Beating the old drum - the best 2-3 person 4 season tent for MC travel?
 

I've been searching around in the forum, looked at the tent article, but still haven't made up my mind...

- Must be lightweight
- Reliable, able to serve for years
- Quickly piching
- Good waterproofness (3000mm or better for outer tent, 5000mm or better for the floor)
- Well venting
- Able to withstand some a bit more extreme conditions (strong winds, very dense rain, some snow, cold)
- Good pice/quality ratio

From my practice 3 or 4 person tent is much better for 2 up travel - we take the critical stuff inside the tent (stuff may be stolen from the bike or if they're left into the additional outer room of the tent during the night). So more space is needed and sometimes some "personal space" is needed if staying long time together = 2 person tents are ruled out! Or they must be very spacy 2 person tents.

So far I've filtered out the following models:

1) Ferrino Aral 3 (4.9kg)
2) Ferrino Syncro 3 (3.4kg)
3) MSR Mutha Hubba
4) Camp XP 3 Plus

Also there are some very good models by Hilleberg and Vaude, but they seem to be very expensive, are they worth it?

Ferrino's Aral 3 seems to be very robust and looks like it'll resist abuse for years, but at the same time Sycro 3 is lighter, much quicker to pitch up, yet it seems more fragile and there's also a bit less space. I don't know anything about MSR Mutha Hubba or Camp. MSR Mutha Hubba looks like very lightweight, easy to put up, altough it's the only 3 season tent in the list of 4 season tents, but looking around the net it looks like it can withstand some cold conditions(?)

Any comments and personal experience on any of these tens, how they'd fit into those criteria? Any other good tent model to add/recommend?

All advice very welcome!

Thanks in advance, Margus

Man, you can get cheaper or less but this is the best one.

Black Diamond Equipment, Ltd. - Ahwahnee

Sorry to tell you due to the price.
bill

My Lord! That's an expensive tent! I need a sit down.

Nope that's not helped.... why on earth does it cost that much? I'm no budget shopper when it comes to kit - but how can that cost that much? Is it made of Gold? :eek3:

Ahhh now I see it's got rather clever material.... blast... now I'm interested....

If there is a single answer to this question, I am interested in it also. I suspect that there is no single answer however; as indicated, price has a part to play. The Black Diamond tent is not so expensive if the exchange rate for the US dollar is taken into account - I guess a European distributor has to be found though because shipping from the US will not be cheap.

I use a Coleman tent (also made in the USA but much cheaper than the Black Diamond) for camping in the UK - it does OK for summer/fair weather camping but I would not expect it to last well in strong winds; my son has bought a tent made by North Face from Cheap Tents . Com - UK Online Shop. Tents, Camping Equipment, Outdoor Clothing
That webpage may be worth a look - I haven't used them personally, but the webpage looks useful.

True - if you have everything there then you're looking at just over £400 and looking at the site you can get international shipping fairly cheap, but you'd get screwed on tax when it came back into the UK... unless you were lucky :-)

Personally I'm really pleased with mine - it's not the smallest in the world but it's solid even in the worst weather - I've been out in some horrible downpours and still nice and dry - the best thing of course is that it has a door front and back - so when I chuck all my kit in the front porch I can still easily get into the sleeping quaters.

Got it from here

http://www.outdoorworld.org.uk/

in their discount tent section - discountinued model - it's the Campus something or other... photo here.. came in around £75.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/8441426...7600027765486/

Tentipi
 

Expensive but will last you a lifetime:
Nordic Outdoor - Tentipi - Arran Model
Might be cheaper in the continent.

I bought an Arran tent last summer, and after years of crawling in tiny tents, I would not go back! Floor removable, can be zipped open so that you can walk in the tent with you rmuddy boots, cook inside, stand, etc.
Tall, spacious.
A bit on the heavy side but that's the only critic I can say.

It has been discussed at lenght in the forum:

http://www.horizonsunlimited.com/hub...hlight=tentipi

Cheers,

See mattch,
You shouldn't have asked.
The Bibler.

Todd Bibler is an American tent designer and I guess that model has more than 25 years of history. Always the same shape and build but they added the extra door when it started production in China. Before that it was sewn in the USA.
I has always been the best.

Yes it is the material.
Works like Gortex but the inside is just a little furry to collect moisture.
The tent is very tough and sheds wind.
Closes tight so no dust either.
Dry in the rain, sleeps about 10 degrees warmer than a nylon tent but cools perfectly if you open the doors.
The light inside is ethereal.
Floor is heavy duty.
There is no fly.
It's the Rover of tents.
bill.