Tag Archives: quilt

Gear Trials – A Comfort light trip in Mt. Rainier NP

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Rain on the new tent

After a new ship is launched, it gets to meet the ocean for the first time with “sea trials”.  As our parks reopen and snow leaves the high country, it was time to get out for gear trials with recent projects.  I headed for a Park camp adjoining a couple of sub-alpine lakes at about 4700′.  The forecast was for a nice day, followed by a weak front overnight with a chance of rain in the morning.  As the first backpack of the season, I wanted to reality test my current set-up.  I had finished a new tent – the Hex-Lite.  My ultra-light bivy would serve as a quilt and air pad cover.  I was planning to Esbit cook with a single pot.  It was time to test a new Therm-a-Rest NeoAire Xlite air pad.  My Big Agnes pad no longer held air overnight and was 6 years old.  New gear keeps betting better. The Therm-a-Rest, with pump sack weighs only 15 oz., a 5 oz. improvement.

My claim for Comfort light backpacking is a 15 lb. base weight.  For this trip, my actual was 16 lbs. – close enough.  With overnight food and water, I left the car at 21 lbs.  (I don’t really count fuel separately anymore, since for this trip it was 3 Esbit tabs – 1.5 oz.)  Everything packed easily into my 2800 cu. in (46 L) RayWay pack, with the extension collar almost completely rolled down on top.  Now over 7 years old, it is still a very comfortable pack to carry. Continue reading →

The price of nothing

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Price of nothing“You pay a lot for what you don’t get.” This has long been my advice to people confronting the higher cost of lighter weight sports equipment. At some point I wondered if there was a representative price for the privilege of shaving off pounds. I looked at a couple of cases comparing lower cost, heavier items with their high-tech cousins. $100 per pound saved looks typical. This order of magnitude number seemed to work whether the weight savings were a pound or a few ounces.

Of course it makes a difference whether you are choosing between two items to purchase, or buying something to be lighter than what you already own.

Replacing my pack

I owned a pretty good Gregory internal frame pack, weighing 3 lbs. 3 oz. I replaced it with a Ray-Way pack kit with a finished weight of 12 oz. The kit cost me about $80 with extra parts. That’s a savings of 2 lbs. 7 oz. If I don’t charge for my labor, that’s about $33 per pound saved. Looks like a good deal. If I couldn’t or didn’t want to make a kit, I would need to look elsewhere. Continue reading →

Beyond the bag

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P1010117-001I sleep cold. I have always needed sleeping bags rated at least 15 degrees colder than the conditions I expect. Once I made that adjustment, I have logged a lot nights in a variety of bags with a variety of fills. My current approach focuses on staying just as warm while carrying less weight.

Sleeping equipment is one of the “big three” in moving to lightweight backpacking. So I looked for a lighter solution, and decided to try a quilt. Continue reading →