We have too many tents.

This is a story about how I bought another tent.

When our son Toothless was born, we transitioned from a ZPacks Duplex to a ZPacks Triplex. We evaluated our options and found the Triplex was the best option by our criteria. For our GDT thru with Toothless and all subsequent trips since then the Triplex was reasonable, but the footprint was a hair too large for the interior space. The vestibules take up a lot of space and start to restrict tent sites. Once you restrict tent site selection, then you start to make compromises on the site selection and either choose something not optimal (cold, damp, windy) or can’t find a site and need to hike longer (which is not ideal with kids).

Then when our daughter Lil’ Flier was born, we had a problem. We needed more space. The Triplex wouldn’t work – it doesn’t fit the four of us. But we couldn’t get a tent with a larger footprint. What to do? Bring two tents and have to each solo manage one of the kids? Bring a large tent where all four of us can sleep?

Requirements

• Single tent that can accommodate existing sleep system with minimal changes
  • Don’t want to reinvest in sleep system, or have to each parent manage a kid on our own
  • May need to accommodate a Peapod if Lil’ Flier prefers to sleep in one like Toothless did as a baby
• Pitched footprint comparable to the Triplex
• Weight of the shelter (all in) comparable to the Triplex
• Have a floor (to keep gear/ kids dry)
• Some bug protection
• “Tent” not “Tarp” to avoid escaping children

The 2023 Halfway Anywhere PCT survey showed a surprising amount of Triplex’s on trail. I read reports that in general one could find a site with enough space to fit, with some exceptions. Using the Triplex footprint as a guide seems reasonable.

Options

I leaned towards a 4P mid with these requirements. Some options that do frequently come up:

• Bring two shelters
  • Two 2P tents: one kid + one adult in each tent
  • One 3P tent (Triplex) for 2 kids + adult and a tarp for 1 adult
• Get a TarpTent Hogback. Henry Shires already thought about this and the hogback was the solution.
• Supermid/ or other 4 person mids

For 4 person mids, the following options stand out:

• Supermid (DCF option is the best to be comparable weight to the Triplex)
• Ultamid4P
• Liteway Pyraomm max
• LocusGear Khafra DCF-B

I modeled the 4 person mid options out in CAD and in our apartment building’s common lawn using tarp poles and twine. We laid down, put our sleeping pads down and took a look. This helped me get a feel for how spacious each of the options were, and how large of a footprint they had.

I compared the footprint of the mid options and compared those to the Triplex. The Triplex has a fairly large footprint if you include the vestibules. Although the vestibules can be pitched over a scrubby surface since they are not part of the footprint of the bathtub floor.

This exercise showed that a smaller 4P mid would be pretty comparable to the Triplex footprint and would fit us all comfortably.

Using a 4 person mid basically gives more floor space since it lacks dedicated inner and vestibules as the Triplex. In order to balance clean/dry space with space for wet or dirty gear, I considered a 4/5 or similar configuration. This was considered in my mock up. If you open only one door to enter or exit the tent in wet weather, you should be able to limit having water get onto the bathtub and sleeping space.

The solution

I decided on a LocusGear Khafra DCF-B tent. It’s a 4 person mid on the smaller side that has a very competitive weight. It is made of DCF, has dual peak vents, and has some options for inner.

The reason for this decision was driven by a balance of the features and the weight. The Locus Gear Khafra is a bit smaller, and it comes in DCF, so the total weight of the tent outer is quite a bit lower than the Triplex and gives some room to figure out a floor and bug net.

I have a good friend in Japan who agreed to help me purchase and ship – in case that helped with logistics of buying the tent locally to Japan. However I happened to find someone selling a used Khafra from the US for a reasonable price. It came with an inner and CF pole and extra guy lines.

Instead of using the inner that was provided, or another full dedicated inner, I decided to save some weight:

• MYOG 4/5 bathtub floor
• MYOG perimeter netting

The bathtub floor is removable and not integral to the tent. This would let me leave it at home if needed, replace it, or just use the inner on some trips. This gives us options.

