2007 Hennessy Hyperlight Backpacker A-Sym Hammock REVIEW

I added adjusters to my guy lines at 0.5 gm each I felt it was worth it, a bigger lighter fly would be great though.

Yes Martin- I've since done the same. Especially on the fly guylines, that's a great improvement.

I've also played around with the Hennessy Automatic Fly Tensioner and Water Collection System. It's a great product that adds tension as it collects rainfall. It's a great idea that works nicely.

I just tie tautline hitches & haven't had any trouble tensioning the fly guylines.

Also, I like to attach the fly separately to the tree above the hammock with a length of cord, which keeps it higher over the hammock, allowing better ventilation & if the silnylon stretches during the night it still isn't directly on the hammock netting.

In past use I did not find the snakeskins very durable (the stitching usually eventually worked loose on the wider end). I find I like to just roll the hammock up, leaving one end tied as I roll the other end up toward it, then untie the final end when I reach it. I stow the fly separately, so if it's raining when I need to set up, I can put it up first.

I've found a platypus sport with a small loop of cord tied around it's neck will hang neatly from the glove clips on the ridgeline. To keep it out of my way at night, I push it to the very end, shoving it outside the hammock body with the cord extending through the Velcro. To get a drink at night, I just unfasten the top of the Velcro & pull it in. I do my shoes similarly sometimes.

I was a very early adopter of the Hyperlight and love mine dearly. I'll never go back to being a groundling.

The Cuben fiber fly at that weight (2.5oz) is perfectly plausable. That's a good seven square feet of fly if you use the CN1K08 cuben (at .33oz sq/yd) which translates to a hex fly about 130" x 92" (about midway between a MacCat Standard and Deluxe.) That's a very roomy fly (much more than the stock tarp) and worth even the $150-200 it's likely to cost, given that CN1K08 is now running $19.60 a meter (at 48" wide) from North Sail (who bought Cuben Fiber Corp.)

For the tarp tensioners, that's an easy one. Figure 9s by Nite Ize (the smallest size) are the answer. Lightweight lines of all kinds hold great in them and they're quick and easy to use and come in at 3.6g each. What more could you ask?

Great and useful review. Thanks!

I have gone back and forth from the stock HH tarp used as designed, attached to the hammock suspension ropes, and using a larger tarp tied to the trees. It looks to me like it was used by Doug Johnson as per originally designed in the review. So, what tricks did you use to overcome the slack that occurs when you get in the hammock and the hammock sags closer to the ground, taking the tarp with it? Because naturally, if your tarp was tight, it is now loose. It can be very loose.

I have tried hanging weighted stuff sacks from the lateral tie outs ( that is actually what the little plastic hooks at the tarp left/right asym tie outs are for). I have tried first over tightening the tarp to the ground, with the tarp pulling down on the ridge-line causing some "pre-sag", and then tightening the ridge-line. I have tried these two together or with bungees. They all work to varying degrees and all have their drawbacks and are quite a bother. But they are better than nothing. Because rain coverage is much better if you are attached to the suspension, because you stay close to the tarp ridge-line, as they sag together. But at the cost of a loose, flapping, noisy tarp.

So, Doug and others, how did you handle this? I'm always searching for a way to better use the original tarp, without having to use a larger tarp tied to the trees. If you tie that stock tarp to the trees, you probably aren't going to have much sideways rain coverage after your hammock sags.

But despite minor problems that need to be overcome, ain't hammocking wonderful and restful after a long hike?
Bill

Thanks Pan.

Doug, as I look more closely at some of the pictures, the ones where the tarp appears nice and tight, it looks like you tied the tarp to the trees. Or in one pic, it looks like you are maybe tied to the hammock on one end and the tree on the other. Though it's kind of hard to tell for sure. Is that the case? Or did you find a way to use the tarp as directed- tied to the HH rope prussic(sp?)clips- and still keep a tight tarp?

The first picture in the snake skin segment shows a tarp that is pretty saggy. Don't know if that's with the tarp tied to the ropes and you in the hammock?

If I only lived somewhere that had trees………….