Pyramid Tent WIP

[realunlucky]

Good to know. Like I said I tend to over think stuff like this and hence my tent project sits off to the side.

Like I've said whatever it takes for piece of mind is worth the work in the end.

I have read where plenty of people have built tarps for hamacks using only silicone to glue silnylon seams together with no stitching at all without any reported failures. I prefer a touch more insurance myself for anything I didn't consider light duty.

Sorry for the slight thread derail


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[gudspelr]

Like I've said whatever it takes for piece of mind is worth the work in the end.

I have read where plenty of people have built tarps for hamacks using only silicone to glue silnylon seams together with no stitching at all without any reported failures. I prefer a touch more insurance myself for anything I didn't consider light duty.

Sorry for the slight thread derail

Not at all. These are the good type of tangents that I appreciate about a number of my favorite threads out there. Seeing how some folks do stuff and what works is great information to be shared.


Jeremy

 

[Flydaho]

gudspelr - your shelter is looking great! Can't wait to see it when it's complete. I'm jealous that they didn't have the XL fabric in stock when i built my shelter as the 11'x11' footprint would be a palace!

One suggestion I do have (by looking at the picture of your seam) is to increase the stitch length. It looks like you are at the lower end of the stitch length (stitches per inch or SPI) setting on your machine. When doing research on tent making, I found that you want to be in the ballpark of 8-10 stitches per inch. I pulled out my Hilleberg Nammataj and Cabela's Alaskan Guide tents to see what they used, and it was more around 6-8 stitches per inch. I maxed out my machine at this 6 - 8 SPI mark and it worked great. You can use the grid pattern on the material to help keep track of the SPI, but it will vary because the material doesn't like to feed at a consistent pace the entire time. Also, check thread tension as i see your stitches are angled (which is nearly unavoidable when sewing such thin material, but it doesn't hurt to try and eliminate it). It's looking great and please keep us updated on your build!

 

[gudspelr]

Flydaho-
I feel fortunate that they now have the wider Silpoly. Wanting enough room for comfort with a few kids, gear, and a stove was high on the list of "wants". And thanks for the information on stitch length-I had no idea what the standard was. My machine is fairly old (1950's) and I have the length maxed out. I grabbed a ruler and it appears there's 8 stitches in the inch I measured. Though, like you mentioned, it is difficult to keep everything super consistent because of the material feeding through... It's challenging, but I'm looking forward to having a cool tent at the end .


Jeremy

 

[gudspelr]

So, I got some more done tonight. I rolled the seams on two of the panels and got them stitched, ran out of oomph before getting the third wall done. For clarification, here's a picture that illustrates the seam I had used. It's at the bottom labeled French/flat felled hybrid:




You can see where it would leave those holes you can see through on one side... It may have been just fine, but I like how it ended up:




Also, I rolled up one of the walls and put it on a food scale we had in the kitchen. It's a dial type, so maybe not super accurate, but it weighed 8.5 oz. The idea of having this big of a shelter that may come in under 4 lbs (hopefully) is making me feel pretty happy. I managed to make my mind up on vents and stove jack placement, too. I think there will be two vents, one on the left and right panels and the stove jack will go on the back wall.

After I get the third wall finished up, I'll get the zipper cut and sewn in.

Jeremy

 

[zeroforhire]

^ very cool. I'm super excited about the progress you have made. What are your plans for the bug netting?


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[530Chukar]

Only thing that concerns me is the seam style on the thin material, but perhaps its an unfounded concern. With that style seam the one side of stitching has no layers of material underneath it so when tension is applied to the seam and the stitching holes open up a bit (which they do on that stuff) you can see daylight through them. Not sure if seam sealer addresses that issue fully? It otherwise is a more convenient seam to sew on that slippery stuff that's for sure. William are you using that seam style or are you folding/pinning to get both stitch lines on stacked material?

I built the same tent about a month ago with the Silpoly XL. I noticed a huge difference in the amount of stretch between silpoly and silnylon. Using the flat felled seams with the Silpoly I was not able to see light through the stitches as I could with the silnylon. It spent a few days in the Black Rock Desert this last weeks and sounds like it held up very well to the winds.

I think I was able to do mine with an 8ft ceiling at 14 yards of fabric. All said and done was around $250. I could see it being quite a bit cheaper using 2nds.




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[gudspelr]

^ very cool. I'm super excited about the progress you have made. What are your plans for the bug netting?

