Registered: 04/23/08
Posts: 260
Loc: jersey city NJ
Point is.. ..... most tents aren't necessarily worth what they cost.....and the very few super-ultralight super cheapies available in $20-$30 three-pound range......are waaaaay the best value for summer backpacking.....compared with mainline and specialty manufacturers at ten times the price or more, and very similar weights or heavier...
Can anybody say why, for example, the undoubtedly very nice Huba Huba, is 11 times or 15 times more expensive, than a Wenzel Solo, when they are, I would contend, equally functional, assuming summer use.
HH is significantly heavier and only very slightly larger. Yes, I could be wrong and am looking for argument. There may be trollish element here, but on the other hand, I am sincere about my point.
The "Rainbow" to take another popular example, is similarly expensive and only slightly lighter -- and not less constricted in space than a Wenzel, but at best only equally functional, ..or at least that is my contention.
Many (most or all) the numerous other low-end backpacking tents, at Campmoor, for example, definately including most Wenzel models, are neither truly ultra cheap nor ultra light and I think of them as all-around bad bargains.....I can't believe Wenzel Solo is the only ultra-cheap ultralight, but it's all I've seen. Somebody mentioned Cabelas... etc.......I guess there are a few others
Perhaps the contract factories in Asia will soon be supplying the market with more along these lines.....?? Could easily be true and there could be improved ultracheap versions in the offing.... but it hasn't happened so far.
On the other hand, my late, great, sub-four pound puptent was purchased nearly thirty years ago in a large discount department store.......and the Wenzel knocks a pound off that and is somewhat cheaper at twenty or thirty current U.S dollars...
I've almost certainly purchased most or all of my lifetime supply of back packing tents, and have spent perhaps a thousand$$ ??? on various models... Therefore, I'm certainly hypocritical..... But I'm very glad my various tents have included one that was something like the current Wenzel Solo.
I bought an el cheapo Texsport tent once. The problem with that POS was that the PU coating was too thin. A 5-minute, fairly intense garden hose test didn't reveal any flaws, but a continuous, overnight rain totally overwhelmed the thin PU coating and soaked right into the tent. Luckily, the overnight rain test was in my own backyard and I didn't sleep inside. It took a couple of cotton kitchen towels to soak up the lake inside!
By the tone of your post I assume that you have not experienced a night of strong wind or heavy rain inside a cheap tent compared with a Hubba or a Rainbow. I also have to assume that you are referring to the Wenzel Starlite as your "comparable" product.
First I can tell you for a fact that if one of the various Chinese manufacturers could make a similar tent to the Hubba using similar materials for a fraction of the cost of the MSR they would. There is at least one Hubba Hubba type tent sold by a Chinese company that is almost half of the cost of the MSR, but is heavier (cheaper fly material) and uses cheaper but still aluminum poles. As far as weight is concerned, the Rainbow is almost twice as light and still offers more space inside (steep walls on the Star Light) The real weight of the Wenzel is over 4 lbs, BTW... There is a very big difference in cost and performance between taffeta nylon and fiberglass poles compared with silnylon and Easton tubes. Take the Rainbow as a comparison. At $225 it is 7.5x the cost of the Wenzel. But that is not a way to judge a product. There are many that have used the Rainbow for more than 50 nights, some well over that. If you work on 50 nights, that is 4.50 per night. Do some research and you will find that tents like the Starlite are used once or twice ( I have just noticed Ben's comment) and then the owner upgrades or gives camping a miss. That is 10,20 or $30 per night. Makes the Rainbow sound cheap, doesn't it ?
Here is the start of a user review for the Star Light : The only positives of this tent are that it was really really cheap, and light. That being said, I don't really think it was worth the 30 bucks. I'd rather have put that money toward a real tent. I think it fails in all of the respects that a tent should not: size/comfort, ease of use, weather protection, durability
Colin Fletcher used to say, "This is still an honest industry; you get what you pay for." He's still mostly right (with a couple of minor exceptions.)
When it comes to tents, you may choose two: light, cheap, weatherproof. You can't get all three.