I made the floor out of DCF, which kept it light, and it packs down to an acceptable volume.

I’ll post about the floor design and build in another post.

The perimeter net is being added around the edges using 0.5 oz/yard noseeum mesh. A perimeter net instead of a full inner is chosen to save weight and accommodate the bathtub and for flexibility. The total weight difference between 0.9 oz/yard noseeum and 0.5 oz/yard noseeum is very low – but the packed volume is pretty different. I opted for the less bulky option, which happens to be the lighter option. I am building the perimeter netting to be removable. I will post about this separately.

Pole Configuration

We will be using our trekking poles for the centre poles. We have a pair of adjustable 125 cm poles for Natasha and I to share. Toothless has a pair of similar length poles made from aluminum. Both sets of poles will work for the tent.

The height of the tent requires two poles to be strapped together. Shorter 2P or 1P mids (or our Triplex and other mid-ish variants with 2 poles) only require a single pole.

To strap the poles together, I am using a small cord and alien loop to prevent them from sliding along the length. Then I am using nano straps to keep them together.

In order to accommodate the floor design I need to offset the poles by 10-15 inches from the centre of the tent. This angles the poles a bit. So far in testing this is stable, but it does alter the pitch a bit. I have test pitched a number of times with this configuration and so far the pitch still works but the slope of the front of the tent is different than the slope at the back. I can tolerate and compensate for this.

An alternative option to this is to use all four poles in an A shape, using a DTPE or similar. I chose not to use this as my primary approach to save weight and avoid relying on four poles – if I can pitch the tent with 2 poles then I have some redundancy. I’ll evaluate again when we do our shakedown hikes before the trip.

Tent pegs

For tent pegs I have selected 5x mini groundhogs for the corners and door and 4x MSR carbon core pegs for the other lines.

Tent Stuff Sack

I try to limit stuff sacks and bags, but for the shelter I do tend to use one. If I carry the tent on the outside of the pack (stretchy pocket, etc) I tend to want to want to protect it from brush. If I carry the tent inside I prefer to contain some of the dirt and moisture. For the PCT I will be using a MYOG stuff sack to store the tent instead of the DCF bag that came with it. In my experience tents never fit their bags once they are wet, and by adding the bathtub floor and perimeter netting the volume will increase slightly so I needed a way to contain everything. I carry the tent pegs and the pole straps in a plastic bag, rolled up on the outside of my pack to prevent holes in my gear.

Tent weight/ breakdown

I’ve broken down the weights of the shelter system in our lighterpack.

At the moment, these weights in the table below do not include the stuff sacks.

Overall, I am able to get the shelter system for the PCT with two kids under 5 years old to be lighter than our previous shelter system for the GDT with Toothless without having to go with a tarp.

Element	New Shelter System Mass (gm)	New Shelter System Comments	Triplex – Old System Mass (gm)	Triplex – Old System Comments
Tent body with lines	504		698
MYOG perimeter netting	75	Estimate – 50 gm for netting, 25 gm for other. Perimeter netting in progress.	0	Included with Triplex tent body
MYOG bathtub floor	136	MYOG floor using 0.67 oz/yard DCF	0	Bathtub included with Triplex tent body
MYOG footprint	0	Shouldn’t need unless we do end up hiking the Sierras. Can replace or patch floor without damaging tent. Get polycro in town if needed	75	MYOG polycro footprint since floor is integrated with shelter. We protected the floor to prevent damage to shelter.
Tent pegs Mini groundhogs	5 x 9 gm = 45		10 x 9 gm = 90	Could have used carbon core for some to reduce weight
Tent pegs MSR Carbon Core	4 x 5 gm = 20		0	Could have used carbon core for some to reduce weight
Pole straps	2 x 8 gm = 16	To keep two poles together.	0
Pole strap – yellow line	6	To loop through the handle and keep the poles from sliding down.	0
TOTAL	802		863