Remaking commercial gear in UL materials

I've heard of people having flys remade out of lighter materials, so I would imagine a whole tent isn't out of the question. Might get a little pricey though.

One that comes to mind is Moonbow (www.moonbowgear.com). They do some custom sewing, but they definitely don't fit your hope of them being close (all the way across the country in NH).

Best of Luck

for price reasons, you may want to take advantage of the economies of scale companies have. It would take a large amount of skilled labor to make a custom tent. What type of tent do you have? There could be others very similar to it already made out of UL materials.

Bump….thanks for the input so far. Just trying to collect a bit more.

At one point I considered having a silnylon fly made for a Sierra Designs tent that I really liked. The price of the custom fly as quoted by a local sewing outfit in Seattle was wicked expensive- I think just the fly was going to be like $300. So I kept it and later bought my first Tarptent which was lighter by both materials and design.

I don't know if my price was realistic (I didn't get a second opinion), but I imagine a tent, fly, and poles would be crazy expensive. I'm curious about your tent too, what with so many UL and LW tents to choose from these days. There may be something out there that you haven't yet considered. Either way, I'd be really curious what Moonbow would quote you- that's the first place I'd call too.

Best of luck!

I made a silnylon fly for a Sierra Designs Lightyear that I have been using for about 5 years. The hardest part of the whole job was making the pattern. I didn't want to take the old fly apart to make the pattern so I needed to estimate the seam and hem allowances and add them to panel patterns traced from the original fly. I also had to look around a bit to find the clips to match the fly connections on the tent. Altogether, I reduced the weight by about 6 oz if I recall correctly. The job took over 16 hours including the pattern work but not finding the hardware. I wouldn't do it again. I now use a Tarptent Contrail unless I anticipate continued rain; there is more room for a lot less weight.

Thanks for all the input.

The main reason I'm interested in this is that I want (my wife wants, and I have to agree I'd like it too) a double wall tent with a top that's all mesh so we can see the stars at night and a waterproof fly for when it rains. We camped for years with a plastic tube tent we used as a ground cloth. If it rained, then we set it up and crawled inside (the tube tent weighed 2 lbs). As we got older, we got a 2 man Eureka tent that weighed 4.5 lbs that filled the bill – mesh top and one door. It was nice to have protection from the bugs, but the tent finally literally wore out. I have a Tarptent Clouburst at 2.5 lbs. It's a great tent, but my wife really wants the mesh top so we can see the stars at night.

I saw a one man Coleman tent at SportMart on sale a few years back for $30 and bought it just because it was cheap. It is a Coleman Peak 1 Cobra. They apparently came out about 1998 and got reasonable to good reviews. It weighs about 3.5 lbs and has an all mesh top with a single hoop pole at the shoulders, doors on both sides (really nice), and a nice rain fly with vestibules on both sides. It's a very cozy fit for two and works extremely well for us. The dimensions are 97" long and 53" at the shoulders/head. It tapers to 24" at the feet and 36" beyond the head and is about 42" high at the hoop. It's very "cozy", but because of the length we have a bit of room above our heads for gear. Our Jacks 'R Better quilt tucks in very nicely along the sides. If I knew how, I'd include a plan and/or pictures. We've used it for the last 5 years, and it's a great tent. The newer versions of the Peak 1 have two hoop poles, the second at the feet, and are up to 4.5 lbs or so.

We've been continually trying to lighten our packs and although 3.5 lbs is really good for a two wall, two man tent with these features, it seems like this one could go lighter. The tent weighs 25 oz; the fly 20 oz, the poles 7.5 oz, and the stakes (8) 3 oz. I figured I could start with the fly and maybe get under 3 lbs.

I've talked to several people now. Narain's in Berkeley has worked with UL materials and gave me a quote for ca. $350 for the fly alone. The materials are about 25% of the quote – Silnylon 1sts are expensive. I've used Narain's before for repairs and they do great work. I also talked to a couple of local seamstresses that I got recommendations for. One said "no" because she felt she couldn't do the quality of work she wanted to for a reasonable price. The other just said she couldn't make any money given the hours involved.

The other tents I've had my eyes on are the Big Sky Evolution 2 D 2P and the Big Agnes SL2. The Big Sky tent looks good, weighs about 2.75 lb and has the all mesh top and two doors. It is about a foot shorter so there's no room for gear at your head. In addition it seems to be manufacured from "unobtainium". The Big Agnes SL2 seems to be about the same but doesn't have two side doors. I don't think my wife is ready for a tarp with a bug net under it yet. I'm also thinking about the SMD Lunar Duo and trying to convince my wife the open sides are almost as good as a mesh top if it only weights 2.5 lbs.

If anyone has seen anything else or has any ideas I'd be very interested. Thanks.

If you can find them. The tarp combined with the mesh liner may suit your needs. Might pick it up as a cheap 2nd hand item too?

We can stargaze with our SMD Europa, if the door is pointing in the right direction, but I don't know that SMD make these any more.

Goodluck.

If you can find one of these it might suit your needs. Check 2nd hand market maybe.

Our SMD Europa is OK for star gazing if pointed in right direction.

I wanted to post an update on my efforts to have all or part of a commercial tent redone in ultralite materials (I don’t sew and my wife, although an excellent seamstress, no longer has time because her job). After a fair amount of research with no positive results, I emailed Tim Marshall (who posts on BPL) to see if he might be interested in my project, namely to redo a fly for a commercial tent in UL materials. Tim was willing to give it a try, and I was willing to take a chance and experiment. Tim is an excellent craftsman and has made some nice gear for several other UL backpackers.

