Back when I got back into hiking a number of years ago the third thing I bought was a pair of Gossamer Gear LT4 Trekking Poles and I still have them to this day. They are the only piece of gear I still have from my first three seasons of hiking put together. I have a few thousand miles of use on them.
There is not a lot to say about the LT4 poles that have not already been said by other hikers for years. They stand as a pedestal in the long distance and ultra light hiking world, much like the ULA Backpacks do on the PCT, where well over 50% of the hikers are using a ULA pack of some sort. The amount of hikers you see these days with the GG LT4s is just amazing. It is a testament to their strength and weight.
They are the second lightest hiking poles I am aware of, second only to the carbon fiber Yana poles sold by Ruta Locura – you can read my review of them.
As a Trail Ambassador of Gossamer Gear I was asked what my favorite piece of gear that Gossamer Gear makes and without any doubt or hesitation at all, the LT4 Trekking Poles are my favorite! I bought the pair of mine years ago, back before I was a long distance hiker, back before I was posting videos on youtube, and back before I was writing articles about hiking gear.
Primer Thoughts:
If you are a hiker who follows my articles you know I am not a fan of putting competing products up against each other, but it would be very difficult to talk about either the LT4s or the Yana Poles without comparing them to each other – they are the defacto lightest hiking poles we can buy. Without a doubt I prefer the Gossamer Gear LT4 poles over the Yana Poles, but it sort of goes without saying that somewhere along the way they need to be compared to each other, so I will do so a few times within this article.
I do want to start off by saying that I have never snapped a single Gossamer Gear LT4 hiking pole. I do not use wrist straps and have taught myself to instantly and automatically let go of my hiking poles if I sense they have gotten stuck in rocks, roots, logs, or whatever. I am pretty sure that this training on my part has saved me from shattering a few of them over the years.
I will also say that I am very much attracted to the “Black Diamond Alpine Carbon Cork Trekking Poles” the more that I hike. They are significantly heavier (492 grams for a pair – verses 238 grams for the LT4’s – that is 254 grams / 8.95 ounces heavier!) but there are some aspects about them that really appeal to me. That includes: the locking mechanism, the three piece design, and the locking mechanism. yes, i said that twice. Continue reading “LT4 Trekking Poles Poles by Gossamer Gear”→
Klymit Static V sleeping pad – an economically priced air sleeping pad with a unique and comfortable v-chamber design.
Greetings Hikers,
The world of sleeping pads continues to grow and I have been no stranger from talking about sleeping pads from Klymit. Just over a year ago I published my thoughts over at RedwoodOutdoors.Com (my originally site for publishing hiking gear articles) on the Klymit Inertia XL sleeping pad. A month later I took the bold step and resized my Inerta XL (perhaps the first customer in the world to do so??) and I published how I resized it and compared it to my resized Original Therm-a-Rest NeoAir (which I had also resized.) Suffice to say I have really come to like what Klymit is doing. They are a company that is working very hard to get their products out there, do so in a respectable manner, and producing some very solid products.
Now I want to take the time to write up my thoughts on the Klymit Static V, their newest sleeping pad – and their first sleeping pad to not be filled with a bunch of holes (err, sorry: loft pockets).
I am one of the few SUL hikers in world who uses a “full size” sleeping pad. I am a side sleeper. I like to sleep. I like comfort. Enough said.
The way I figure it, given the low weight of my setups, I can get away with adding a few extra ounces of weight in order to make sure that my sleeping gear is of sufficient comfort that I can sleep well. In the summer time I might only go out with a simple CCF pad, but once it hits the shoulder season the full size air pad comes out – and sometimes in the summer, if I just want to be comfortable!
In the world of air pads I have owned an Exped Downmat 9 (size Large), an original NeoAir (full size, small, medium, and a second full size I cut down in length so I could have a ‘wide-short’), the NeoAir X-Lite (full size), the Klymit Inerta XL (full size, later cut down to a wide-short), and the Klimit Static V (only comes in one size: large).
Why I Bought The Static V:
Recently I have become tired of spending huge amounts of money on hiking gear. It scares me when I think about how much money is tied up in my hiking gear. Granted it is ‘my life’ for a good part of the year, but those who follow my articles know that I tend to buy the top of the line gear, and also have a large amount of my gear custom made – which is just over-the-top expensive. I have never made it any secrete that XUL hiking is not cheap, a hiker going from a heavy setup to a XUL setup can have $10,000+ invested in all of the gear that they have bought from their twenty-five pound setup down to their under three pound setup. You end up buying a whole lot of gear along the way trying to find multiple setups that work for you. I also know that some of my readers are not SUL/XUL hikers – folks who follow my articles to learn a bit (hopefully), and folks who might not want, or who cannot, spend big bucks on gear. So I have been trying to spend some time with some gear that is more reasonably priced yet still not overtly heavy. The Klymit Static V fits into that group perfectly!
Every year over on the pct-l (a mailing list for the pct – and what happens to be, in my opinion, the best resource on the internet for hikers) there are potential pct hikers who start asking questions about gear that does not cost a fortune. Just in the few years I have been apart of the pct-l I have seen dozens of folks asking about how to hike the pct without spending a fortune. I am sure that websites such as whiteblaze also gets a ton of these type of questions every year about the AT.
So I will be honest and say that the main reason I bought the Klymit Static V is because I wanted to see how an air pad that has a MSRP of $59.95 would compare to the almighty NeoAir XLite, which has a MSRP of $179.95. Could it be as comfortable? Could it hold up? Could it handle more than just an overnighter? What exactly are you going to get for a sixty dollar air pad? These are the questions I wanted answers too.
How It Compares:
Those who follow my articles know I really do not like to compare one product to another. Only twice in all of the years that I have been writing articles about hiking have I compared products (and those two times where short paragraphs just to help people have an understanding of something) so I am having to break my rule in order to write this review. Simply put, if I do not spend the time comparing the Klymit Static V within this article, I will probably spend three times as much post-article answering comments asking me to do so. So how this is going to work is that I will be comparing the Klymit Static V (the most recent air pad on the market I think) to the NeoAir XLite, pretty much the de facto best-of-the-best. I will be using the NeoAir XLite “Large” within this review, as it is the closest in size to the Klymit Static V.
