Zpacks Hexamid Duplex Torn Netting

I currently own the Twin but the Duplex has a few features I really like over my current shelter. I love that it has more room if I have one of my kids with me and that they can get in/out from their own side. Venting it from both sides is another nice feature.

I really want to buy this shelter but have decided to watch the reports trickle in over the next year or so to see how this tent works out.

If I were to buy this shelter today, I'd be inclined to request for the netting to be attached to the tarp the same way it is with the Twin. Sure it's extra weight but I suspect it'd add extra miles to my ground sheet and take some of that stress off of the netting.

I'm sure I'll change my mind several times before I pull the trigger.

It does seem like the tolerances are too tight, some slack would help. You are in good hands with Joe though. I love buying stuff from that company.

I've had a couple Hexamids and just got a Duplex in the mail today … will have to pay attention to how tight the mesh is …. my only tear was when I've had was on a Hex when I was readjusting the front pole and pulling it out, towards me and inadvertently yanked on the mesh around where the square is that accepts the tip of the treekking pole, ripping it …. total user error …. put some tape on it and it was good to go …. will have to pay attention to mesh tightness this weekend when I get the duplex up … haven't heard any other mentions of this though ….

Thanks for the review. This tent is at the top of my wish list right now and I have been seriously considering buying one, but maybe a 2nd generation model would be better.

Steve,

I too own the Duplex and have fewer nights of use on it than I would like. During my initial pitches in the yard to get the technique down, I too noticed that the netting in the corners *could* be pulled pretty tight. One thing I didn't like were the stock fixed-length corner tie-outs…they just seemed too long to me and made walking around the tent risky.

After replacing the corner tie-outs with Glowwire and mini line-locs, I discovered that I actually preferred the pitch resulting from adjusting them to ~2/3 to 1/2 the stock length. The edges of the tarp were closer to the ground, the tie-outs were easier to avoid tripping over and the corner netting was not as tight. The side-effect was that the bathtub was a little more "loose".

I empathize with your despair…damaging my new bling always makes me sad…and your story will certainly make me pay a little more attention to this issue in the future. I'm certain that Joe will hook you up, but when your Duplex is returned you may want to experiment with different tie-out lengths.

Best of luck and let us know how the repair goes.

Excellent feedback John, thank you! I'll give that a try.

You are seriously in good hands with the fact it's Zpacks branded.

Keep in mind this is a brand new tent design so it will take a few tweaks and input from customers for a few months.

The original hexamid was much different back in the old days…

@John: You hit it on the head. I got my Duplex up for the first time today and was experimented with pitches and had my corners at about 9 to 12 inches high …. after a storm with sideways rain in my Hex, I've learned to keep as low as possible within realms of tent's / tarp's natural best pitch …. and in this case, ventilation is a non issue given the doors. I think I ended up taking about 8 or so inches off the corners, which brought the stake closer to the tent and the pitch to about the 6 inches the instructions say it should be ….

Worth a mention that in the video after Joe stakes first two corners and then get first pole up, Joe then puts second pole in and THEN puts in the final two corner stakes …. as opposed to putting in corner stakes on last side and then final pole … makes sense….

My big take away is that once you have all 4 corner stakes in and both poles in, the first two stakes tend to be an angle where they are pulling directly away from each other, as opposed to pulling more away from dead center of the tent (sort of like how rays of the sun originate at center and go out ) …. if that makes sense … so I restake the first two after all 4 corners are in so all 4 stakes have an equal pull that is pulling more away from dead center of the tent … I have a feeling I did a crappy job describing that …. let me know if you need clarification ….

These pics were PRE guyline fix ….

https://plus.google.com/photos/108134190522177141359/albums/5983774116200582673

I agree completely with what Trace is describing. The first photo in his gallery illustrates the point he is making…the corner guys should be oriented such that they "radiate out" from an imaginary tent center point. During initial stakeout, the first two corners staked are almost always non-optimally positioned. The take-away here is that, like with most non-freestanding tents, a little post-pitch stake adjustment is usually in order. I have found that Joe's video on how to pitch the Duplex shows the best method.

Another variable is pole length…I have experimented with shortening the poles which allows the tent to be pitched closer to the ground. This is valuable for those storms with heavy sideways rain that we in the south call "Toad Stranglers". However this pitch is at the expense of the tautness of the bathtub floor. Since this design suspends the walls and floor from the canopy, when the canopy is lowered the tent "settles" to the ground a little.

