New tent from KUIU – Thoughts?

" It just like event/goretex/MemBrain; all are a just a ePTFE membane."
Actually, Membrain is PU. :-)

:S Whoops.

Thanks for telling me though.

The tent is way overpriced and the sleeping bags cost more than either a Western Mountaineering (Made in America) and even a Valandre, so I would pass on all their products. I am sure the gear will work, but you can get far better for less money.
The pricing is just too high.

Now the logo is very cool and I would give a thumbs up for that.

Brief comments

PU-coated nylon – yawn. OK, Toray is a major mill and their cloth is good, but it's hardly new. Already widely used of course. And PU fabric is much weaker than silicone-coated fabric.

Easton CF poles – yawn. Yes, they are very good, but CF pooles have been on the market for ages – even I use them. :-)

Pole structure – it's a 3-season 2.5 pole pop-up tent. Nothing really new in the design at all. Redeeming feature: you can peg the fly corners out before fighting with the poles, so it is much easier to erect in a storm than a 'throw-over' fly.

Tai Chung Canvas manufacturer – yeah, they are big, and they make a lot of pop-ups. But they had 4 tries at making a tunnel tent for me and never got it right. They just could not follow pictorial instructions. Then they offered to rebadge someone else's design for me, without getting permission from the designer. (I knew the original designer!)

Weight – 1.50 kg for 2-man 3-season tent. Hardly world shattering. Just average.

Ventilation – where? I have a feeling you might get a bit of condensation inside when the door has been partly shut.

Overall? A reasonable mainstream mass-market pop-up tent, but not leading edge. It's what Tai Chung make in the tens of thousands. Probably quite suited to the hunting market. Price of $450 for 2-man tent is a bit high for a pop-up which may have cost about $150 ex factory. I suspect that some of the USA cottage mfrs could do better. :-)

Cheers

There have been a few comments trying to mystify what is silnylon. Basically it is coated nylon fabric. There is a difference between PU-coating and silicone coating though.

PU coating is (normally) applied to the SURFACE of the fabric where it forms a stick-on layer. The way it adheres is what makes the fabric weaker. You can get fire retardants in the PU coating, although these are toxic and do not work anyhow. There may be legislative changes coming to remove the need for these. About time too.

Silicone coating is normally applied from both sides. Industry calls it 'double-coated' because of the manufacturing process; the rest of us would call it 'impregnated'. The structure makes the fabric stronger than the basic fabric.

Seam sealing – the cheap way is to have the customer do it himself with a silicone sealant. This works fine. But you can buy siloxane transfer tape quite readily these days to do tape sealing. I have been doing that for 6 – 8 years now and it works very well too. Caveats: the tape is more expensive, and the bond takes 72 hours to fully cure. So there are some manufacturing 'problems'.

Hilleberg/Kerlon: good stuff, was leading edge when first introduced. But you can buy equivalents today from a lot of mills or coating companies. Granted, a lot of Asian silnylon is made to minimum HH rating, because the market is always after cheap-cheap-cheap. But if you specify what you want, you can get it. (By the full roll.)

Cheers

Roger,
a few follow-up questions:
1) sometimes it is claimed by brands that their fabric is 3x coated with silicone and I read sometimes that the third coating comes from the individual fibers being coated and other times that the inside has one layer and the outside 2. So do you happen to know more about this ?
2) is there a way to tell which silnylon fabrics are better than others ? Because some tentbuyers afterwards came to the conclusion that the silnylon fabric was actually pretty rubbish.

> Weight – 1.50 kg for 2-man 3-season tent. Hardly world shattering. Just average.

I agree it's not earth shattering, but it's a long way from average. A 2009 test of a Big Sky International Revolution 2P measured the trail weight (tent and aluminum poles) at 53.7 oz/1522 g, almost identical to the claimed weight of the KUIU Mountain Star. Prices are within 10% of each other.

And the Big Sky International Revolution 2P that was tested had super-slick, dirt-attracting fabric which some people may not enjoy.

Looking at the Excel spreadsheet from the 2010 Backpackinglight State-of-the-Market Report, most of the tents are well over 3 pounds, but the tents that are under 3 pounds tend to be severely compromised in some way. (Feel free to name 2-person double wall tents that provide more space at a lighter weight and are as sturdy.)