Below is a chart based on the specs provided by both Static V and Therm-a-Rest:
Static V
NeoAir XLite
Weight:
514 grams (18.13 ounces)
460 grams (16.22 ounces)
Length:
72 inches (183 cm)
77 inches (196 cm)
Width:
23 inches (59 cm)
25 inches (63 cm)
Height:
2.5 inches (6.35 cm)
2.5 inches (6.5 cm)
R-Value:
1.3
3.2
MSRP:
$59.95
$179.95
Here are the differences work out between the two:
Weight:
The Static V is 54 grams (1.90 ounces) heavier
Length:
The XLite is 5 inches (13 cm) longer
Width:
The XLite is 2 inches (4 cm) wider
Height:
Both are the same height
R-value:
The XLite provides an additional 1.9 of R-value
MSRP:
The XLite is $120 more expensive
Pros:
When it comes to comfort, that is paramount for me. The Static X is very likely the most comfortable sleeping pad I have ever used. As a side sleeper who tosses and turns and rolls and most of the time ends up in a fetal position while sleeping, having a sleeping pad that can keep me on the sleeping pad is a surprising difficult thing to find. The NeoAir Original did a decent job, the NeoAir XLite for the most part totally fails me – I almost always roll off the sides of it. The Exped Downmat 9 did a pretty good job of keeping me on the pad as well.
Durability totally goes to the Static V. As far as I know this is the same crazy tough material that they make all of their other sleeping pads out of, and you can put these things right on the ground and jump all over there. Check out this video to see this!
At $60 bucks, it totally blows away any other “large” size sleeping pad out there – at least the ones I would consider buying. I have seen them on sale at a few different places in the high 40 range. Compare even their MSRP to the NeoAir and, well, “wow”. It really makes you stop and wonder if the extra 1.9 ounces is worth $120 bucks. If you are an active SUL hiker, it might be worth dropping the extra $120 bucks, but if not, it just seems to me like the Static V wins in every regards when it comes to price.
Inflation very much goes to the Static V. I tend to average 12-15 full breaths to fill up the Static V. Compare that to an average of 29-33 for the NeoAir XLite. That is a huge difference.
Cons:
At 23 inches in width the Static V gives a bit more width than most of the other regular or small sized sleeping pads out there. For those that like/need a “wide” sleeping pad, because of the way that the sides are designed on the Static V, it feels as-wide-as, perhaps even a little wider than the XLite. However, on paper it is not as wide as the XLite so I have put this under the ‘cons’. As I said though, based on sleeping on them both, I prefer the Static V.
I will say that I have noticed the missing 5 inches from the overall length of the Static V. I am not really sure why Klymit decided to ditch the industry standard for a “large” and go with one that is 72 inches rather than the 77 that pretty much everybody else uses, but it is something that I have noticed when laying on it. Basically it has taken away the ability to place my pillow directly onto the sleeping pad. At 2.5 inches tall, that makes trying to put a pillow at the head-end rather difficult.. I simply do not have enough stuff left over to stuff into a stuff sack in order to raise my pillow up high enough. And for whatever reason I do not like my feet hanging off of a sleeping pad, so the missing 5 inches limits my ability to use this sleeping pad by putting my head off the top-end.
Being 72 inches in length also limits the ability of the Static V to use it with a “long” sleeping bag – my MBULSS#3 is a long and I end up having a few inches falling off the end of the sleeping pad. Inside of a shelter this is not all that big of a deal, but when cowboy camping, it pretty much mandates that I take along an extra ground cloth to protect the end of my sleeping bag.
At a R-value of 1.3 you are not going to want to be taking the Static V thing out in winter (unless you combine it with some other pads) so the XLite at 3.2 clearly wins in this regards.
The Static V is 54 grams (1.90 ounces) heavier than the XLite, and as a SUL/XUL hiker, that is a lot. However the comfort, the ability to stay on the pad, the knowledge I am supporting a smaller cottage company (Klymit is based out of Ogden, UT), and the price-factor makes those extra two ounces go away – even for a hiker as perfervid as I am about counting grams.
Conclusion:
If you are looking for an air inflated sleeping pad that is sub-100 dollars, provides some decent comfort and does not take up a lot of bulk space, the Klymit Static V should warrant some serious consideration!
I have been waiting a while to write up this review, and over this past weekend I passed the 250-nights of use with a MontBell U.L. Super Spiral Down Hugger sleeping bag, and I told myself I would write up a review of this bag when I hit the 250-night mark.
The MontBell U.L. Super Spiral Down Hugger (herein I will simply annotate it as the ‘MBULSS’) is not exactly a sleeping bag that falls into the model of a SUL or XUL hiking setup. It is very much possible to carry this sleeping bag as a SUL hiker and it could be possible to do a XUL hike with the MBULSS #5 and maybe the #3 (but that would be really hard). So I realize that this sleeping bag might seem to be one of those sleeping bags that does not typically get reviewed by a SUL/XUL hiker, but if you are a SUL/XUL hiker you have probably come to learn the very valuable lesson that sleep comfort is almost as important as knowing your route and knowing how to maintain your core body temperature. So for me, having a sleeping setup that is above-par is a near-must. A little over 1000 grams of my 1800 gram BPW setup is devoted to my sleeping system (shelter & bag). Yes I could save 115 grams or so of weight (around 4 ounces) if I switched over to a ZPacks sleeping bag or an Enlightened Equipment Epiphany, but the simple fact is (for me) the comfort of the MBULSS is worth those three or four ounces. Hiking Lighter does not always mean hiking with the lightest possible gear in the world.
I have owned both the MBULSS #3 and a MBULSS #1 and have loved them both.
The #3 has an EN Rating of “40 comfort” and a “30(f) Lower Limit” and a “3(f) Extreme” rating. My thoughts on these ratings, as a cold sleeping, is that they are way off. I own the previous version when they were rated at 30(f) rather than 40(f) and I often found myself rather cold at anything under around 46. I made the mistake once of taking it out when it was going to be 30 and I pretty much froze all night, even with all of my clothing on. Whoever these “extreme” hikers are that can take this bag down to 3(f)… well, huge props to you guys!!
The #1 has an EN Rating of “26(f) comfort” and a “15(f) Lower Limit” and a “-19(f) Extreme” rating. I would say that these are a bit more accurate – again, I am a cold sleeper. The problem with the #1 is the bulk size of this bag. If you really stuff it, it can get down to around 7″ by 14″. As I almost never compress my sleeping bag, it can take up a rather large percentage of my ~1000 cubic inch backpack. The #1 also breaks the 2-pound limit, at 2.5 pounds, of which 1.5 pounds is 800 down fill and the other 1 pound is material. Compare this to the 17 ounces (482 grams) for the ZPacks 30(f) bag (remembering it is hoodless bag.)