You described it really well Trace. I find that I can still get the proper staking first try (or very close to it) with some practice. If you pitch the first pole back towards the center a bit, so the two guy lines are pointing to the center of the tent, you can get closer to an ideal pitch the first time. At least that's been my experience.

@ John, that's great feedback. I wouldn't mind a loose bathtub, it sure beats a taught one that's stressing the mesh.

@ John. Are you saying that pitching the tent with shorter poles makes the bathtub more taught, or less taught?

As you shorten the poles, you drop the netting and bathtub closer to ground where it will settle a bit. The walls of the bathtub will be more loose and not stand up as well, but the corners of the tarp can also be pitched closer to the ground and with shorter guylines. This reduces the distance between the corners of the tarp, thus reducing how tightly the bathtub and netting are stretched.

You can think of it like this…draw an equilateral triangle that will represent the side view of the tent. Now imagine moving the bottom "side" up. You will see that the length of the sloped sides is reduced as is the volume of the tent. This is what you are doing by shortening the poles.

Sorry if that isn't clear…but I think it will become so if you try it.

That makes sense. I'll try it out when I get my tent back. I decided to upgrade to the 0.72 oz cuben roof. I don't mind the 1.5 oz penalty.

I just want to follow up on this now that I have seen and repaired Steve's tent.

So far this is the only tent that has been reported damaged. Repairs are always free, so please report any issues. Steve will be getting a new tent.

After repairing the screen on this particular tent I set it up in the yard for testing. I experimented by pushing down on the corners of the bathtub floor and stressing the screen more than it ever should be. The Cuben fly and the screen moved with the floor and did not cause any tearing even when being "abused".

I think that this incident may have been a fluke. Maybe the tent was pitched higher than intended, or something unordinary happened.

The screen has to be fairly tight so that it holds up the bathtub floor. If anyone else reports an issue I will make a design change, but as it stands it does not appear to be necessary. As long as the tent is pitched at the usual 6-8" height, any stress on the floor simply causes the tarp and screen to move with the floor.

As everyone already knows, Joe rocks and he has taken great care of me!

Gotta say, there isn't anything about how this was handled that one could possibly complain about. IMO, Joe went above and beyond to make certain things were made right. Had this happened to me, I'd have been happy just to have the tent repaired. To receive a completely new tent, AND be given the opportunity to upgrade the canopy to .74 is just remarkable CS. Reading about how Steve has been treated makes me feel all the more confident that I made a good purchase decision.

Well done Joe and cheers to Steve.

BTW, I too opted for the .74 canopy and could not be happier.

I forgot to mention that I haven't seen any undo stress on netting/ corners of my Duplex … It's also nice having a symmetric tent … I always referred to pitching Hexamids as "an art and a science" because there was a little learning curve and a lot experimentation in my case. I think my expectations of a perfect drum tight pitch with my Hex and in general are a bit unreasonable, so I have to remind myself of this time and again ….

Joe your CS is spot on man, top notch cat right there. Makes me happy to own Zpacks products.

So is anyone able to pitch it tight and close to the ground, and not have any of the mesh being stressed?

I was camping in the desert this past weekend, and it was quite windy. Sand and dust were blowing in all directions, and I tried pitching it taught and close to the ground (with the poes shortened 2", and it still stressed the mesh. Anyone have any tips on super windy setup?

If shorten the poles to get it closer to the ground you'll need
to shorten the guy lines too. Otherwise the sides will be farther
apart and the geometry will not be right.
I bought a Hexamid SolPlex for this summers hike and tried it
out in the back yard as soon as I got it. The yard was soggy and
I didn't realize it at first but the poles (2 different lengths with
the SolPlex) sank into the ground up to the baskets and threw the]
geometry off. The sides pulled farther out and the 2 door flaps
wouldn't close right. I thought before I realized what happened,
what the hell is this ?! This isn't at all like Joe's demo on
Youtube. Then I realized that the poles had sunk in about 2 1/2"
and changed the pitching geometry. So I cut out 2 thin plywood disks
with holes for the pole ends and put them under the poles and all
was right with the world. The ply disks keep the poles from
sinking into the soft sod. Probably won't be a problem in New Mexico but may be if setting up on sand.
It does take a little practice to get the setup right but so far
it's all good. I'm sure that I'll learn a few tricks along the way
but I think that maybe linelocks would be a good idea on the
corner guy lines so you could change the geometry without having to
retie your fixed guy lines.

Larry

I made the guy lines a lot shorter to get the right angle. Maybe I just need to experiment with different guy line lengths.