Looks like a good design. Heavy for the UL crowd but for more mainstream consumers it would represent a lightweight option. I think their target market (hunters) probably won't value weight as much as price. They are going for a niche in a what is probably a bigger market than backpackers.

It is interesting though… hybrid mountaineering tent/backpacking tent. If you spent a lot of time camping above treeline in 3-season backpacking conditions it wouldn't be a bad choice.

Hi Woubier

> fabric is 3x coated with silicone
Coated fibres are used for EPIC fabrics. That may be where the idea that the third coating is on the individual fibres. However, I seriously doubt that anyone would try to start with coated fibres and then add 2 more coating layers. They would possibly be in breach of the EPIC patents, just for a start, and I can't see the point of going at it that way anyhow.

My understanding (from industry sources) is that some companies do start with stock double-coated silnylon fabric (of poor HH rating) and get a third coating put over one surface. That is not hard to do, and is probably the simplest (and cheapest) way to get a higher hydrostatic head rating. Yes, it works fine.

> is there a way to tell which silnylon fabrics are better than others ?
First you must define the word 'better'. Do you mean cheaper, stronger, higher HH, more elasticity (or less), more UV resistant, or what?
Under most conditions I think one would find most any silnylon to be strong enough. I don't leave my tent pitched in the daytime, so UV resistance is not super-critical for me. That leaves hydrostatic head (HH) or pressure rating as the most likely key parameter. We can measure that, but such a measurement needs to be done properly.

One other parameter of some considerable importance is 'HH after lots of use'. There are even standard tests for this, using either a 'standard' washing machine (eg Maytag) or a Cubex. Richard Nisley has recently bought himself a Cubex to extend his fabric testing capabilities. We find that some fabrics suffer a bit from 'creasing' with a serious loss of HH – the lighter Cuban fabrics seem to suffer from this.

Cheers

>>Richard Nisley has recently bought himself a Cubex to extend his fabric testing
>>capabilities. We find that some fabrics suffer a bit from 'creasing' with a serious
>>loss of HH – the lighter Cuban fabrics seem to suffer from this.

Any large fabric reviews in the making?

Hi Roger,
I'm not completely sure, but I think it was about the strength of the fabric. In Europe it's an important and big seller of tents and a well known brand after all. You would exspect (quite) a lot of such a brand, aspecialli since those tents are not particularly cheap. But one employee of a store wrote that they had far more complaints and guarantee issues with tents from that brand then with tents of other brands (even after correction for the sales volume). And that was aknowledged by quite a few users. And I seem to remember that they mostly complained about the fabric, particularly about the lack of strength .

"My understanding (from industry sources) is that some companies do start with stock double-coated silnylon fabric (of poor HH rating) and get a third coating put over one surface. That is not hard to do, and is probably the simplest (and cheapest) way to get a higher hydrostatic head rating. Yes, it works fine."

I use silnylon for packs, mostly because I have scrap pieces left from making tent

Coat both sides with mineral spirits:silicone maybe 5:1. Then it's waterproof.

Also bivy bottom. Only problem is the surface against the ground starts peeling off after a few trips. The top surface that I sleep against is pretty durable though.

Easier to just use the Shield from thru-hiker.com. I'm sure it's more durable.

Hi Woubier

> In Europe it's an important and big seller of tents and a well known brand after all.
Are you talking about Kuiu? To be honest, I had never heard of them.

Ah – maybe you are talking about Hilleberg? I have not heard anything bad about their fabrics. It is possible that being so well-known means they get a lot of clumsy novices who expect a bit too much from Kerlon. It's very tricky, apportioning blame between the product and the user. Having handled one Hilleberg tent I would be inclined to blame the users myself, until proven otherwise.

Cheers

No, it's a German brand, the name starting with a V.

> it's a German brand, the name starting with a V.
Oh – Vaude maybe?

I think my comment about novices might still hold. I had not heard of any special problems with their fabrics. Are there any specific cases or details, or just general moans?

Cheers

Wondering why KUIU does not provide dimensions. Just the inside height, and floor length and width would be very helpful in evaluating the tent. Are they perhaps on the web version of the recent Backpacker gear guide?

Submit that quality of the coating is much more important than whether it is based on polyurethane or silicone. There are plenty of poor examples of both types of coatings on the market. A hydrostatic head spec can also be helpful in evaluating the coating, although the manufacturer's own tests are sometimes skewed.