I typically consider the 30(f) range the sweet spot in which sleeping bag to choose. Realistically anything under around 42(f) and I am cold. So a bag that can get me down to the 30(f) mark is a sleeping bag that I am going to shoot for, knowing that it should get me down to the freezing range, which is not all that common here in the Redwood Forest of Northern California, but it is very much possible to reach sub-freezing only an hour away from the Redwoods.
Perhaps the three biggest competitors to the MBULSS #1 is the Western Mountaineering AlpinLite, which is a 15(f) bag and is 31 ounces (1 lb 15 oz) (of which 19 ounces is down fill) and the Marmot Helium which is a 15(f) bag and is 38 ounces (2 lbs 6 oz) (of which 21.5 ounces is down fill) and the Nunatak Alpinist which is a 20(f) bag and is 22 ounces (1 lbs 3 oz) (of which 12 ounces is down fill). [all bags based on 6′ length sizes]
The Nunatak is the only one of those three that I have not had the chance to try. Based on its specs I am not sure I would like using one – for the same reason that I do not like using the other two: they are not wide enough. I, like the vast majority of the people in the world, am a side sleeper. I am not only a side sleeper but when I get cold I very quickly go from being a side sleeper to being a fetal sleeper, and that requires a sleeping bug with a lot of width to accommodate the bent knees. And that is where the MontBell U.L. Super Spiral Down Hugger shines at.
It is no secrete that the problem with wide bags is that you end up sleeping colder, because of the larger amount of mass air inside the sleeping bag. The MBULSS solves this by being, well, a super spiral bag. When I am in a fetal position, it hugs my knees and bag. When I am in a standard side sleeping position, the bag hugs my knees and bag. If I happen to be sleeping on my back, the sleeping bag still hugs my sides. That is the awesomeness of the super spiral technology. There is very little dead-air space inside one of them. Perhaps the largest pocket of dead-air space of the entire sleeping bag is in the foot area, as it is not aggressively narrow in the foot region, which can be both good and bad. It is great when you want a bit of foot room, but I have also had my feet freezing a bit when I was pushing the limitations of the bag.
With over 250 nights of use on my #3 (and around 45 nights of use with the #1) I can definitively say that the sleeping bag has lost a fair amount of loft and thus warmth. I have washed it, treated it, and everything else I know of to try to bring back some warmth to the bag. If it falls below 50(f) I have found that the #3 is just not warm enough unless I put on a base layer of clothing or use a silk insert. It is rated at 40(f) so I would guess that it has lost around 8-10 degrees of warmth over the last 250 nights. I have never owned any other sleeping bag with this many nights of use so I am unaware of whether this is on-par with other bags or if this is rather poor performance. At this point the #3 is very little more than a summer time sleeping bag, or if I feel like carrying an additional 20-odd ounces of clothing to compensate for it. However as I previously mentioned the bulk of the #1 is significantly more than the #3 and in my backpack I have a hard time getting everything stuffed into it when I have to use the MBULSS#1. So I am more and more finding myself looking at one of the ZPacks sleeping bag and than a Nunatak Balaclava to compensate for the bag being hoodless. But, each time I do the numbers on the weight and the price, I just continue to think to myself that the pleasure of the pure comfort of the MBULSS sleeping bags are worth the bulk and the few extra ounces.
-Abela
In accordance of Federal Trade Commission 16 CFR, Part 255: I hereby declare that the disseminated content within the review of this product(s) is free of endorsement(s) between myself and the manufacturer(s) of any product(s) disclosed herein and meets all FTC 16 CFR.255 compliance requirements.
Two weeks ago I had the opportunity to acquire the new 2012 Gossamer Gear Murmur backpack, which is the first non cuben fiber backpack I have bought in many years, because by the numbers the Murmur is one amazingly impressive backpack! The numbers were so impressive that it pretty much forced me into buying it (giggle) just to see it and put it on and take it for a hike.
As most of my blog and video followers are aware I have been using a multitude of cuben fiber backpacks for the last few years, with the ZPacks Blast 26 (now called the Blast 30) and the ZPacks Zero (X-Small) as my primary two backpacks, the latter of which is all I used in the 2011 hiking season, for a bit over 750 combined miles. Somewhere along the way I had a HMG WindRider as well but in the end it proved to be overbuilt and too heavy for my requirements (25 ounces is more than 1/3rd of my Base Pack Weight at this point.) Before I made to move to cuben fiber backpacks I was a big time ULA owner, having owned all of them from the catalyst down to the smallest ohm – but I moved away from ULA when I got into the mid-level UL range and have never looked back due to their larger capacity.
The Gossamer Gear Murmur is my first backpack from Gossamer Gear. Going away from cuben fiber was something I thought I would never do. None the less a backpack that is sub-10 ounces (283 grams) deserves the attention of anybody – especially when it is a fully featured backpack!
In traditional style (with the exception of my one article about the zpacks waterproof breathable cuben fiber rain jacket unboxing) I have tried very hard to never write a review, or do a video, about a piece of gear that was totally untested. It just seems wrong to write an article or do a video on something I have never even used. So, even though I did not have a trip planned for this weekend, when the backpack showed up and I took a seriously hard look at it to see if it would be worth spending a few days on the trail with it, it did not take me long to stop looking and just go dump the gear out of my other backpack and throw it into the Murmur and jump in my truck – and that is exactly what I did.
Being a SUL/XUL hiker, in true tradition, I went without a camera and video recorder, so for those of you interested in what this backpack looks like check out the official Gossamer Gear Murmur website and the following other reviewers (which all helped me make the decision to buy one) Brian Green, Philip Werner, JERMM, and Jhaura Wachsman.
My Weekend Trip Stats:
Over the last three days I did a total of 57 miles (91.7 kilometers) – which granted is not very far for an initial review on a backpack, but it was all I could pull together for such a short planned three-day trip. The backpack felt very nice and performed beyond what I was expecting it too, reminding me of the days of having a ULA backpack on my back (I have always considered the ULA Backpacks to be the most comfortable backpacks out there – but that comes at the price of being way to heavy for my style of hiking these days).