I bought some noseeum netting and plan on making little triangular shaped panels to sew up at the peak. The plan is to basically do it like is outlined in the Bearpaw Wilderness video I mentioned-sew to the inside, cut out the Silpoly, then fold the excess Silpoly and stitch again, through the layers. Hopefully it will leave a nice clean look-we'll see how it actually goes when it comes time...

Jeremy

 

[gudspelr]

Chukar, thanks for the info. It also reminded me to go look at the invoice of materials I ordered.

.67 oz noseeum mesh, qty 2, $8.50
1.1 oz Silpoly XL 2nds (foliage green), qty 16, $95.20
420D Robic ripstop nylon, qty 1, $6.00
Stove jack material, qty 1, $15.00
#8 YKK coil zipper, qty 10, $5.50
YKK coil slider-standard, #8 /Double, qty 2, $1.40
Gutterman Mara 70 thread, $3.60 per roll (I got three, not wanting to run out-there's no chance I will, there's a lot...)
Add in some grosgrain ribbon of various widths that you want for tie out/stake down points and away you go. That's not added in, but the rest is $135.20. And the grosgrain is only $3.75 or so per yard depending on the width you get. Plus, I have plenty of extra Silpoly, so if I'm not counting my time, I feel like it's money well spent. I'll also need to add in a center pole to the cost, which will likely be a decent chunk since I want to go the carbon fiber route from Ruta Locura...

I got the double pulls for the zipper so I could grab them from inside or outside the tent easily and I wanted two so I could unzip it from the top for more venting if I really wanted to. As I mentioned earlier in the thread, I got some other peak reinforcing material along with the 420. It was HyperD 300 diamond ripstop. It was $4.65, so not exactly breaking the bank if I didn't use it. I think I'm going to go with the 420...but not completely sure.


Jeremy

 

[zeroforhire]

Perfect. Thanks for the shopping list.


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[gudspelr]

Figured I'd resurrect this thread. I'm bummed that photobucket crapped out and the pics no longer show... But-i have made significant progress. I got stalled with stuff going on this summer and if I'm being honest, the zipper installation had me a little worried, too. I finally managed to just get to it and I'm glad I did. As of this evening, I have all four walls done and joined together .

There's still a ways to go, but having the whole thing actually resemble a tent is pretty cool. Here's what still needs to happen:
-Roll the bottom edge all the way around.
-Add in reinforcement pieces* and stitch on the stake down/guy out loops.
-Make the vents and sew them in.
-Make the stove jack and sew it in.
-Add peak reinforcement (definitely inside, maybe an outside piece?).
-Add in some loops on the interior for a clothes line.
-Sew up a stuff sack for it all.
-Seam seal.

I weighed it tonigjt, as is and it came in at 2 lbs 5 oz. I'm feeling fairly good at this point.

*I'm a little torn on how to proceed in regards to the reinforcement "patches". On my tarp, I glued them all on, then rolled the edge and stitched the patches, as well. The problem is, the tent is huge... I don't know where I can get a big enough space to actually lay the whole thing out to do the same kind of thing. If I did a little at a time, I'd end up wasting seam sealer each time I mixed some up (I can never figure it out for exactly the right amount..) and days to let one set dry, then the next, etc. Does anyone have some thoughts on just stitching the reinforcement patches on? Is it better to go the longer route and get them glued on?

Thanks for any help/insight. I'm going to try and get some more pics as I go and get them onto a different account and add them to this thread.

Jeremy

 

[gudspelr]

I'm fairly excited-I got the tent up this evening for the first time . I only have stake down loops on the four corners and there's a little ways yet to go on the details, but it's pretty cool to see the tent up. I'm trying to figure out the whole Imgur thing on my phone, we'll see if I can post some pics. It wasn't a very good (tight) pitch, I used my trekking poles and they weren't terribly stable, so the tent was a little saggy. I'm planning on going the carbon fiber pole route. Tomorrow, I'll see if I can get things better and get some good measurements on it all.

Imgur: The most awesome images on the Internet

 

[William Hanson (live2hunt)]

Looking good

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[colonel00]

Looks great. A couple suggestions. When you do guyout points, I'd suggest doing them on the side walls and on the corners. This will allow you to pull up the corners for some more vertical walls. I had this done to my Cimarron by live2hunt and it's nice. I recently got caught in a heavy snow that accumulated on the tent and weighed down the sides. The Cimarron is pretty big for one person and I woke up in the night, laying next to the pole, and the walls were coming in on me. Before I knew it, my pole snapped and it was a fun scamper in the cold and wet to get trekking poles and a branch in place. Unfortunately I hadn't run those corner guyouts when I originally pitched the tent but the next morning, I rigged them up and it helped quite a bit. I've got some video that I need to upload that will illustrate what I mean.