The major flaw in your reasoning is "assuming summer use." However, if you are only going to use the tent in clear, hot weather, or can crawl into the car to sleep if it happens to rain, I still don't think a cheap tent is worthwhile. In those conditions, I'd submit that no tent is needed - just take a groundcloth and sleep under the stars (and maybe some bug netting to hang if bugs are an issue.)
Way back when, I bought one of those cheap Texsport single wall pup tents. It was hot when dry, wet when it rained, and cramped always. I soon went to a 6x8 coated nylon tarp and a piece of Visqueen, and found it far superior (I hung one of those twin-bed sized mosquito nets in it during summer.)
By the way, my choose-two selections are light and weatherproof.
My tent is a 3.5lb, $30, 2 person, one pole (aluminum) tent from Swiss Gear that I bought at Sams. I can't really recommend it because you can't buy it anymore. It has taped seams, but is not made of ripstop. I haven't done the garden hose test yet, I guess I should. I have slept in it several times with no rain. I found that if it is buttoned up all the way, major condensation problems. If you open the vestibule, then no problem with condensation.
Anyways, I can't really agree or disagree to your argument, because I really have never bought and expensive BP tent. Before this one, I had an old pup tent that I got at a garage sale. It was heavy, but I didn't know, I was young. <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" /> I also had a cheap two man dome from coleman. The dome kept me dry in the all day rain of the PNW.
As for the Wenzel Starlite, Walmart is selling it online for $19. Sam's Club is selling a new Swiss Gear that looks a lot like a Hubba Hubba. <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />
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Registered: 04/23/08
Posts: 260
Loc: jersey city NJ
"By the tone of your post I assume that you have not experienced a night of strong wind or heavy rain inside a cheap tent compared with a Hubba or a Rainbow."
Funny you should ask.
I bought a coated nylon pup-tent 29 years ago for $19.99, and almost immediately used it for seven continuous weeks on a bike trip. Subsequently over a period of nearly ten years, it went on a number of week-long trips, and countless weekends.
When my friend unfortunately abandoned it in the jungles of Costa Rica in 1989, the floor had become transparent in places due to abrasion, mainly from beach sand, and the tent had seen plenty of inclement conditions.
I only remember two nights when weather caused difficulty. One involved a heavy snowstorm in April, and one involved a tropical storm a few yards from the beach in Nova Scotia (though protected by a spruce thicket) during which I realized a shortcoming in my seam sealing job that was later rectified.
I'm sure this tent was functionally similar to a "Wenzel Starlight" now available for $20 current dollars. Except that the Starlight is potentially lighter due to its tapered wedge design. However, if I owned a Starlight, I'd ditch the fiberglass poles, one of which I think is an "A-frame," This would save significant weight at no sacrifice of utility.
As to Hubba or Rainbow, I've never used them, but I've owned at least ten other backpacking tents by various "name brand" makers, and slept in a certain number of others. The old puptent was lighter than, for example, the old Sierra Designs Half Moon, which was advertised at about four pounds.
What I've got in mind for the Asian sweat shops, would be improvements on the "Starlight" style wedge tents, possibly to include mass-market dirt cheap SilNylon, which I don't think yet exists.
Free-standing tents are problematic as ultralights, expecially dirt cheap ones. BTW, doesn't North Face, and many others, use Chinese factories?
Many (most or all) the numerous other low-end backpacking tents, at Campmoor, for example, definately including most Wenzel models, are neither truly ultra cheap nor ultra light and I think of them as all-around bad bargains.....I can't believe Wenzel Solo is the only ultra-cheap ultralight, but it's all I've seen. Somebody mentioned Cabelas... etc.......I guess there are a few others
well aside from other issues mentioned in other posts. this is a large part of it.
you've basically tried to build a thesis off of a single tent, whose size/weight/price ratio is quite good. But myself, and i'm sure many others see a bunch of tents we don't want any part of by the same manufacturer and basically get suspicious of it.
The purpose of a tent is to give guarenteed protection in really bad weather. If you backpack in an area with good weather, low wind, only afternoon storms that allow you to easily dry out after the deluge - you do not need a tent at all! Forget the cheap tent and go with a small tarp that is even lighter.