When I started the hike I had a Total Pack Weight (total pack weight = all gear + all food + all liquids) of 4176 grams (147 ounces / 9.20 pounds).
This is an exciting day for me – I finally get to share with the world my thoughts on the Six Moon Designs “Skyscape X” shelter which I consider to be one of the finest solo shelters that presently exists!
When I first wrote my article and built the spreadsheet called “SUL/XUL Solo Enclosed Shelter Comparisons” I never expected it to be as popular as it has become. It seems that every time I open it there are two or three other people looking at it. I have no idea how many times the spreadsheet has been viewed but the article itself has been viewed well over 2,500 times. I mention this because while doing researching for that article I came to realize that there were a few shelters out there I had never stopped to consider just how light weight they actually were, and the Six Moon Designs, Skyscape X was one of them!
The Six Moon Designs “Skyscape X” shelter is getting my highest praise in this review. It is an exceptionally engineered shelter utilizing cuben fiber material, super light weight bug netting, the lightest #3 zippers, and cordage that is amazingly light weight. I have bought, used and put to the test dozens and dozens of shelters over the last few years, and in the world of UL and SUL shelters, I do not know of any one-piece shelter that is better than the Six Moon Designs “Skyscape X” shelter. It is a 5-Star shelter and one that I am beyond happy that I bought. It is the shelter that is in my backpack every time I leave the house for a hike.
Shelter Specs:
Here are the specs based on their website:
Weight: 425 grams (15 oz) — and let me just confirm this… when they say 425 grams, they are dead on accurate! I got two Skyscape X shelters at two different times and both of them were exactly 425 grams. That was just amazing! Oh, and unlike some of the other companies out there… when SMD says 425 grams, they mean it… as in, all of it… the tent, the guylines, and the stuff sack. You will not find any of this crappy, deceiving PR crap like what Terra Nova and MSR and others pulls with their “minimum weight” and than having the TRUE weight of the shelter be pounds heavier. Way to go SMD – keeping it real, like it should be!! But here is the point hikers, that 425 grams that SMD states is the weight of this shelter, that is everything except stakes and poles (which no company factors into their listed weight), and the vast majority of hikers these days use poles so that makes it even sweeter!
Stakes: Five. Yes, five. No six, not eight, not tent… five. This shelter is totally secure with just five stakes! And if its a nice sunny day with no wind, it only takes three! This pretty much owns every other fully enclosed shelter out there!
Inside Space: This shelter has 23 square feet of space. All of it is usable and reachable. I would say that around 5% of it is not available for sleeping and that is at the very head of the shelter. I suppose this is a good point to talk about one thing that would be a nice modification or future product update. When it is windy and if you are not using a sleeping pad, the sides of the inner wall have a tendency to move ever closer and closer in towards your head. A few times I have woke up and had the netting right in my face. I originally thought about attaching some shock cord to both sides of the inner wall (netting) and pulling it out to one of the stakes, but I think a better way to go would be to attach loops on the outside of the wall, and push a couple of sticks (or stakes, if you felt like carrying them) through them. It would take very little to prevent this inner wall from moving in. Realistically this is a solo shelter so one does not (nor should not) expect it to be a wide shelter – solo tents are light weight because they are just wide enough to fit inside of, do not go buying a solo shelter if you want a grand hotel shelter, simple as that. But, this one little modification could solve an annoyance.
Hybrid Double Wall:
I suppose it is important to talk about this issue. This shelter, like a few other shelters out there these days are being called “Hybrid Double Wall” shelters. I really have no idea who originally coined that term but I wish they would have picked a different name, it seems to be a bit mis leading to a lot of hikers who do not understand shelter terminology. Thankfully I understood the term from previous encounters with these “hybrid double wall shelters” so I knew what it was I was getting into.
The basic logic behind it is seems to be that there are two walls, a bug netting (which they deem to call a “wall”) and than a hard-shell material wall (cuben fiber in the case of this shelter). The thing is that unlike true double wall shelters, most of these ‘Hybrid Double Wall shelters’ are finding unique ways to attach the two different materials together. So, basically think your standard dome tent with an inner setup made of bug netting, with a ‘fly’ that you put on over the top of it, only in the case of Hybrid Double Wall shelters, the top part of the bug netting is cut away and the ‘fly’ is sewn/attached to the top of the bug netting. Hopefully that makes some sense.
I will say I have never personally been a fan of them. Than again I have never been a fan of dome tents, nor to be honest have I been a big fan of all netting shelters either – I guess I just do not really know what I am a fan of, to be honest. But what I do know is that of all of the Hybrid Double Wall Shelters that I have used, Six Moon Designs has thus far been able to pull off this concept in a way that actually seems to work. Not only does it work, but I have to admit I kind of like it. Ok, I think I really like it. I have never made it any secrete that my favorite all time shelter is the TarpTent Rainbow. Its a heavy beast (compared to my other shelters) but it just works so amazingly well. It has massive headroom, a lot of wiggle room inside, setups fairly easy, and is the only shelter that the rest of my family (none of who hike) will actually call “a real tent” lol. Now I do not do write “comparison articles”… I just do not do that… I never have and hopefully never will. So please understand when I say this… the Hybrid Double wall system that Six Moon Designs has pulled off with their design of the Skyscape X… well, it sort of feels like my old beloved Rainbow… only a lot lighter!
To get away from feelings and to talk about reality, the reality of the facts are simple, SMD has pulled off a hybrid double wall shelter that actually works. It has an amazingly simple entry/exist, it setups faster than any shelter or tarp I have ever owned, it only requires five stakes, and it just feels like what a tent should feel like, regardless of it being a solo-shelter. I have owned and used and tried a lot of solo shelters on the market and there are only two of them that have survived my trials and testing, and both of those are still in my house and get used on a very regular basis. But now I have three!
Vestibule: According to the SMD website, this shelter has two (2) of them. I however, am going to argue against that. The basic definition of a vestibule is that it is a lobby, entrance hall, or passage between the entrance and the interior of a building. Now the SMD Skyspace X clearly does have one vestibule, on the door entrance side. But on the other side, it just does not seem to fit the properly description of a vestibule. Yes there is a zipper that allows you to open the non-door side outer wall (going back to the Hybrid Double Wall knowledge), but there is no actual entrance into the shelter from that side. Therefore, it is not a lobby or a passage way or an entrance, it just isn’t. There is no zipper entrance to allow you into the shelter, so lets not call it a vestibule, technically speaking. But not technically speaking, yep, it has two vestibules.
