Hi all,
New to this forum and am really enjoying it. I have been backpacking off and on and have just converted to a quilt. When stowing a quilt i made an extra large stow bag and hang it in the corner. My question is how small can you pack a quilt without permanently affecting the insulation. Thanks TomH

All insulation deteriorates a bit everytime it is compressed. IMO some synthetic gets brittle overtime and breaks down. High quality down has a long life.

If it is synthetic you should ckeck with the manufacturer.

Some will say don't ever compress it and that you may as well throw it out if you do.

I don't subscribe to that. I have good quality down bags which I compress for packing down nice and small. I never leave them compressed after a trip, I take them out and store them in a large net or cloth sack with lots of room to stay fluffy and hang them from my basement rafters. My bags seem to do just fine with this.

Compressing synthetics over and over will gradually break it down. Same with down, but down has a longer life span (I've heard of 30 year old down bags) if you keep it clean and store it properly between uses. I'm given to understand that synthetic, used regularly, may last a few years.

My synthetic and my down quilts hang in a closet, loosely. I'll clean them as necessary - haven't noticed a lot of grunge buildup yet, wearing clean clothes at night to sleep in seems to cut that down considerably.

Thanks for the in put
TomH

My first down bag lasted twenty years, and I compressed it for every trip. My current home-made quilt is six years old, get compressed every trip, and still works like new. As long as you store a down quilt uncompressed, it should be O.K. for a long time.

What I want to do is pack the quilt down small enough so it will
fit in my pack. Osprey atmos. I was thinking to use a trash compactor bag or what size stuff sack should i sew
Thanks Tom

What size atmos, the 50? I always stuffed the quilt in a large sack half compressed and then added gear around it, Ray Jardine style. If the quilt doesn't fit in your pack, you either have the wrong pack or the wrong quilt. Depends on how you want to look at it.

Is the 50 big enough. I went to rei and tried it and wasn't sure if the quilt would fit and rest of the gear. The 65 was big enough but not sure if i want at bigger
pack.

I was able to get all my gear in the aura 50, with the quilt, hammock, tarp and clothing inside and a bear vault solo standing up on top of them (only place the bear can would fit, and a bigger one would have been very difficult) - the filter, first aid, and other small gear items fit in the outside pockets and the back pocket usually held rain gear and a snack. But I didn't haul a tent or large sleeping pad. Not sure what gear configuration you have, but I think if I had to carry a tent and a stove larger than a supercat and .9 liter pot, the 50 would be a very tight fit indeed. If I were shopping for an Osprey, I would look at the aether 60 - on the aether series, you can also swap belt and straps if you need to. The reason I sold the aura 50 was that the belt was wholly inadequate and I could not swap it out for something different. If your pack works for you, and you don't need the bear can, it would be easy to get a NeoAir and a quilt into it.