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 Topic: Leaking Outwell Hartford XL 2012
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18/8/2014 at 1:10pm
Location: Aberdeenshire
Outfit: Outwell Nevada M; Outwell Hartford XL
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Joined: 16/6/2005 Standard Member
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Hoping to get a little advice... Got an Outwell Hartford XL 2012 tent in September 2012. It was out for a weekend the week after it was bought, during which I don't believe it rained much, one week last Summer in the sunshine and one week last week in the Lake District. At the beginning of last week, having been up for a day, we realised that we could feel a very fine drizzle in the central living area when the rain was very heavy. Now I'm no expert, but I should have thought that a tent with a hydrostatic head of 4000mm would be able to remain waterproof under heavy rain? As it's leaking through the actual fabric of the tent, I believe this is a manufacturing fault and that the tent is not fit for purpose. It is also leaking in two other spots near seams and these are clearly faults. I had a Vango Diablo 900 for 7 years which saw a great deal more of wind, rain and hot sun, and it was still fully waterproof when I sold it secondhand in 2012. The retailer, Yeomans, have advised that tents need to be reproofed every year if they have been used a lot, which I don't class mine as. I am grateful for the reproofing liquid they have sent me though was unable to use it as the tent had to be dry to have it put on and it didn't stop raining all week! They have taken out a case for me with Outwell and I am hopeful that they will see fit to replace the tent. Has anyone else experienced this and what was the outcome of any complaint you raised?
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21/8/2014 at 1:11am
Location: chesterfield
Outfit: abbey vogue 620 caravan + Chevy G20
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hi read this what gary put up some time ago about condensation nice little story that explains a lot
Hi campers
I want to tell you a story...
Firstly I hope the people who know me from this forum will agree I give good advise and even though i'm a retailer I tell it how it is...
So, once upon a time (this bank holiday just gone) a family went away with their camper van and steel framed drive away awning, the awning was brand new and looked so nice on the side of their van. Then the rain started and it rain and it poured but the family said "we won't let the rain bother us" and out and about they went. When they got back after a day of splishing and sploshing they noticed a tiny amount of water in the corner of the sewn in ground sheet but they didn't worry as it had been very wet that day.
The family dried off and hung there wet clothing on the chairs to dry and settled down for the night. The rain carried on through the night and the next morning the family ventured out of the camper van into the awning only to find the carpet had wet patches all over it and bigger pools of water in the corners of the awning... Mum and dad were experienced campers and were not at all happy and dad said "i'm going to ring the shop and complain" he was ready for a battle with the retailer. The retailer explained that he was sure it was condensation but dad was having none of it so the retailer was happy to pay to pick the awning up when they got home and very quickly take a look at the awning and test the awning and then if the awning leaked he was going to swap it for the family, dad was very happy as he knew the retailer had a good reputation.
So the family decided to go out the next day in the rain and splish and splosh once again, the kids loved it and once again the family returned home but to their delight the rain had stopped so mum and dad dried of the kids with some towels and then hung all the wet clothing, shoes and towels in the awning to dry. "Off to bed" dad cried to the kids and sweet dreams were had. The next day dad awoke knowing it had not rained all night long so expected to step out into his bone dry awning, you can imagine his shock when he found more water than the last time, "but how could this be" said dad to himself. Well dad took a short walk to the shower block thinking maybe the retailer was right, but on this short trip for his morning shower dad came across an old gent and his wife who had their sleeping bags hanging on their car, he asked if their tent had leaked and the old gent said "how could it of leaked, it hadn't rained last night, no my young man, its condensation and we like to air our sleeping bags in the morning" the old man then started to explain how these new fangled polyester tents can suffer from a lot of condensation and this weekend was the "perfect storm" for condensation, cold outside, lots of damp just in the air and lots of people with wet clothes in there tents.
Dad thought some more and realised his tent had "leaked" last night even though it hadn't rained, dad then rang the retailer and explained this whole story and said, "you know what mr retailer, ill give it another go and thanks for all your advise about venting and keeping wet stuff out of the awning if we can...