Nettings: The netting is your standard No-See-Um. It makes up the entire “inner wall” of the Hybrid Double wall design with the exception of where the support poles are and the bathtub.
Canopy: The outer wall, the canopy, is made from CT2K.08 cuben fiber, also known as 0.74 cuben fiber. I do not want to get into the discussion of which cuben fiber weight material is the best for solo shelters, so let me just put it this way: Pretty much every single outdoor cottage manufacturer that makes cuben fiber shelter, with the exception of one, uses 0.74 (CT2K.08) cuben fiber. Test after test after test by some pretty brilliant people have shown that 0.74 is able to be the most water impermeable cuben fiber for its weight. Yes many people have shown that you can get away with lighter cuben fiber – I myself have been doing long term durability testing on 0.34 cuben fiber for a tarp, but I absolutely do not recommend 0.34 for anybody but the most experienced of hikers with a lot of use of CF shelters. I think one of the very important things for sticking with 0.75 cuben fiber for the SMD Skyscape X is the amount of pressure it has on the material because of only having 5 tie-out points and that spreader bar inside at the top. I have used cuben fiber enough over the last few years to really know how far you can push cuben fiber (and have pushed it too far a few times, which has cost me a lot of money!). Going with 0.74 really allows me to stake down this shelter tight. Really tight. There is none of that “setup, weight 30 minutes, than retighten your guylines” with 0.74 cuben fiber. You setup your shelter and go to bed.
Bathtub: The floor is made also made from CT2K.08 (0.74) cuben fiber. Like I said above, I do not want to get into the discussion of which cuben fiber weight material is the best for solo shelters, but a nice future option for this shelter would be the ability to have 1.24 cuben fiber for the flooring/bathtub. I have come to respect the ability of 1.24 cuben fiber on the floors of shelters. This is not to say that the average hiker will/should ever have a problem with the floor (given proper site selection/clearing) but having the ability to go with 1.24 for the floor just means that it gives you the ability to pretty much throw your shelter down anywhere, especially important on thru-hikes where camping space can be limited if there is a big pack of hikers. This potential option would add an additional 3 ounces or so, so that is why I think it would be an option and not standard. Personally, there are better options if you are willing to carry an extra item in your backpack, such as the Gossamer Gear 1/8th sleeping pad (2 ounces) but I feel like it was worth mentioning that an optional floor using stronger CF would be worth noting. I took my GG 1/8th sleeping pad and cut it down to fit about 1/2 of the bathtub floor (right at the door entrance where the most pressure is applied to the floor material) and it was a bit under 2 ounces. But I only carry it when I know for a fact I will be likely setting up somewhere that is not going to be floor friendly. Of course a person can just always deal with it and if a puncture rip ever does happen, well, that is what you carry ducktape for! Ducktape and cuben fiber seem to have a love for one other. Or better yet, carry 8 or 10 inches of “Single Sided Cuben Fiber Tape” It performs much better than that gray tape does. Now for something is not an “option” but a “must have” for the next version of the Skyscape X… an actual real bathtub. Not a floor, but a bathtub. Something that will give me at least 4 inches of height for hiking here in the Redwoods of Northern California where the ground is usually totally wet all year long – and not having a bathtub floor is just not a pleasant thing. That is what I love about the HMG Echo Shelters, they have the tallest bathtub of any shelter I have ever encountered, and I loved it!! Now the SMD Skyscape X does not need ones as tall as the HMG shelters, but having a bathtub with at least 3 or 4 inch height would really make this a dream come true shelter for me! Here is a photograph of a typical trail in the Redwoods during the shoulder/winter season which I hope explains why I am constantly after a higher bathtub floor. The very first time I got to see one of these Skyscape X shelters, and got into it, was when I was on a hike with the owner of SMD and the very first thing out of my mouth was “it needs a higher bathtub” – Ron, I am still saying it and am going to keep asking for it :-D
Zipper: The zipper is your standard #3 YKK. Only the best! One of the things I really like about this is not necessary the zipper itself but rather the angle that the zipper takes. A few solo shelters I have used over the last few years had zippers with really sharp angles, or angles in high stress/pull areas. The path that the zipper takes is very smooth. I did have to attach some 1.25 mm spectra card to the zippers because those little #3 gabbers are just to small for my fingers to find, especially in the dark or with gloves on, but this is typical of most solo shelters.
Bonding: In the world of water protection you have DWR, SilNet and tape bonding. Six Moon Design wisely choose to go with tape bonding. And not just the tape that the guys who make Cuben fiber sale – nope, SMD after a lot of testing deemed it unacceptable! So SMD does what nobody else I know of does… they went out and found some glue that works really well for cuben fiber, than cut strips of cuben fiber (0.74) and they make their own bonding tape! That is just uber crazy! And I freaking love it!! My shelter is rock solid tight and I put it to the test by having it setup 24/7 for 18 days of straight rain. Not a single drop caused by a leak in the bonding.
Usage Observations:
So far I have over 45 nights spent inside of the shelter since I acquired it a few months ago, so, not a whole lot of nights spent inside of it but probably close to what a weekend hiker would end up using it for all hiking season. There are a few things I have observed about it that I want to share with my readers.
The bathtub has yet to have any water get into it from drippage or condensation or from build-up on the netting and than working its way down.
In the nights I have spent in it only a single time did I experience any condensation at all. That one specific night it had been raining for 14 hours and the ground was saturated and it was raining and foggy all night. No shelter I have ever had could have not suffered from condensation with those conditions. I carry dried out wet-wipes (they are lighter dry and are just as good when you add a few drops of water on them) and I just grabbed the one I had sitting out for breakfast and used it to wipe up the condensation on the inside (and saved me using water from my bottle).
I have noticed that the three corners of the bathtub end up with small puddles in them on really wet ground. This is a result of the seams on the bathtub not being bonded (and SMD has confirmed this.) I know it is not dripping down as none of the material above it is wet. The puddles are small, dime-size, and would not cause any problem at all if your sleeping bag came into contact with it – that is what dwr is for after all. I will be attempting to solve this by applying some one-sided cuben fiber tape on the outside of the bathtub seams and would recommend you do as well if you order one (or better yet SMD should do it in their shop.)
