I have made about 15 quilts and a few sleeping bags over the years. In the past 5 years, fabric has made huge leaps in weight and down-proffness. Then came the huge incline in the price of down.
So in the past few years, the one quilt I have for myself has a Nobul1 liner which leaks 1000’s of plum pieces all over me each night. I just turn it inside out and use a bivy, but it was never my “Go To” quilt.
So now that I have tested and used every 10d fabric you can get your hands on, I decided it need to be done. This would be a quilt I could grab anytime for anything and would not have any issues. I went with Membrane .66 for both the inner and outer layer. Membrane seems to have a slightly higher T-rating than Argon .67 so it’s a little more downproof. It also has slightly more calendaring on the inside but doesn’t have the trash bag fell of Momentum 50. Membrane is a very nice fabric
So here it is.
5.5 ounces of fabric and 16 ounces of 800+ down Yep that’s almost 75% down!!! 42″ foot-box and a whooping 62″ width. On top of that, it will fit someone to 6′ 3″.
So it’s between a Wide and Ex-Wide and between a Regular and Long length. It would have a 15 degree rating but I would rate it to about 25*. I pretty much always add 10* to a rating. From experience, (it’s just what works for me).
Because of the size, I can bring this up to the top of my head and snap the cam-snaps and still fit with enough room to shift to my side without the cams coming loose. It’s very warm but also has about 2″ of excess room in both the foot-box and on top. However, this will allow me to have whatever layers I need for colder temps. With the size of the quilt, I also have the option of loaning it out to someone other than a person my size or smaller.
For the build, I decided to go for a slightly modified EE baffling. The way EE does there baffles so well baffles me. This was the absolute biggest pain to make. The lines all have to match perfectly and it must be sewn the exact same way because a bottom and top layer will pull more one way or the other. Once you get completed with a long baffle, you could have 2-3″ excess one way or the other. Even an inch on these baffles is not an option. I almost took it apart half way through to re-do it as a vertical baffled quilt. My hats off to the seamstresses that sew those baffles. Hopefully this will be the last quilt I will need to make myself for a while. That is until .5 ounce 7d hits the market!
