Perfect Pitch Tetrahedron Tent

I'm intrigued by this shelter, thanks for the info. Any pictures? I didn't catch them when it was in the gear swap.

No pictures yet- we just set it up for a short time and I didn't think of taking pictures. I sent Jonathon an email to ask for copies of his.

HA HA HA!!! I am alive!

This is a bummer for me to see. I was planning to make a shelter along these lines. Now i am too late. I was planning a lower pitch with 10' sides so it could be made from 5yds fabric, but still i am too late, even if it was an oops. 2nd place, hmm first loser for me.

-Tim

Jonathon,

Thanks a bunch for the photos. Note that it isn't quite a perfect pitch using an overhead support rope. That's because it can cause a pull to one side if the support isn't exactly overhead. It was very symmetrical when using a pole- even when I moved the pole base a foot to the side to open up interior space.

Tim-
Yours could be the first "on purpose" production. You can even use my TetraMid(tm) name.

Ahhh, and there she is. Looks as though it can be set up as a hex (sort of)?

With the side pull it looks , to me, almost like the Titanium Goat Vertex tipi. I like that shape.
Franco

Ahh, the 'mid users are here. I feel the love.

James, that's a really interesting point about the ease of pitch. I hadn't thought of that before, but it makes perfect sense. How do Shangri La users pitch their mids? Triangle and pull out the sides or sequential corners?

James, how long is each side at the base?

Rod

Um… Bad gear tester.

I didn't actually measure it. I presume that it's a nominal 10' on each side (60" fabric times two minus seam allowances)

I did play around with pure triangular vs. more hex-ish pitches. With the corners pegged tight to the ground at their webbing loops and short 1' guys to the midpoints, the wall midpoints easily pulled out about 8" and lifted up maybe 4". Trying to pull the midpoints out but pegging them down tight to the ground created slack at the corners (as you would expect). Bringing the corners in a few inches let me pull the midpoints out more, but of course they rose up more as well and the pitch became slightly less perfect- a few fabric ripples up the walls at the corners (see Jonathon's last picture).

it's actually a very interesting point about pitching and I hadn't thought of that either or at least the theory behind it but I guess that's what I actually do to pitch my mids by staking out opposing corners. In a Shangri-La it's almost imposible to get it right if you stake down all 6 corners and then set the pole up because you just can't spot the right angle between two adjacent panels. I stake down two adjacent corners and the two opposing ones, then put the pole in place and the correct angles between adjacent panels just happen when I stake down the two remaining corners. More or less…

It's even easier with a pentagon like the Lunar Solo or a half-hexagon like you can shape a rectangular tarp: stake down first the two adjacent "back" corners and then the front line from the apex, that's exactly getting three triangles (one real and two virtual ones) and it's a very easy way of getting a good, taut, wrinkle free pitch.

Inaki,
Good points- sounds like you have a lot of experience. I've been looking at all the options of mid/hex/tipi to use for my family of four. The Kifaru tipis sound great until you read the pitching instructions. That's what made me decide to go with a standard square pyramid, until this triangular one came along. A multi-sided tent with a floor is a lot easier since you just peg the floor flat and the corners end up in the right place.

not really that much. Anyway, if there's a floor with a fixed layout attached to the fly, as in a traditional tent, you can also get the right shape from there. In the absence of such floor, it's possible to install a length of cord or webbing joining two opposing corners so you get the right distance in between them as it was done for the GG Spinnshelter. Anyway, I think practice beats anything else. With the Hex, I'm still on it.

Do you say 'mid' only when it's 4 sided or does the term also apply to 5 or 6?

now I think of it, it works the same for pitching a rectangular tarp in an A-frame: two back (or front) corners, then opposing ridge line apex (again the virtual triangle thing), then the remaining anchor points are straightforward and you get a taut pitch at first try. I've been doing it like this for years.

Wikipedia says:
"A pyramid is a building where the outer surfaces are triangular and converge at a point. The base of pyramids are usually quadrilateral or trilateral (but may be of any polygon shape), …"

Webster's online dictionary says:
"1. A solid body standing on a triangular, square, or polygonal base, and terminating in a point at the top; especially, a structure or edifice of this shape. "

So yes, I'm saying that most any center-pole tent with triangular wall panels is a pyramid. Only one is the TetraMid(TM)(tm) though!

There seems to be a lot of brainpower going into this. It's quite fun to watch what comes out of a simple mistake like this one. Of course this only happened because Dave was happy to pass it along so cheap, and of course it went to the appropriate first enabler..ooops purchaser.

It's already started me thinking about how to improve the pitch (and maybe the design on my Megamid

Rod

Sorry about the delay in getting dimensions. My daughter and I spent the night in the TetraMid set up in the yard. We had the pole offset to allow about 48" from pole to one edge. On the other side of the pole was a nice big storage area.

Dimensions with the corners staked tight to the ground and midpoints pulled out 6", which raised them up 6".

Peak 7' even.
Length (corner to corner of fabric) 9' even
Hypotenuse (length of middle seam on each side) 7' even.
Weight- Tent alone 17 ounces. * (I'll get a bit more precise weight)

Doing a little simple math each side should take 3.5 yards of fabric, not counting seam allowances.

Size seemed fine for two, but it was our first time using a single-wall tent. It was a dewy night and both inside and outsides of the nylon were damp.

It did sag a bit, but I just adjusted the pole to tighten things back up.