Outdoor Designs (UK) switch to eVENT

[Jon Solomon]

Tom, I was wondering the same thing about the air-perm GTX, and I have heard the same thing about Activent/Windstopper. A funny thing is that you don’t see any air-permeable GoreTex available in product lines in North America, do you?

Paul: a code word? Not a bad idea! Maybe the manufacturer could use this trick, too?! Portions of my posts above have been deleted to protect the innocent against unforeseen eVENTs (wink, wink) of damaGE (wink, wink)!

If Outdoor Designs isn’t planning to use eVENT in tents, that suggests to me that Exped’s Polaris could face some unexpected difficulties…

Like Kevin says, better grab one now if that’s the sort of thing you might want. I have to confess, that’s exactly why I have one, but I haven’t used it enough to write anything reasonable about its field performance. The one time I used it on snow, on a very cold night in Central New York, there was absolutely zero condensation in the tent, except on the silnylon vestibule, from cooking. By contrast, my BD Lighthouse in EPIC would have had some interior condensation, especially around the internal poles. The Polaris poles (except that fourth one) are in neat flat pole sleeves, so they are not inside the tent. Just one of the neat features of the Polaris (along with the vestibule and vents). The tent body itself isn’t all that bulky actually, but it sure uses a lot of metal to support it. It does make it easier to split the weight between two people. Like I mentioned earlier, that fourth pole is pretty much required for snow use (to keep the large fabric side panels from collapsin inward), so I would advise anybody purchasing the Polaris to get that, too.

[David Spellman]

Exped Polaris —
The tent was introduced in 2005 in eVent (not just another ePTFE laminate). It was successful and is currently completely sold out. In fact, none of the tents actually made it to dealers — everything that was manufactured was sold on special order. According to OR, Exped’s distributor in the US, Exped will not have new Polaris tents available until February, and they will not be in eVent. They will be in a PTFE laminate “very similar” to eVent and it was noted that this laminate could not be identified as eVent but would be (nudge, nudge, wink, wink) *VERY* similar. So we’ll see.

[Jon Solomon]

I always like threads that arrive at a sense of resolution, so here it is:

http://www.outdoorsmagic.com/news/article/mps/UAN/3524/v/1/sp/

” from next January or so, the range of bivvy bags and tents currently badged under the outdoordesigns name are moving into the Rab stable. Not only that, but they’ll be made from eVENT rather than Gore-Tex”

Some people are going to be very happy about having those Outdoor Designs designs now made in eVENT under the Rab name.

I think the name of the Exped non-eVENT fabric in North America will be “Airvent”, nudge-nudge wink-wink.

[paul johnson]

are these products available in the USA? if so, from whom?

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