When a tent is truely needed, it better be bombproof. Tent failure and getting soaked in truely poor conditions is not an option. Think of a 4-day storm at 12,000 feet, above timber.
When I need real protection, I use a Mountain Hardware 2-man, 3-season mountaineering tent at 4# 14 oz. It was about $300 and has withstood many continuous days of horrid weather. It sets up tight as a drum, is very wind worth and offers enough room to sit out several days of weather and has never leaked.
I am quite willing to put my dollars into what I consider a piece of true survival equipment.
For other conditions, I go with my bivy - it is light and still very weather resistent but kind of miserable to be in for continous storms. The bivy is not cheap either - $150.
There are some poor high dollar tents too. I think the issue is quality regardless of price or weight. The materials the tent and poles are made of do matter, as does the design and quality of construction.
Every cheap tent I've ever wasted my money on has lasted one miserable season, and usually failed catastrophically at a very bad time involving lots of wind and rain. One day you realize that you could have had a good tent for the same money you wasted over the last few years. Then you find out about camping hammocks and give the tent to your wife.
Quote:
Yes, I could be wrong and am looking for argument. There may be trollish element here, but on the other hand, I am sincere about my point.
Be sincere in one hand and...well, I guess you've heard that one.
I probably did not express my opion very well in my last post.
To me the issue is the consequence of tent failure. I would not compare bicycle camping to remote wilderness camping. The factor I look at is my "bail out" opportunties. I do not hear of bicylists dying of hypothermia. There are emergency response alternatives- call on your cell phone, flag down a car, hunker under a bridge. If on the other hand I am 8 days out, at 12,000 feet, 4 days to the nearest trailhead and have not seen a single person in 6 days, if my tent failed, I could die of hypothermia.
I have seen a lot of cheap tents in campgrounds - most of them flapping in the breeze and not performing very well when it actually gets stormy. I have yet to see anyone in a cheap tent in serious mountaineering conditions or in the really remote above-timber back country. Also cold wet conditions are far different than wet warm (Costa Rica).
By the way, I have also tried to sew my own tent and believe me, there is a lot to tent design. My tent was not what I called a success. It became a back-yard toy for the kids. To me, $300 for a high quality tent is a bargin given the design work that went into it as well as the construction and distribution. I guess each of us has his "price point". I have yet to see the added value of going to some of the really high end tents at $600.
Sorry to burst any bubbles here, but it appears that a Chinese contractor has indeed figured out how to make more expensive tents, if the Campmor catalog is correct: http://www.campmor.com/outdoor/gear/Product___24951 http://www.campmor.com/outdoor/gear/Product___27370 Both the Big Agnes Seedhouse at $289 and the MSR Hubba Hubba at $279 are listed as "imports" (go all the way to the bottom of the product description). Doesn't say from where, but I would refrain from chewing on the zipper pulls. Got to wonder about quality control, given the Chinese practice of using muiltiple subcontactors to do most of the work. Doesn't look like they dropped the price when they switched production overseas......
Switched? Big Agnes tents have always been made in China. And it's these Chinese tents that have built up an enthusiastic bunch of users -- myself included!
Let's avoid mindless broadbrushing here. There are horrible sweatshops there -- and quality manufacturers as well.
BTW, GM, Ford and Chrysler cars are junk! But you don't see me trashing an entire country...
Registered: 04/23/08
Posts: 260
Loc: jersey city NJ
" If my tent failed, I could die of hypothermia."
Yeah you could die in the woods. Lotza danger.
Closest I've come to hypothermia was in a 1983 April snow storm in my cheapy puptent. This was due to unbelievable condensation and melting snow. It was nearly ten years before I went back to using down sleeping bags in the off season.
I wouldn't recommend a cheap coated puptent as anything but a "2 1/2 season" shelter.
"Every cheap tent I've ever wasted my money on has lasted one miserable season, and usually failed catastrophically at a very bad time involving lots of wind and rain."
