How are your visualization skills? Bed-top netting without poles?

Do you have a side picture and dimensions for it? Its going to be tricky with four high tension points but I am starting to see some ideas though they might involve too many lines.

If you are "in the woods" you could tie out to trees.

If you are "in a meadow" and your trekking poles Long, it might be doable.
How high is the top edge?

Edit: +1 George – Dimensions all around and a side photo as well, to help with photoshop-ing and discussion.

Piper
Yes you can but you will need 2 trekking poles and 6 guylines.
I might do a sketch later on…

Possibly.

The lower corners (1 & 2) should work provided you get the stakes far enough away to elevate corner 2.

Corner 3 is the tricky one.

If you have 4 poles, no problem. ~4' carbon tent poles weigh in around 2oz, so you could buy 2 of those to use with your trekking poles which would add just 4 ounces.

If you only support 2 of the four ceiling corners, the structure will stand, but obviously won't be tensioned properly.

Getting it tensioned with just two poles may require that the poles be taller than your trekking poles will go. If you try the upper guy lines shown below and your poles are too short, you still might get a better pitch than if you only go for two of the upper corners.

Be careful using less than 4 poles as that may put more tension on the tent than it was designed for.

According to this page that sells it (I've had this thing for a couple decades) http://www.longroad.com/products/The-Skeeter-Defeater.html

34″ Width x 34″ Height x 73″ Length
(86cm x 86cm x 191cm)

Renee, your picture is really helpful. Maybe with some struts to spread the top edges apart.

And maximum the extension of your trekking poles is ….?

+1 Rene.

Piper,

Good point about spreader bars. That would probably add just 2 ounces. You could also just replace the existing poles with something lighter and spare yourself the trouble of all those guy lines. I think that would come in around a half pound.

The tricky part is setting it up and this is the way I visualise it :
Stake the 4 corners down, insert the cord (fix length) from point A to B around the pole tip (make a loop), guy that out to the side and then the back.
Now guyout the front end.
If your poles are over 45" it will set up better.

+1 Rene and Franco. Pretty much what I was seeing. You're in good hands.

My poles were advertised as 125cm which according to google is 49" so I guess they will work. It's a little windy so I will try this sometime this week if I can find something to use for spreader bars. Thank you for your help!

You don't need spreader bars, it's a bug net not a tent fly..
Point 3 in Rene's drawing will be kept in tension(towards the front) by the guyline starting at point 2.
The other top corner, at the back of N3, is kept in tension by the pole , you could move that pole back a bit if needed(towards the rear of the tent in that photo) .
BTW I had assumed that the top of the tent was between 90 and 100 cm , so you should have enough height with your poles.

Yeah, w/ just a 34" ceiling height, 49" poles may just do it. Might as well give it a try before buying anything.

You could also try pitching the whole thing a bit lower if necessary to get the ceiling taut. The walls between points 1 and 2 would just be slack, which is fine for something like this.

Good luck, and let us know how it goes!

Okay, here's what I got:

My former lawn which is now a sandy gopher pit makes it hard to pull anything very tight but I don't think I could have gotten the top part of it tight no matter what I did. But it's usable. Of course I still have the problem of how the heck do I get inside. I've always had that problem though.

I also wasn't sure how to get a tarp to go over it. I also forget how to do all the various knots I used to know how to do.

Anyway, I could use this again, but I think the one I sewed myself is actually better even if it's a little wonky looking. Maybe I will turn my attention to figuring out how to make an attachable floor so I can get in and out through the floor and seal the floor once I'm inside.

It did not look symmetrical in the original photo, so much for my visualisation skills.
Still my comments were about setting it up as a bug net not a tent inner and by that I mean not one were you would want to put a tarp over it.
I would not use that net as a tent inner.

After I set it up was when I wondered if it could also work as a tent inner. I had to use it that way once before a long time ago and it didn't really work then either.