I saw a simple pattern online and wanted to try it so I made a little hexamid, or more precisely a penta tarp, with a fabric remnant that I had. I was surprised it only took from after lunch until before dinner to make it.
I don’t know what kind of fabric it is exactly. It’s some kind of DWR treated nylon ripstop. I don’t think it’s silnylon. To test its waterproofness I laid it over a bowl and added a couple cups of water and let it sit for many hours. The water did not go through into the bowl. But the other side felt wet. Online there are various DWR treated nylon ripstops sold for tentmaking (e.g. Ottertex DWR is one) so I think it’ll be fine for Southern California when I just want a warm little house protected from dew.
Not sure how perfect my pitch is in my slanted yard. Also, the rear corner on this side seems looser than the other side. My sewing skills are pretty bad.
It works even without guylines on the back corners.
The sleeping area has about 71″ of useable length before I feel like I’m too close to the edges. I’m only 5’3″ so it’s plenty of space for me.
If you look at the pattern, several inches of the bottom of the drawing are just empty space. I laid out my 66″ width fabric and made marks at 72″ and then laid out all the angles and sure enough, the whole thing fit on the fabric. I also followed the advice to change the 13″ measurement to 15″. It’s nice that this whole tarp only has a single seam. I sewed the seam only once with about 1/4″ seam allowance and used grosgrain to bind the seam, folding it over a little bit again inside the grosgrain.
If I could change this pattern I would extend the front corners out more so that the sleeping area has parallel edges when it’s set up. That could potentially be all it takes to make this tarp larger enough for a taller person.
I feel pretty happy I tried this out. I would love to make this again someday with fancier fabric and try to do a better job.
5.7 oz with lines, no hardware.
The original pattern is here: https://imgur.com/a/WJDiCbs And there was a reddit discussion here. https://www.reddit.com/r/myog/comments/cr7u9t/myog_shaped_tarp/
