Honest Gear Maker Hall of Fame

[EndoftheTrail]

Reading Alan Shaver’s post about honest vs. dishonest gear specs, I think this is a great place to highlight those gearmakers who publish HONEST specs!

In your experience, who’s specs are the ones you read and trust?

Please do NOT include bad apples, since they are not here to defend themselves. Just list the honest ones.

[EndoftheTrail]

1. Six Moon Designs
2. Henry Shires Tarptent
3. Golite
4. Montbell
5. Bozeman Mountain Works

[paul johnson]

Ben,

Did you intend to forget Gossamer Gear? Or, is it that you have no firsthand personal experience with them?

often their delivered wts are less than the published wts.

[EndoftheTrail]

Paul,

My list is simply a start. Please add to it, based on your experience. Hopefully, everyone will do the same.

[Thomas Laepple]

I can add
mountain laurel designs

I only bought a EPIC bivy from them, but this is really great and exactly like the specifications.

[EndoftheTrail]

Fanatic Fringe – pack weight was right on!

[Richard Nelridge]

I would include Feathered Friends and McHale Packs in this list, but with so many options, materials and sizes, it is almost impossible to know what custom orders would weigh.

Rich

[kevin davidson]

ULA should most definitely be included on the list

[Ken Helwig]

i second that on ula!! Brian does a wonderful job and their customer service is second to none.

[David Peterson]

Definitely MontBell (for a big company), although their stretch wind pants were actually lighter than listed; would that make them dishonest?

[jacob thompson]

I’m also going to put in a bid for gossamer gear. I’ve purchased a fair bit of gear from Glen. He really did bend over backwards for me and sent Lightrek + poles to Australia albeit through the very expensive postal system but hey I’m the only one that has ’em. All the gear I have bought from GVP has been under the listed weights sometimes by upto 3/4oz. That is all bar a stuff sack for the Spinnshelter which was about .1oz over. I like to see Manufacturers that weigh their gear themselves and write the weight on each one.

Also I have a Montane Light Speed that comes up to nearly .2oz lighter than stated.

[Mike Storesund]

I bought an Arc Alpinist with the Pertex Quantum shell. While they did not publish the weight with the PQ fabric, the bag fell right in between the 16 oz .85 Fabric and the 18 oz Microlight at 17 oz.

[Al Shaver]

For large companies, MontBell is the champ; with Go-Lite a distant second. I’ve also had great experience with Bozeman Mountain Works and Gossamer Gear.

[Jason Smith]

I would like to add Bay Hat & Canvas Co. as I just had a really good experience exchanging a Watership Trading Company hat purchased from them at http://www.bayhat.com

[Robert Ebel]

McHale packs should most certainly be in there.

[Jan Unneberg]

SnowPeak has blown me away with the accuracy of the stated weights of their products. Weighed on my digital scale, each of the five products I’ve bought has weighed exactly, to 1/10th of an oz., the published weight.
Now that’s awesome!

[Author]

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