Gee, sorry to hear that. I wore the floor out on mine after ten years of fairly hard use in highly variable conditions. I agree that most cheap tents are junk. But not all.
So if I like them so much, why don't I have one now?
I use mostly tarp shelters, or tarp tents, or whatever the term is.... Mine are much larger and lighter. and more versatile as 4-season shelters. They don't have a floor, so that scene in April can't be repeated.. The condensation and snow-melt just drain into the snowpack or into the dirt, rather than getting trapped inside the tent and underneath my sleeping bag, which is, in anycase protected by a cover with waterproof bottom. I've been foolish enough to spend about $600 --- Gawd! more! on four of them. It's a sickness....
Also, Wal-Mart tents do lack, shall we say.. a certain je ne sai quois???
However, I do miss the insect netting and all I've got along those lines, presently, is a miserable little worn-out one-person tent made from a very poor immitation of Goretex. It cost $180 in 1990, and given a choice at bedtime between it and a $20 Wenzel Starlight, I've no doubt which I'd choose.
[P]resently, is a miserable little worn-out one-person tent made from a very poor immitation of Goretex. It cost $180 in 1990, and given a choice at bedtime between it and a $20 Wenzel Starlight, I've no doubt which I'd choose. [/quote]
Good that none of us has to choose between these two horrible choices. I'd rather just put my $20 in the bank.
Sorry to burst any bubbles here, but it appears that a Chinese contractor has indeed figured out how to make more expensive tents, if the Campmor catalog is correct: http://www.campmor.com/outdoor/gear/Product___24951 http://www.campmor.com/outdoor/gear/Product___27370 Both the Big Agnes Seedhouse at $289 and the MSR Hubba Hubba at $279 are listed as "imports" (go all the way to the bottom of the product description). Doesn't say from where, but I would refrain from chewing on the zipper pulls. Got to wonder about quality control, given the Chinese practice of using muiltiple subcontactors to do most of the work. Doesn't look like they dropped the price when they switched production overseas......
Don't get too shook up about tents made in China: the two standard shelters for the South Col of Everest are the MH Trango series and the TNF VE-25, and both have been sewn in China for many years.
Bibler tents, often considered the gold standard for "have to live through it" mountain tents, are also now made in China with no discernable drop in quality from when they were made in Boulder.
Don't want to sound as though I am putting down Chinese tents - I own three of them, and they are the best tents I ever had. That said, I paid significantly less than I would have if they were American made. Suppliers who have their tents manufactured in China and sell at American prices might do well for a while, but sooner rather than later their supplier will produce a "clone" of their product and sell at a reduced price under a different brand name. Think it doesn't happen now? Look very carefully at the "no name" brands sold at discount stores, and many will look very familiar. Legal protection against this? You would have to thread your way through the maze of subcontractors to figure out even who to sue, and they will be selling under a different brand name before you get there. Chinese tents are a great value, but no way should you pay premium prices for them.
Three out of five stars for a $20 tent.It would get 1 out of five it you paid $100 for it.
One reviewer gave it 4 stars but he is upgrading (too small, too much condensation) Another spent $59 to make it useable but still compares it to a "tube tent" Here is another 3 star review : Have used this solo tent on several hikes. Its main advantage is how light it is. Only about three pounds. Getting in and out require you to crawl, and it is only a single wall. I have other double wall tents, but still use this cheap little number. I'm going for a very early spring hike this weekend and the forcast if for rain. I can't wait to see how it holds up.
This guy has not even used the tent ( in the field) , finds it hard to get in and out, but gives it three stars !!!
The other 4 star comes from a guy that uses the tent in fair weather .
Funny that two reviewers mention "about 3 lbs" , to most here there is a big difference between "about 3lbs" and "just over 4 lbs".....
If you had started the thread by stating "for mild weather and occasional camping , for some... a $20 tent will do" I possibly would agree with you , however your inference that a $200 tent is a rip off is at best naive.
As far as the Chinese manufacturing comments are concerned, yes a lot of the best ( and most expensive) tents are made in China, however for the moment because of the cost of materials, don't expect "cheap" silnylon/spinnaker/cuben fiber tents with Easton or DAC poles.