It should be noted, however, that silicone coated nylon in the 20-30 denier range can be extremely flammable, much moreso than PU coated nylon treated for fire retardance. MYOGers like me use it anyway for its good features, and partly because it is very hard to find PU coated nylon in such a low denier range. I've tested and observed how silnylon burns, and it isn't pretty. A friend observed a whole tent go up in a campground, and has now sworn off it. Still, I use it for its low weight and strength, and because when backpacking, I camp in wild areas where there are no campfires to contend with.

Now that low denier PU nylons are being used by larger tent manufacturers, they should become more available, and I would not hesitate to use a good low denier PU coated nylon if the weight were competitive with silnylon. Not sure I buy Roger's suggestion that the PU is MUCH weaker than the sil, not without more evidence.

So I'd be very keen on this KUIU tent if the dimensions and waterproofing are ample, and if weight were a few ounces lighter. What is troubling about that is the tendency of manufacturers to understate the weight. Maybe once some reviews are out, the picture will become clearer. My version of Roger's 'yawn,' is simply to avoid purchasing new products, especially from less than established and reliable companies, until there is more detailed reliable information available.

Samuel, it turns out that if one clicks on Sizing in the right-hand stack of drop menus, the "View Specifications" that appears, will, when clicked, display a PDF with dimensions. This is somehow different than the "Specifications" header in the same stack.

I hope their tent designers and their web designers don't work in the same room. Anyway:

1P: 86" long by 27" wide by 38" high, 16.12sqft, 2#10, $399

2P: 84" long by 49" wide by 39" high, 28.5sqft, 3#5, $499

For reference on the 1P:
Nemo Veda 1P: 99'L x 36'W, 2#1 $349
MSR Hubba NX: 85'L x 30'W, 2#7 $339
BA Fly Creek 1: 86'L x 42'/30'W, 1#11, $329
BA Copper Spur 1: 90'L x 42'/30'W, 2#3, $369

The colorway is compelling, I'll give them that. It's like the dream Copper Spur 1 that doesn't look like a clown car.

> that silicone coated nylon in the 20-30 denier range can be extremely flammable,
I tried a burn test on the silnylon I was using for my summer blue tent. It was hard to get it to burn. (Carbon-based) PU does burn, but silicone polymer is not known for it.

Cheers

How many German brands you know that starts with a V and make tents ? ;-)

The rumours about their fabrics not being strong enough are just a point of attention and we didn't put too much attention to it. Yes, there are negative voices but there are even more positive ones. For me at least, fabric choice is only one factor. There is though also the design.

" It should be noted, however, that silicone coated nylon in the 20-30 denier range can be extremely flammable, much moreso than PU coated nylon treated for fire retardance."
Well, I use a silnylon tent for over 10 years now and 1000 of people have a silnylon tent and while I am aware of this, I've never heard of a fire accident in all those years.

" Not sure I buy Roger's suggestion that the PU is MUCH weaker than the sil, not without more evidence."
Well, to answer this with a quote:

" Unlike tensile strength, tear strength is not a simple function of the weight of the fabric. Weave construction details and coatings play crucial roles. The simple wing-rip test begins with cutting a slit partly in from one edge of a fabric test piece. Both the warp and weft axes are tested. The fabric edges each side of the cut are gripped and then pulled in opposite directions. The force needed to smoothly tear and extend the slit in the fabric is the tear strength.
To understand tear strength it helps to focus on what's going on at the very end of the rip, where the first unbroken yarn is now at the front-line. With an uncoated fabric yarns are relatively free to shuffle around. As the stress increases the weave distorts, resulting in the load being shared over a number of yarns immediately behind the first unbroken yarn. The more the weave is 'glued-up' with a low-elasticity, deeply-embedded coating the less the weave can distort and the more the stress concentrates on that single, front-line yarn. The result is a substantially reduced tear strength. You can think of the coating as making the fabric more 'paper-like' and less pure 'textile-like'. If the coating is very elastic – as is the case with silicone elastomer, or the fabric has a relatively elastic, laminated membrane which sits up more on its surface, then the yarns are not so constrained. The sharing of the load can still be taken by a number of unbroken yarns because the silicone coating or TPU membrane can stretch as the yarns reposition themselves. In this case the coating material's own strength may actually add a little to the tear strength. Some tent manufacturers (particularly those using nylon fabrics that are coated both sides with silicone elastomer) make a feature of the high tear strength of their outer tent fabric."