I am planning on buying a tent for autumn and possibly winter weekend camping. What hydrostatic head would be best? Is 2000 enough or do I need 3000 or more?
For that ime of year I'd concentrate on tents that can cope with wind etc. though hydrostatic head is suposed to be a good guide it seems fairly abused by some manufacturers (and is meaningless i the wind has flattened the tent!)
Are you talking winter weekends on campsites where there is some shelter or wild camping?
If you can cope with leaving a lot of gear in your car I'd go for a smaller more specialised tent for the later months, with just enough room to sit and cook etc. (smaller means they warm up quicker too!)
September, October and November are normaly not very wet and any rain is not likely to be very heavy so HH of 2000 would be sufficent.
The area you proably need to look at are bucket style groundsheet or "mud flaps" which will keep out cold draughts while still providing ventilation. Wind could be a problem especially in the North and Scotland over the next few weeks with severe gales possible in Scotland.
The Southwest will have the best weather during the next 2 to 3 weeks - so I am heading off to Somerset at the end of the month
The British army reckons that 1500 HH equates to totally waterproof so I dont see how a tent that is 3000 or 5000 HH can be more waterproof ,because surely waterproof is waterproof and if its not a question of different degrees of waterproof then the HH figures quoted over 1500 are meaningless and probably just a sales gimmick used by manufacturers.
September, October and November are normaly not very wet and any rain is not likely to be very heavy so HH of 2000 would be sufficent.
The area you proably need to look at are bucket style groundsheet or "mud flaps" which will keep out cold draughts while still providing ventilation. Wind could be a problem especially in the North and Scotland over the next few weeks with severe gales possible in Scotland.
I would agree with dave-t, look for the storm flaps rather than concentrating on HH.
------------- Carpe Diem
Started in Tents, then trailer Tent and now Caravan.
Quote: Originally posted by beezers on 10/9/2006
Both of ours have a HH of 5000, I thought the bigger the HH the better.
The HH indicates the amount of water the material will stand per square CM (I think)
The higher the HH the better. However, what is important is not the amount of rain that falls, but the rate at which it falls.
15mm of rain in a day should not a problem for any tent. If 15mm of rain falls in an hour that is a different story and could cause flooding and probably push the waterproofing of a tent to be compromised.
The Southwest will have the best weather during the next 2 to 3 weeks - so I am heading off to Somerset at the end of the month
So how come I got sunburnt at Leuchars Airshow yesterday - we had an absolute scorcher of a day and today wasn't much cooler - yes in September and in Scotland.
Quote: Originally posted by Mature-Student on 10/9/2006
Hi
We just got ourselves a tent with a sig for spring/autumn camping.
Another thing to remember to get is delta pegs as they will help your tent stay up even in very strong winds.
I was amazed to see how many people do not bother to peg their tents out. Last weekend we had a storm that lasted for a couple of hours and there were a couple of Gelert kites flying around the campsite
we have vrx scenic 4.4. Went away for week in very windy weather and storm previous week of camping. Yes it stands up well BUT it did move a little that was more likely to be our bad pitching as it was windy when we arrived and we rushed it quite a bit but another identical tent on site looked great!!!!