Now i'm afraid children there isn't a morale to this story except maybe that camping is camping and by it's very nature it brings you closer to nature...
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Gary Cross - The masked camping guru.
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kevin
camping-online ltd
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21/8/2014 at 8:43am
Location: Scotland.
Outfit: Conway Camargue Lots of Vangos. .
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Not so very long ago you used to get supplied with a tube or bottle of seam sealer with every new tent, with instructions to either go over every seam as a precaution the first trip out or to spot treat any drips. Reason for this is that a tightly pitched tent will pull on the stitching and odd small gaps will open up in the stitching lines, especially where there's a lot of tension. I just assumed this fact of life had continued with new tents, but apparently not so? Mind you it was less of a chore in Ye Olde Days, tents had considerably fewer seams to let in water anyway.
The other fact of life is if you do have condensation in your tent (and who doesn't?) then it will roll down the inside arch of the flysheet until it reaches a seam or some other obstacle and then roll down this to a low point, like a toggle, and then drip from there. This looks exactly like it's the seam that's leaking, yes.
Proof of pudding is to erect the tent on a good dry day, get the hose out and have a really good spray at the suspect seams for twenty minutes at so. Do not cheat and use your pressure washer, this will damage the flysheet! Anyway there will be no condensation present over such a brief period and thus any drips in the tent will be due to a genuine leak, yes. At which point you can let it dry out, dab on a bit of sealant and the problem is fixed, or take a few photos to accelerate the complaints procedure.
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23/8/2014 at 12:34am
Location: Aberdeenshire
Outfit: Outwell Nevada M; Outwell Hartford XL
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Thanks for your comments. I agree that the misting was condensation but I'm less convinced about the leaking seams in question - one in particular is clearly not correctly put together - I may not make tents but I am a very good dressmaker and I know a faulty seam when I see it. Anyway, they are currently offering reproofing and seam sealer. I have protested because I know at least one of the seams is actually faulty but will see how it goes.
I do take the point about the additional strain on the seams - obviously I had to retighten guy ropes etc as there was so much rain so, yes, there could have been more strain than usual on said seams. Having said that, no other seams in the tent actually did leak.
My Diablo was, indeed, one of those 'pain-in-the-neck' double skinned tents and so you may well be correct in that we may have never suffered much condensation due to the sandwich of air between the layers of fabric - that's definitely 'food for thought'. Ultimately I sold it because it was a pain in the neck to pitch - one unfortunate pitching ended up with torrential rain coming down at the pitching inner first stage and my then husband and I had to bail out buckets full of water - because of course the bathtub groundsheet worked exactly like that (wry smile!).
Advice received has made me much less worried about the waterproof-ness of the main fabric of the flysheet - it does, indeed, still bead with rain so it is pretty unlikely that water is getting through the actual fabric thank goodness.
Sadly, I'm afraid, seam sealer is certainly not included any more, and neither is a spare pole. My Nevada M came with a spare pole and separate ferrule in addition to the one, unhelpfully, glued on to the spare pole (unfortunately the ferrule glued on did a reduction in tent pole connection and therefore didn't fit the existing pole it needed to connect to resulting in valuable time being lost desperately trying to get the glued on ferrule off to be replaced with the one in the spares.
I would, also, like to say that, despite not being used much at all, there are, in fact, several bits that have not stood up to any degree of wear - I have a broken plastic buckle type bit that should allow tightening of one of the bedroom edges (broke last Summer on its second outing altogether), another connector of some sort in the panorama room broke on the tent's first outing, and I think something else tore slightly this time out. Now, we're not hard on tents and it's only been out a total of three times, so it's a bit poor so far. My Nevada M has been a lot better value for money so far. Having said that, I love the style of the tent so will get on with repairing the bits that I have to and cross my fingers that Outwell may decide that the tent wasn't that good from the start.
Thank you all for your comments and advice, it's very helpful indeed.
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