The cuben fiber is standards 0.74 cuben fiber, and I have had a lot of shelters made from 0.74 cuben fiber. For some reason the bathtub floor on this shelter seems to be suffering from hydrostatic pressure issues. That is, it seems like the cuben fiber used on the bathtub is allowing water into the bathtub from the pressures applied where you sleep at, as well as where the two support poles rest on the floor. In the morning I end up having to take a towel and soaking up water under the sleeping pad and in the two spots where the poles rest on the bathtub floor. I would sort of expect this from 0.51 cuben fiber but not from 0.74 cuben fiber. I am going to put this to a test by placing a large Polycryo Ground Cloth underneath the shelter and seeing if that resolves this issue. This is an odd issue because I have other shelters with 0.74 cuben fiber floors and have never had this happen before. It is perplexing me. I will report back when I am able to determine what I believe has been causing this. Six Moon Designs has confirmed that there is a double layer of cuben fiber on the bathtub floor where the poles go, so that makes the issue of water seeping through all the more curious. Pretty much all of the Cuben Fiber out there comes from Cubic Tech Corp as far as I am aware, so it really just does not make any sense why this hydrostatic pressure issue is occurring.
This shelter is rock solid in high winds. I had it setup for one night in some very high winds (35+, which is really windy for where I hike at) and it took it without even a hesitation of causing problems. For those concerned a single stake at the head-end would be a problem in the wind, I can assure you, it is not.
In high winds there does seems to be a significant amount of air flow coming into the shelter. This can be good to prevent condensation or bad if its crazy cold and you do not have a warm enough sleeping gear. It felt like I was using a tarp. There is an art to getting the side vestibules deflecting a lot of the wind, but this is typical of any solo shelter – tricks to learning how to set it up. In the end though, I am somebody who believes that high wind flow through a shelter is a good thing, especially in solo shelters with a lot of high angle material that condensation usually seeks out.
One of the issues that haunts other solo shelters is that the netting and bathtub floor are usually so close to the end of the tarp, especially at the foot end, that you encounter issues where either the netting gets wet and than drips inside, or rain spray causes water to get into the bathtub. That I just do not see happening to this shelter. I had this shelter setup for 8 straight days (24/7) for which it rained for 6 straight days, and zero water entered the bathtub from rain spray or dripping onto/through the netting. Highly impressive. Only solo shelter I have had (out of well over two dozen) that did not have this problem (though the TarpTent Rainbow has never had this problem once I learned a couple tricks to setting it up.)
For some reason I tend to end up on the non-door side of the shelter once my pad and sleeping bag are inside. I suspect this is instinctive as every other solo shelter I have (non tarp) you have to move as far away from the door as you can in order to evade rain spray. That is just not the case with this shelter. I am learning I can actually setup right in the middle, or even right on the door if I wanted too, and enjoy the greatest amount of elbow room on both sides.
Getting into this shelter is easy. Getting out of this shelter is really easy! Without a doubt the easiest solo shelter I have owned for getting out of. I have no idea why, but its almost naturally to get out and stand right up.
Crazy fast setup time. In soft grass where stakes could go right in, I suspect I could setup this shelter in under 60 seconds. Having dedicated carbon fiber poles helps with that time of course, no fiddling around getting the right size for your hiking pole height. I have also found that I usually just leave the spreader bar inside of the shelter, even inside of its stuff sack. Makes setup easier and it stuffs just as easily.
Future Updates I Would Love To See:
Here is a list of some of the features I would love to see this shelter have in the future:
A higher bathtub. Not because it needs it from rain spray, but rather for those situations where you might need to setup in really wet ground, such as is very common here in the Redwoods of Northern California.
Adding a pouch on the non-door side would be really nice. It would probably only add a few grams and would be nice.
Adding a short zipper along the bottom of the netting on the non-door side so I could actually utilize that vestibule space, it just needs to be long enough to put a pair of shoes, or whatever through it. Would add less than an ounce and make the shelter vestibule space seem more usable.
An option to not have a zipper on the outside vestibule on the non-door side. I realize having the zipper on the other side allows for both sides to be opened up to allow max air flow, so this could be an ‘optional’ feature for those that would rather save a few grams of weight in exchange for never opening up the vestibule walls on the non-door side of the shelter. I went 12 nights inside of the shelter before I finally unzipped the non-door side vestibule zipper – but it was really nice during a warm day when I went out and sat in it for an hour or so.
Offer an option to not have all the extra clip-hardware installed (for the optional ‘porch’). The attachment in the apex of the shelter (inside) is just a total waste of weight for most thru-hikers who are never ever going to be buying and using the ‘porch’ attachment. Likewise, by not having the clips at the termination end of the door side zipper could shave off a few grams. It seems to me that any long distance willing to spend the money on this cuben fiber shelter is not going to be lugging around the weight of the optional porch.
Loops on the outside of the bathtub side-wall where your head is at. The idea of these loops would be so that you could use a couple of stakes/sticks (or cordage out to the primary side stakes) to pull out the netting right where your head is at. When its really windy the sides of the netting tend to flap around, and can even flap into your face if you are not using a sleeping pad. Rather annoying and could be so easily solved.
Additional layers of cuben fiber on the inside of the bathtub floor where your poles set at. I am concerned about long term issues in that area with poles eventually weakening the material and allowing the cuben fiber to break down. I solved this issue by applying some one-sided cuben fiber tape in that area, but it should be there by default. This is all the much more important for hikers that do not use hiking poles with broad handles. When using small dedicated poles like I am (0.292 poles) it creates significant amounts of additional pressure in a very small spot. Six Moon Designs places two layers of Cuben Fiber in this area to prevent any issues, it just does not seem to be enough to me however.
Change the stuff sack. Right now the stuff sack is a narrow and tall stuff sack. Probably designed this way for the cross-bar. Personally I would rather have a wider and shorter stuff sack and than just shove the cross-bar somewhere in my pack. Just me.
I would just like to be clear here: None of these issues I have listed above are “game changers” and would sway me from buying or not buying this shelter. None of them are so much of an issue that I do not want to use my shelter. This is an amazing shelter and I offer these suggestions in the hope that Six Moon Designs can see what one specific hiker using the shelter would love to see in a future version of the shelter. A couple of them could cause me to buy an updated version though!
