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Quote: Originally posted by ktdaisy on 09/6/2009

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I would say roughly, erring on the side of caution and not wanting to be too specific or scientific but at the same time realistic, and obviously on a wholly personal front and in my own honest and firmly held belief around 1mm.

Katie

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Q. How much rain is too much?

A. when you roll of your airbed only to find you are knee deep in water.

Yes this has happened to me all be it a long time ago when all tents were canvas. We were on a canoe camp with about 20 tents in a field next to the river, it didn’t stop raining the whole time we were there. All the others were sleeping on the floor or on camp beds and when the river burst it’s banks they soon found out & evacuated the field, I was sleeping blissfully on my airbed which started to float within the tent. I awoke in the morning & could still hear the rain on the outside of the tent but wasn’t bothered because I was still dry & snug in my bed. That was until I went to get out, yes the water was knee deep & my tent was the only one left in the field & as I looked out there was everyone else standing on high ground laughing at me but at least I had a good nights sleep so I had the last laugh.

It's a fact...you can have a flysheet made of top quality 5000HH material but as soon as you put a seam in it, you're punching it full of holes. It's very rare for a tent to leak directly though the canvas and very common for it to leak through seams and zips. Thing is you can tape and seam seal the seams six ways till Christmas but pitching a tent can and does stress the seams and sometimes a couple of stitching holes open again, even in the best tents. And the more seams you put in a tent the more chance there is of this happening. I've seen tents with window panel + mesh panel + zip down outside panel + inside curtain panels...ie four sets of seams round the same area, and half odf them with zips too. No wonder the bloomin' thing will leak...that's not a flysheet, that's lacework!

My advice? If your leaks are definately not caused by condensation, they're only miniscule ie a couple of drops, you can see daylight at a couple of stitch holes and you're otherwise pleased with a tent...seam seal it and get on with camping.

Q. How much rain is too much?

A. when you roll of your airbed only to find you are knee deep in water.

Yup thats happened to me too!!! was fun..... air beds float.........

when is too much though..... well TBH as long as the tent stays dry id say it doesnt matter really... last summer it was sunny for 2 days out of 2 weeks and it didnt bother us too much...

I have just returned an Outwell Nebraska XXL from 2007 as it leaked.  I got store credit as it was more than a year old but will now have a dry tent.

We tried sealing the seams and fabsil but I am sure you know due to the size of the tent this is difficult.  Nothing worked.  The entire grey fabric leaked.