses for different things now i think the thorough good between the thoroughgood and danner the thoroughgood is definitely better it has more slip resistance with oil and then basically the midsole and the uh the insole are exactly the same so you're getting a lot of shock absorption for both of those but the thorough good just performs better has more slip resistance so in a working condition i would definitely pick the thorough good over danner and if you want more longevity then you're comparing the red wing to the thursday and of course the red wing is gonna last longer because it has that leather insole so that's just going to last longer than the poron insole of the thursday diplomat but at the same time the thursday feels almost like wearing a sneaker whereas you know people it like feels like you're standing on a piece of wood for the first couple days when you're in your red wing so you kind of sacrifice some of that shock absorption it could be worth getting the thursday diplomat if you stand on your feet for long periods of time and maybe have bad knees or something like that having that more shock absorption in the thursday diplomat helps a lot but the red wing of all these boots that insole is going to last the longest here's the final verdict i'm going to rank these from least favorite to most favorite and if you guys want to do the same in the comments below go ahead and do that you can pause the video do that now or you can wait for mine as well so my least favorite of these boots is the danner bull run with 1.5 millimeter thick leather the fact that it performed the worst in terms of slip resistance on that oil concrete test basically you know to me if i'm getting a work boot it needs to have really sturdy leather it needs to be slip resistant and the dander bull run just doesn't really offer that now there is a flip side to this and if you're working in the summer i think some of those things actually become well not the oils the slip resistance but the thinner leather a little bit more breathability the synthetic materials on the insole and midsole that actually makes the boot more breathable so this would definitely be if you're getting ready for summer and you're going to work a long summer out in construction and you don't want to spend too much on a boot like a red wing or something like that well then the danner bowl run is actually a pretty good choice because it's going to be more breathable than the thorough good mocktail my third pick is the thoroughgood mocto now this is definitely a construction boot this is like a work boot and this is not the kind of work that i do this is the kind of work that i do so i don't necessarily need a heavy duty work boot at all that said if i was going to pick a work boot i would definitely pick the throw good over the over the red wing because you know it has thick enough leather it's pretty inexpensive it's 220 bucks whereas the red wing classic mark is 280 bucks so it's a good amount cheaper it's got the triple stitching the sole performed really well on that oil test and then you know it's basically got everything it's got a padded collar right here it's got a storm split storm goodyear welt that's hard to get out which has a ton of water resistance and that's going to be recraftable if you ever want to basically it's a pretty beefy boot it offers a lot of protection you can get a uh you can get a steel toe you can get composite toe you can get eight inch version there's tons of different styles of the throw good mock toe so i'm gonna say this is definitely of all the mock toes this is the best work mocto and lastly because i have trouble with confrontation i'm given two number one points for the red wing classic mock and thursday diplomat now these are two totally different boots and i wear them on different occasions the thursday is my number one pick for style and i like this because again it is slimmer it is sleeker it fits better with a pair of slim jeans and so i actually end up wearing the thursday diplomat more than i wear any of these other moc toes i'm really excited to wear it throughout this fall and winter i love that it has three millimeters of leather there that keeps it warm so it's a good winter boot as well so this is definitely my pick for style the thursday diplomat now i couldn't put the red wing makto at number two though because it's just got such good quality leather i like that they keep the instep tapered i like they keep you know everything is very contoured the triple stitching it's very stylized it's a super classic boot i that's the profile is just bigger than i prefer you know and but if for guys who wear straight cut jeans or anything with any sort of extra fabric down towards the ankle well then this is just a better looking boot in those scenarios compared to the thursday diplomats so a lot of guys don't have the same style as me so you know i couldn't i couldn't dock points or something subjective like that but for all intents and purposes these guys are are extremely similar they both performed exactly the same on the oil slip test they both had very uh thick leather you know 2.3 millimeters this is probably about 2.3 millimeters on the outside with a um you know .7 millimeter maybe one millimeter liner so leather thickness is about the same and then they both weighed the same again let me know how you would order these boots from best to worst which ones would you get first let me know in the comments below if you found this video helpful please give me a thumbs up and also hit the subscribe button down below i have new videos coming out every single week all about boots if you want to see any of the reviews i've done on these boots you can check out these videos popping up right now and until next time put your best boot forward