In Closing:
In closing the facts are simple, the Six Moon Designs “Skyscape X” shelter is the finest one-piece solo shelter I have ever encountered. The 75/25 apex is amazing. It is wide enough for a 25″ pad plus a bit of extra room. It can fit a 6 foot tall person with ease. It is crazy light – the third lightest fully enclosed shelter in the world based on my SUL/XUL Enclosed Shelter Comparison – and the worlds lightest one-piece solo shelter based on my research over the last year!! It setups amazingly fast and very easy using only 5 stakes, and three stakes are all you need in nice weather. I truly believe this shelter to be a redefining moment in the world of UL/SUL fully enclosed shelters. It uses 0.74 cuben fiber giving you a higher durability of material and even with a required cross-bar this shelter packs down into a very small space, for those like myself with sub 2000 cubic inch backpacks – and it even fits inside of my 1000 cubic inch backpack when I need it too.
I am not raving about this shelter to try to talk you into buying one. I am raving about this shelter because I have been on a hunt for over three years for a fully enclosed shelter that made me happy. With a few modifications to mine, I am now happy. In the end, that is all there is to be said about a shelter.
Thanks for reading!
Updates:
November 13, 2013 – The SMDSX has now been updated by SMD to have double doors!!
-Abela
(disclaimer: I purchased this product with my own money. It was not given to me. I am under no obligation to write this review.)
A lot of hikers place a lot of value in making sure that their water is filtered, and rightly so. I am not going to get into that issue within this article, other than to say that there are times when I absolutely refuse to go on a hiking trip without a water purification of some sort. Because of where I live and typically hike a water filter is not necessary – it rains so much that I can just gather water by setting down my water bottle and it fills up in a few minutes. At night, if I know the next morning I will be wanting to take a quick towel body shower, clean any gear, or just to have a nice breakfast I can easily gather three liters of water, the one liter that my primary bottle holds plus a 2 liter water bag for additional storage. Of course there are times when I am just not able to gather that much water and find a need to acquire water from another source beyond just rain falling, in these times it is typically from a river or creek.
I have gone through a lot of different water filters, like most of us have I suspect, trying to find one that works for me. Forget trying to find “that perfect one”… these days I just try to find one that makes me happy and feel safe and does not weigh a lot.
I have bought the Sawyer Three-way filter but it was way bigger than what I expected it to be and thus it never made it into my backpack, plus I almost never drink directly from a storage bag and I am just not a fan of the whole gravity system. Nothing against those methods, I just do not care to go down those roads, done them both and just do not like either of them.
I have bought the SteriPen Adventurer Opti and really do love it. It has never failed me, something I hear happens to people here and there. It is also something that I do not have to worry about freezing in sub freezing conditions. If you have ever woken up and realized that your standard membrane filter is frozen and totally unusable, you know what I mean. Yes it requires batteries, but I do not care about that. It is really no different from carrying fuel for your stove, its just a necessary part of your overall total backpack weight.
Awhile back Sawyer released their “Sawyer PointOne Squeeze Water Filter System” which at first I neglected to take a close look at, but here a few weeks ago I came across it again and took a serious look at its technical specs and it jumped out at me as something that could be the finest – and lightest weight – membrane filter system available for hikers. Continue reading “Sawyer PointOne Squeeze Water Filter System”→
This is an update to my previous article about the ZPacks Waterproof Breathable Cuben Fiber Rain Jacket, which I really recommend you read if you are at all interested in what is possibly the lightest cuben fiber rain jacket on the market.
As I promised within that article I would provide updates on this jacket as I get some usage of the jacket. I have now reached the 25 hour mark of wearing the jacket in the rain, and have nearly 40 hours of total wear time with this jacket. I believe it is safe to say that this is more than enough time spent wearing this jacket to provide a solid initial update article on this jacket.
I have been able to use the jacket on the trail, around my house, and while out doing business around town. It may not be the biggest fashion statement around town, but what SUL/XUL hiker cares about fashion – none that I know. It has performed flawlessly.
Keeping Things In Perspective:
In a comment I made in the original article I made this statement:
Over 90% of hikers do not hike a 500 miles a year. Of the remaining 10% less than half of them do over 2000 miles a year. Those rare few in the 1-5% of hikers that do more the vast majority of them that I have talked to have had very very few items that gotten used for 2000+ miles have durability issues, and typically it is socks and shoes, nothing more, and they are the two things we expect to not last that far. As most tripple crowner can testify too, the use of rain gear on the big-three trails is typically less than 2% of the 8000+ miles. You really going to be wearing your *rain jacket* for 2600 miles? Stop and think about that.
So with this in mind we need to ask ourselves, is the weight of a 10+ ounces rain jacket really worth carrying? I say no. If I can hike any of the long distance trails in the USA and typically encounter less than 20 days of rain, why would I carry twice the amount of dead weight when I need too. For me, being able to save 5 ounces off a largely dead-weight item such as a rain jacket is an amazingly exciting aspect.
It is no secrete that this latest edition of the waterproof breathable cuben fiber is not the most breathable material out there. I will be first in line to say such (though I know a lot of other folks that would like to get in line ahead of me, because they just enjoy trash talking cuben fiber) and have never made the statement that this new WPBCF is the end-all of breathable material, it is not.
However I can say for a fact that this WPBCF is pretty amazing. I have used it in hail, in snow, in the rain, in my sleeping bag, as a thermal barrier, and sometimes just as a jacket to slip on when I am going out the door. I have used it while hiking with a backpack on as well, obviously. I have tried to use it in every aspect of my life as I can since I purchased it.
Not a single time have I thought to myself “man, this jacket sucks!”. Not a single time.
As a SUL/XUL hiker I carry very little gear, so the gear that I do carry has to be amazingly reliable. The ZPacks WPBCF Rain Jacket has now officially made it into my backpack as an “always in my backpack item”. Yes, it is even in my sub-2-pounds summer gear setup!
How Does It Perform As A Wind Jacket?
This is the most popular question I have received about this jacket. While I did mention in my previous article that “I will no longer be taking” my wind jacket, I did not expect to get the kind of feedback about how this jacket performs as a wind jacket as what I have gotten.
Let us just look at this from a pure number perspective. The wind jacket I have been using the last few seasons is the MontBell Tachyon Anorak wind jacket which I really do love, though it is almost impossible to find for sale anymore. This wind jacket is made of 7-denier nylon. The ZPacks WPBCF Rain Jacket is made of 1.42 oz/sqyd cuben fiber. No matter what way you look at it, the 1.42 oz/sqyd cuben fiber is thicker than the 7-denier nylon material of the MontBell wind jacket. So from a material thickness perspective, the ZPacks WPBCF Rain Jacket is a better wind jacket. Breathablity does not equate to the ability for wind to blow through it.
