Xtherm: Too Warm?

I asked this recently as well and took the plunge…See the original thread….

http://www.backpackinglight.com/cgi-bin/backpackinglight/forums/thread_display.html?forum_thread_id=74965&skip_to_post=640425#640425

You were likely too warm due to the 20* quilt indoors.

Pad made no difference. Too much insulation coupled with the hot desire to sleep outdoors…

…use search first. Thanks for the quick reply though!

LOL! I tried my just arrived 10 degree Revelation X indoors last night about the same temperature as you I was toasty not too hot. But I am a very cold sleeper!

Haha, yea I was excited. I'm even going on a trip in a week to Shenandoah NP, but couldn't wait. At least my wife is visiting friends this weekend so she didn't see my crazy…

The pad just keeps the ground from sucking away your heat, so shouldn't make a difference in warmer weather, unless you're counting on that to keep you cool.

The room underneath yours was heated, so the pad can't really insulate against cold if there isn't any. Being inside a tent increases your warmth- being inside a building with essentially a heated floor does even more. You weren't cold because it wasn't cold.

If you take your pad out into the woods, and it's 20º, and you have a 20º bag, and you're too warm, then it might be a reason to doubt the X-Therm, but this test is not going to do it. Sounds fun, though.

i agree with everyone else- the xtherm hasn't been too warm on warm nights- I just camped in 50 degree weather on catalina last weekend and it wasn't too warm at all.

on the other hand, i've camped in 60 degree low weather with an older, much less warm pad and was way too hot- so i don't think the pad makes much of a difference when it's not keeping your from being cold.

I have a Rev X 20 as well and for temp regulation I just stick my leg/foot out of the side. You won't always have the option of changing your pad and throwing extra clothing in the middle of the night generally is a circus act, but you can always relatively easily expose another leg/arm etc to cool off.

Everyone is different but, being from mild Southern California, I've found that 20 degrees puts me solidly in the "holy hell it's cold" factor, so because I know what I'm in for, I have a puffy and capiline bottoms on. For me, temp regulation gets more finicky in the 30-50 range, that's where my feet go in and out of the quilt throughout the night.

Once you've experimented a bit with the quilt in a variety of conditions, you'll know what pieces of kit to bring to augment it.

Hope that helps.

just realized I didn't directly answer your question. Both the pad and the quilt play a role in heat loss. It's somewhat hard to answer that question because it would require knowing different factors. Practically speaking, the pad might make more of a different in 30 degree weather if you're sleeping on half frozen spring ground, whereas it would make less of a difference if you're on a highly dense bed of pine needles and soft dirt.

Oh the joys of variables!

Roger had a great exhaustive article on pads a few months back that might help with the pad insight.

Thanks for all the input. This weekend is looking like maybe lows around 40 up in the mountains, so we'll see what happens with it. There may be limbs hanging out in all directions, haha!