Your cavilier comment about "dying in the woods" smacks of machoism. Am I to read it that you feel a reasonable regard for safety is whimpy? I think it is understood that all of us who backpack have, by virture of participating in the activity, accept a certain amount of unavoidable risk. Reducing that risk where you can is a no-brainer. Hypothermia is a reality and one of the leading causes of death in the wilderness - and your choice of equipment does make a difference.
Registered: 04/23/08
Posts: 260
Loc: jersey city NJ
I do think that the dangers of hiking are often overblown, especially in summertime forests, where most people hike most of the time. But that's a really different matter.
What I'm focused on, is that I've spent many months camping (hiking, kayaking and bicycling) over long period in a cheap puptent in a fairly wide array of conditions, and was perfectly satisfied with the protection it offered during summer months.
Met somebody who had bicycled from Los Angeles to Nova Scotia using something almost identical, with equal satisfaction, except for one evening that involved a tornado.
Other people do quite well with plastic sheeting, or $400 tents. End results can be roughly all the same, though the $400 tent is likely to be heaviest alternative.
One August evening, with a tarp, on a wooden tent platform in New Hampshire, I got a lecture from a near-by camper about how in the White Mountains, nothing but a mountaineering tent was truly safe.
He said my use of a tarp was irresponsible because I might need a rescue, thus subjecting people like him (who might rescue me) to grave personnel personal risk.
Thank goodness that particular camping area was patrolled nightly by federal rangers.
Pricing on tents, like many other consumer goods, is subject to a point of diminishing returns. Tent A that costs 15X as much as tent B is not going to be 15 times "better" (and what that really means is up to the individual). That last degree of quality usually comes at a steep price curve.
Any tent will usually do for fair weather camping. But if you want extra strength or lighter weight you have to pay. The Wenzel Solo may do the job for weather protection but there are far lighter alternatives that do the same job......at a price.
Any tent that doesn't perform the job you bought it for is no bargain, whether is costs $20.00 or $2,000.00.
Speaking of overblown, I was literally "overblown" while traversing the White Mountains 13,000 feet (the California White Mountain, a 14'er). The largest recorded gust that day at the weather station on the top of White Mountain was 100 mph! Average wind speed for my hiking hours was 45 mph, average "gusts" 60 mph. In my tent, as the rain started, I was very happy to have one of those $300 mountaineering tents! Quite a few of us out west here backpack extensively above timber or without timber. And the dirty little secret - it DOES rain in the Sierra - downpours too! Occasionally snows heavily in September - like the Donner Party fiasco. And the Wind River Range? - now there is an appropriately named range. And the desert is not very kind either. No trees. Windy. Scorpions. Ugh!
I am not prone to lecture other campers on their habits or equipment. That is a bit out of line. I just watch their tube tent blow away and smile.
You don't say where you do most of your tent use but from the tenor of your post, I suspect that you haven't spent much time at high altitude in really lousy summer weather in the western mountains. If you had, I think you would realize that, with a few exceptions, you pretty much get what you pay for.
Far be it from me to tell you what tent you should take along on any kind of a trip. For myself, there are a few things on which I won't cut corners. These include: A tent, if I feel I need one; my sleeping gear; and my clothing. All of these items contribute to comfort and convenience as well as survival. Yeah, I can make a cheap tent work under really abominable conditions; I have been backpacking and mountaineering for a long time and have made-do in some pretty foul weather. Would I enjoy my time in a leaky, flapping, failing tent? No! Would I spend more money to have a better tent for the next trip? I sure would!
Right now, I have three tents: A SMD Luna Solo (2lb+); a Sierra Designs Lightyear (3lb+) and a Sierra Designs Glacier Tent (7lb+). I also have a 5' x 9' silnylon tarp. For most general summer use where rain is a possibility but not likely, I'll take the tarp or the Luna Solo. If I am on a longer trip where rain is likely and bailout possibilities are poor, I'll take the Lightyear. For four season mountaineering, I take the Glacier.
Sure, I usually have more weather protection along than I really need. But, I would rather have more than I need than less.
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