The ZPacks WPBCF Rain Jacket is also much less nosy than any other wind jacket I have owned and/or used. A couple years ago I had a wind jacket that was so loud I just could not stand using it. The WPBCF makes pretty much no flapping noise in even the strongest of wind that I have encountered.
So as I move into the 2012 hiking season the most awesome MontBell Tachyon Anorak wind jacket is going to be staying at home and the ZPacks WPBCF Rain Jacket will for-sure be making it into the very top of my backpack for those times when I just want to put on a clothing item to help with some cold wind.
Discolouration:
discolouration – the act of changing the natural color of something by making it duller or dingier or unnatural or faded
Within this photograph (click it to view a much larger image) you can see some discolouration that has occurred to the jacket. The white is slowing fading off in those places where it receives the most rubbing against my backpack, sleeping bag, and chair when I am wearing it around the house.
When I first noticed it I was a bit perplexed. I have read accounts of non white and non black cuben fiber rubbing off some of its colors, but I had never read any account of white cuben fiber having discolouration issues.
So I put out an email to a half-dozen guys I know that are developing products using this WPBCF material to see if any of them had encountered this issue. A few of them were able to confirm that this WPBCF does tend to have some discolouration issues. I keep meaning to ask two of the guys I know with a Water Penetration Tester (Hydrostatic Pressure Tester) to see if they would be willing to do tests on the jacket to see if the jacket is loosing any ability to repeal water, but it has been winter season and I have needed my jacket, so maybe come June or July I will see if they would be willing to test it. If they are willing and if I do have them test it I will be sure to provide any results that I get back from them.
I performed a standard water puddle test and the jacket did not have any seepage anywhere – be in in the middle of the hood where it is bright white, or the middle of the back where all the white has fadded off. I allowed the water to sit in a puddle for over 10 hours. That is more than good enough for me.
So I mention all of this just so other hikers who might have already bought this jacket, or those looking to buy it, are aware of this discolouration. In no way does it appear to be effecting the performance of the jacket.
Product Updates:
A few days ago I emailed ZPacks and let them know that I was going to be writing a follow-up review of the jacket and asked if they had made any changes or updates to the jacket. (this is something I feel every reputable outdoor gear reviewer should do).
The next day the owner of ZPacks emailed me back and indicated the following:
I made one little update- I saw in your video it was a little tricky for you to cinch the wrist elastic. I added a second non-stretchy cord through the wrist that holds the cord lock in place. That way you can pull the elastic with just one hand. The same way as on my mitts.
Putting aside the fact that it is unbelievably awesome that a company is willing to update their product based on a video review of one of their products, I can say that this is really the only thing that was bothering me with the jacket. Not so much that I will be sending mine back – it really is not an issue at all – but just stop and think about that folks, a minor issue such as this and the company updated their product based on seeing the problem from a youtube video. Huge props to ZPacks for being so on-top of trying to make the best gear available. I never once mentioned to ZPacks or anybody else this minor annoyance.
Other Uses:
Being somebody who does not like to carry single-use-items in my backpack (though I regrettably have a few), I have made it a goal of mine to try to find as many different uses for this jacket as I can.
Here is a list of other uses that I have used the jacket for – just let me be clear here though: I am not somebody who abuses their gear. I have only had a single piece of gear fail on me in the last three seasons of hiking. I treat my gear with the utmost care – you just have to when you are a SUL/XUL hiker.
Quasi-blanket. Over this winter season I have been trying out different winter season gear setups. One of the setups I have been trying is going without a sleeping bag. I purchased a pair of crazy warm down pants from GooseFeet and than using my MontBell down jacket, my ColdAvenger Expedition Balaclava, Black Rock Gear Gloves and Hadron Hat, and Feathered Friends Down Booties. At one point the wind started blowing some really cold wind so I grabbed my ZPacks WPBCF Rain Jacket and put it over my shoulders to help control my core-temperature. It worked very well at blocking the wind and helping to reduce the shiver I felt coming on because my down jacket was not lofty enough for the temperatures – the cold wind caused a 16-degree temperature dip in the span of 20 minutes.
Food Prep. Sometimes when it comes time to prep your food it is nice to be able to put down something on the ground. I use to use my wind jacket, but this jacket works a lot better as it has a zipper and thus is larger, plus the white color makes finding those random mouse-size pieces of food I dropped – hey, calories count, grin.
Wind Jacket. I already address this issue above, but felt I should mention it here again. The jacket has thus-far proven to be very good at being a wind jacket.
A-Frame shelter door. When the weather has been nice I have gone out with my 0.34 cuben fiber tarp to continue long-term durability testing with it. Once a bit of light rain and horizontal wind came up so I threw my jacket up as a door/beak to help block the rain from coming into the shelter. It was not big enough to cover the entire entrance, but big enough to block enough rain that it was worth putting up. I might attach a small tie-out loop on the bottom of the jacket to help with staking it out better as a beak.
Future Article Updates:
As I mentioned above, I now have 25 hours of using the ZPacks Waterproof Breathable Cuben Fiber Rain Jacket in the rain and nearly 40 hours of wearing the jacket when it has not been raining. It has performed without a single failure.
I will probably not be writing up another update for the rest of the 2012 hiking season, as once the main hiking season comes around I am on the trail to much to invest the two or three hours it takes to write these updates.
Should the jacket fail in some way, I will first notify ZPacks and from there decide what and how to share any details of the failure.
I just do not see how the jacket could have any failure if it is not directly related to user-abuse of some type. If after 25 hours of rain the jacket has not leaked, it seems safe to say that the material has proven itself.
I highly recommend the ZPacks Waterproof Breathable Cuben Fiber Rain Jacket if you are looking to have the lightest breathable rain jacket that is presently on the market (at least that I know of). Only you can decide if it is worth the money, but given the fact that my last rain jacket was 10.2 ounces and this jacket from ZPacks is 4.6 ounces, as a SUL/XUL hiker, the extra money spent on this jacket was well worth it – I have spent far more money trying to save 5.6 ounces from my overall base pack weight.
Thank you,
-Abela
(disclaimer: I purchased this product with my own money. It was not provided to me for review, t&e or any other reason, I actually did buy it. ZPacks is not one of my hiking sponsors.)
I have owned both the MBULSS #3 and a MBULSS #1 and have loved them both.