After several emails and design discussions, Tim made a copy of the fly from a Coleman UL Peak Cobra tent for me. I was able to find a used Cobra tent (newer version with somewhat different dimensions) on BPL which I bought and sent to Tim to use as a pattern if he wanted. As it turned out, he didn’t need to cut up the old tent, but made a pattern in Google SketchUp. In late spring 2008, Tim sent me the new fly, and I used it for on all my backpack trips for the summer of 2008. The original commercial tent weighs 25 oz; the fly 20.5 oz, the poles 7.5 oz, and the stakes (7) 3 oz for a total of 3 lbs 8 oz. I figured I could start with the fly and maybe get under 3 lbs.

The new fly weighs 12 oz and reduces the tent weight to just about 3 lbs. The tent is cozy for two, but my wife and I sleep like spoons under a JRB quilt, and the tent worked great for our 2008 backpacking season with an 8 oz reduction in community pack weight. I’m not aware of many two man tents other than the Big Sky tents that are in the 3 lb or under range.

Tim initially had some trepidation about taking this project on, and only did so since the tent and fly are all essentially straight lines with no curves. Tim worked this winter on redoing the whole tent in UL materials with some design modifications and improvements. I will post on the results in the near future.

Side view of commercial tent without fly

Side view of commercial Cobra tent with fly

Side view of new UL fly

I have had the same thouhts. I have SD clip flashlight (2000 model) that has seen alot of use. I woul loce to get a sil nylon fly and botton for it. I also know of a place to get CF poles for the tent. I could likely reduce the weight by nearly a third.Is Tim taking on more projects like this?

Yes i still do this type of work. Not sure my work is always the best in the world, but it's hard to find someone to do these types of jobs.

-Tim

Here’s an update on my efforts (actually Tim Marshall’s work) to redo a commercial tent in UL materials. My wife and I had found a commercial tent that fit our needs almost perfectly, but it weighed way more than seemed necessary, so I wanted to get a custom remake in UL materials. I started by getting the fly redone in UL materials then moved on to the whole tent (see posts above).

There seems to be a lot of people looking for the same thing we want, namely a two wall UL tent with two doors and an all mesh inner tent for stargazing in nice weather and a fly for when it rains. (The Big Sky Evolution comes close, but availability seems questionable). This tent is not a heavy duty mountaineering tent and certainly wouldn’t be the best choice for winter camping. On the other hand it is perfect (for us) for relatively good weather, three season use in the California Sierras. The tent is just big enough for my wife and I since we sleep close together under a quilt. The new tent and fly weighs 2 lbs 3 oz including poles, stakes, and fly. We’re still tweaking details on the fly, but all in all it’s just what I was looking for. Tim does excellent work and is great to deal with. Some of the highlights are a slight (3") increase in height, larger doors, and custom gear pockets as well as a big improvement in weight over the commercial version.

New mesh inner tent

Here’s an update on the fly and a “use” report for the tent after 14 days of use in the mountains.

The new fly (picture below) works fine in the front yard. It’s waterproof under the sprinkler system, but we’ve not had any rain on a trip yet to give it a test under real time conditions. One question I have is how it will fare in higher winds since it was designed to be up off the ground a bit for ventilation.

The light weight (2.3 lbs total for tent, fly, poles, and stakes) is fantastic. The view from the all mesh upper is great for stargazing and just feeling of being outside without having to worry about bugs. One night we were in a very exposed camp on the JMT north of Devil’s Postpile and had winds well over 55 mph (I’m basing this on a weather report we got after we got out for winds atop nearby Mammoth Mountain). There was a lot of deformation of the poles, but no issues other than the noise of the wind and drafts under our quilt. I didn’t have the fly up so I can’t comment on the fly design in this kind of wind. The next night we had similar winds, but were in a much more sheltered site and had no issues at all with the wind.

I’ve included a few of pics of the tent in use.

Thats an awesome job. I have thought about remaking some of the lighter double wall tents as well. As good as tarp tents are I can't help but wounder what the weight of more traditional tents like the SD lightyear would be if just done in lighter materials.
I concluded that it would be too big of a project for me to be worth it.
Impressive.

Awesome!! Nice improvements.

Thank you for sharing this. I used to own this tent in black/purple, and loved it. I stayed nice and dry after many extreme down pours in this tent. Somehow over the years it has disappeared, and a couple years ago I started looking for one again simply because it was so darn cheap and light.

Is this tent still in production?

It is, sort of. It has undergone several revisions and name changes over the past few years. It has been also been known as the Inyo, Dakota 1, and most recently, the Kraz. I bought mine on clearance the year that the Inyo came out, 2004. The newer versions have more clearance for your feet.

That is a really cool tent. I am impressed!

I used to have the Cobra. Actually it was my first backpacking tent. I was always happy with it. It standed up well to wind and rain and was lightweight for the size and price. I paid about $30 for it at a Coleman factory outlet store.

For some reason I switched to a heavier single wall Kelty tent after that. What a mistake!

Joseph

Does anyone know how to get ahold of one of these?

I searched ebay and amazon. They had newer, heavier, different versions. I want the light and cheap stuff. Haha.

I really like reworked version you have, there. I would love to see more details. Maybe some measurements or something to get me started.

What material is the bottom? Where did you get the poles? Is the fly 1.1oz silnylon? Does the side of your rainfly open?

I really think making a simple tent is what I will wind up doing. I can't find anything I like under $200. That is way out of my price range.