Also, when you do the loops on the inside, also put some down lower too. A good place is on the opposite side of the guyout points that are on the outside. This will allow you to run a nest on the inside and pull the nest walls out a bit. If you aren't planning to use a nest, these loops can still be useful to tie up a bivy or just to run a second clothes line or to tie up some gear out of the way.

Extra Guyout Points on Seek Outside Cimarron - YouTube
[video=youtube_share;wyumMezL9Dw]https://youtu.be/wyumMezL9Dw[/video]

Inside the Seek Outside Cimarron with extra guyout points - YouTube
[video=youtube_share;rxSI1-X5_lc]https://youtu.be/rxSI1-X5_lc[/video]

 

[gudspelr]

Brad-thanks for the videos and suggestions. I may go ahead and add those in since I'm still going to be sewing on it all. I'd planned on doing some different tie out loops on the inside to hang a mosquito net or other things, putting some of them on the inside of the tie out points is a good idea. Can't wait to see how this finishes out.

Jeremy

 

[gudspelr]

It's dangerously close to done, now. I've sewed on so many stake down, guy out, and reinforcement points that I'm glad it's about finished. The vents and stove jack are all sewn in. The only thing that has to be done is making one more vent hood and sewing both on. Then it's seam sealing time. I'm pretty excited for how it's all turned out. Up to now, the tent weighs in at 2 lbs, 11 oz. The Ruta Locura pole is a little under a pound, can't remember off the top of my head. I'm loving the pole, but the only thing that bugged me was it'd keep falling apart when trying to put it in the tent. The pieces aren't held together with anything so I'd lose the bottom couple pieces when moving the pole into position. So, I got out the shock cord, an 1/8" drill bit and fished it through the pieces and end caps. It now holds together nicely under tension .

When I get it all finished up, I'll take some more pictures and put them on this thread. Another huge shout out to William Hanson (live2hunt). The guy has been an unbelievable help to me through this process. I can't tell you how many dumb questions he's fielded. He clearly knows his stuff. If you're in the market, I wouldn't hesitate at all to buy a shelter from him.


Jeremy

 

[Kindo]

So, this may sound like a dumb idea but hear me out. I've been lurking around these threads for a while and currently have all the supplies (or so I think) to get the ball rolling on my own shelter.

I know a lot of people have been using pins or clips for keeping material together for the long stitches, but has anyone considered just using a small amount of silicone to bind it together then begin your seams from there? I feel that if you can get the fabric nice and flat (perhaps with a steamer?) then clip it together and silicone it that it might feed better through the machine and give a better seam. Any insight from anyone? I suppose that it might even be slightly beneficial to the integrity of the seam itself?

Nice work though Jeremy. Do you have any pictures of your venting that you put on it? Also, a few pictures of how you reinforced the peak would be nice too.

Thanks,
Kindo

 

[William Hanson (live2hunt)]

So, this may sound like a dumb idea but hear me out. I've been lurking around these threads for a while and currently have all the supplies (or so I think) to get the ball rolling on my own shelter.

I know a lot of people have been using pins or clips for keeping material together for the long stitches, but has anyone considered just using a small amount of silicone to bind it together then begin your seams from there? I feel that if you can get the fabric nice and flat (perhaps with a steamer?) then clip it together and silicone it that it might feed better through the machine and give a better seam. Any insight from anyone? I suppose that it might even be slightly beneficial to the integrity of the seam itself?

Nice work though Jeremy. Do you have any pictures of your venting that you put on it? Also, a few pictures of how you reinforced the peak would be nice too.

Thanks,
Kindo

It works well but is messy and time consuming. You have to let it dry overnight or it slides. It can also gunk up your needle. That said there are applications that I will do this. The steamer is a bad idea as silnylon takes on some water.

Live2hunt custom shelters

 

[Fish N Chips]

I used a white glue stick on my tarp, held it well enough to sew the seams. I then soaked and washed the tarp to remove the white glue, and seam sealed it. I think I got the idea from Ray Jardines book?

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[Kindo]

I used a white glue stick on my tarp, held it well enough to sew the seams. I then soaked and washed the tarp to remove the white glue, and seam sealed it. I think I got the idea from Ray Jardines book?

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Good Idea! That's similar to what I was thinking. I was even thinking of just a light silicone solution that could be brushed on in a light coat.