Zpacks Solplex Pitch/Storm door help

I can’t seem to get my storm doors to remain “taught.”
That’s because you are not teaching them the right way.

Or do you mean ‘taut’?

Cheers

It requires some fiddling for me.  Sometimes loosening or re-positioning one of the adjacent or opposite stakes to get a taut pitch all the way around.  I find it loose with one door open, but I’m less worried about the pitch then vs when I need it to be closed up in a storm.

I picked mine up on Gear Swap, and it didn’t have line-locs, so I added them.  It looks like they are standard on new tents.

Colt , do you have any photos ?

Very welcoming Roger. Don’t mind him Colt.

This thread while Duplex heavy does get into door closure issues

https://backpackinglight.com/forums/topic/calling-all-zpacks-duplex-users/

https://imgur.com/a/svLvNvH

Zpacks Door Issues

Hey Colt. Thanks for posting the photos. I think you need to pitch it higher with your trekking poles adjusted longer.

@rcaffin I have a degree in Aeronautics not English. Thanks

@franco I posted some for you! No matter how high I set the poles (tried the recommended height) I can’t seem to get them “taut”

@here I appreciate the thread recommendation!

@matthewkphx Thanks I will try it out! I have been using the recommended 48 inches (122cm) front pole and the 32 inches (81cm) rear pole. It seems I am getting a great pitch elsewhere. I will test it out in the yard tomorrow.

Colt,

I am pretty sure that it can be pitched hugging the ground but I would first try to do it as in the official photos.

see how it is a few inches above the ground ?

Take a look at this :

https://www.google.com.au/search?q=solplex+set+up&oq=solplex+set+up&aqs=chrome..69i57j0l2.7887j0j8&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8#kpvalbx=1

the trick there is to have the tent fabric LOOSE on the ground. (around 29 sec in ) If you pull the corner taut at that stage it will look as it does in your photos.

Take a good look at the distance of the stakes from those corners. They are probably further out than you place them.

BTW, make sure that the poles are perpendicular to the ground and not at an angle.

Yeah almost everyone I see pitching these tents has the fly floating up about 6 inches. If you want to pitch it right to the ground, you likely need to shorten the poles by 6″ or so.

I reckon that you have the corners too far apart as well. Bring them a bit closer to each other, raise the peak a fair bit, and then pull the front out.

Cheers

I have a Duplex, and it is designed so the doors are about 6″ higher from the ground at the hooks than the side of the tent. This means I have found I have to accept that the doors are about 6″ from the ground at the hooks even when the rest of the tent is hugging the ground (at least to get a workable pitch). To get the doors as well all the way to the ground I have to ditch the hooks and put the doors overlaping with 2 stakes (not a good solution). I am not sure about your tent but from the pictures it looks like it could be the same issue.

Colt F –

I agree with Matthew, Franco and Dan that, in your pictures, the shelter is pitched much too close to the ground.  The pictures Franco posted are how the shelter was designed to be pitched.  Also, it looks like the two “door corner” guy-outs are much to tight…loosening them will give you the slack along the bottom of the doors that you need to close them.

Experimenting with a close-to-the-ground pitch is a good exercise as you may need to do this sometime, but a “perfect pitch” is unlikely to be achieved in this situation.  Here is an old post of mine documenting my observations for getting a good pitch on a Duplex.  I would guess that much of this would be applicable to the Solplex.  The entire thread is really quite interesting as it was time when quite a few creative people were working/collaborating on making improvements to the Duplex.  Again, I suspect that much of what is discussed will apply to the Solplex.

I have a Solplex also and pitch it differently than joe at z packs recommends and it sets up near perfect with little trouble.

start by staking the rear two corners out. Then insert the front pole at a slight angle and stake the apex guy out.. Then insert the rear pole vertical and stake the rear center guy out. Following that stake the front two corners out at a 45 degree angle, don’t stake them strait out from the sides. Secure the storm flaps closed and snug up the slack in all the lines, then you can stake the side panels out, but don’t snug them so tight it throws off the tent geometry.

Pitching this way I can pitch closer to the ground without your issues also, but a lower pitch will reduce headroom.

Following that stake the front two corners out at a 45 degree angle, don’t stake them strait out from the sides

Very interesting.  With the Duplex, I’d say the optimal corner tie-out angle is more like 15-20 degrees.  It looks like my assumption of Solplex-Duplex pitching similarities may not be true.

My experience has been if you use too small of an angle on the front corners the doors don’t close well or it distorts the pitch when you close the doors and then need to readjust the lines. Here’s a pic that shows the angle I usually use on the corners with my method.

. How I Pitch My Zpacks Duplex Tent By Bigfoot .

As a general comment on corner tie outs , try this.

Pitch the tent as you normally do. (with the door panel closed)

Pull a corner guyout out of the ground and move that line ,slightly over the ground and  having it in tension , side to side .

At a particular angle you should see that you have fewer wrinkles on both panels ending on that corner. That is the best angle for your tent.

Better Pitch

Thanks everyone! How does this look other than the front pole looking a little longer than it should be? I left the tent loose as recommended by @franco when staking out the 4 corners and lengthened both of the trekking poles as recommended by @matthewkphx. Much better!

Much better! I’d also recommend lengthening the front guyline (from the top) – you’ve got a lot of unused guyline there.

Yes, agree that is much better.  I would move the apex guy line stake point closer to the door attachment.  This will have 2 effects, get rid of the extra tension on the mid-point toggle closure and allow the doors to better work in tandem with the guy line to provide support for the structure.

I need to look at all these pictures and videos, because on my trip this year I was having a lot of issues with pitch or something.  Facing the tent, the left side drooped inwards on the tent.  So when I was sleeping at night the footbox of my sleeping bag would make contact with the tent wall and it was wet (not soaked) with condensation.

I cannot for the life of me figure out why this just started happening.  I have had the tent over 2 years and never had this problem until this year.  I changed something, somehow and can’t figure out what I am doing wrong now.  One thing I thought is the trekking pole lengths somehow got off, but I measured them before the trip.  I will need to go through some videos and hopefully I can fix it.