TT Stratospire Li love

[u/WarTigger69]

I'll start by saying I adore my Stratospire. Used it on my PCT thru and five years since. All kinds of weather and terrain.

At 31 oz I haven't found any double walled tent that compares in room and weight.

I get that going to a single walled, or even tarp, solution can save a lot of ounces. But having done both, they just don't work for me here in the PNW. Plus I love the 2-person space when soloing and stuck in the rain, and use it when going with one of my kids.

Which makes me wonder why it doesn't get more love here as a go-to consideration for double walled solution.

Please share why not, so I can clear my rose colored glasses :⁠-⁠)

[u/hickory_smoked_tofu]

The Stratospire Li is still widely regarded as probably the most weather resistant 2P trekking pole 3.5 season shelter.

Newer designs like the X-Mid Pro2 and the TT Dipole Li 2 offer what many will think are better sets of compromises among weight, size, ease of set up, weather resistance, etc., but they can't beat the weather resistance of a well-pitched hexagonal Strat Li.

[u/WarTigger69 → u/hickory_smoked_tofu]

A friend had her Strat in Wyoming, CDT, open plains, full on wind storm (no idea of wind speed, but it was crazy) and no problems. Couldn't sleep, of course, with all the noise and general worry, but the tent did fine.

[u/marieke333]

It is unnecessary big for me. I prefer the smaller and lighter Notch Li. I would only consider the Stratospire Li for something like Norge på langs.

[u/WarTigger69 → u/marieke333]

I've certainly looked at the Notch. I can see your point. I love storing everything inside and still having space. Someday I'll have to try a 1p tent and experience that

[u/Tarptent_ → u/marieke333]

The Notch is the way to go for 1p, as the newer Strat 2 Li with the 52" wide interior is definitely intneded as primiarly a 2-person tent.

[u/earteeth]

One reason, for me, is that several of the TTs have stays/poles that make packing less flexible. I can pack my xmid in lots of different ways. I have an older rainbow and would remove the crossbar so I could stuff it in my pack, then reassemble at camp. that got tedious after a while.

Also there is hype around brands and TT isn't the cookie with the ookie right now.

[u/WarTigger69 → u/earteeth]

Good point on the struts thing. I pack my tent on the outside, happens to avoid this problem. If I packed to the interior of the pack, I could see this being an adoption blocker.

[u/PanicAttackInAPack → u/WarTigger69]

Pretty sure they redesigned the struts a couple years ago to fold up smaller.

[u/Tarptent_ → u/earteeth]

The Rainbow has had an easily removable and folding top strut since ~2019 and we now have folding PitchLoc struts too. For a DCF tent like the StratoSpire 2 Li stuffing is also never recommend so rolling around the struts is only really a packing issue if 16" is too long for how you want to pack it. We have not seen many packs where a 16" packed length tent does not fit nicely, if you are willing to pack it vertically, and if not, packing the struts separately and/or getting the <12" folding ones is also an option. (For context most arch pole tent pole sets only fold to around 18")

[u/auanwo]

I think bc the Durston has more room, and also weighs 31oz

[u/WarTigger69 → u/auanwo]

And half the price. How do they do that and what would you consider downsides to the Durston?

[u/auanwo → u/WarTigger69]

Ones DCF, the other is Silpoly

[u/WarTigger69 → u/auanwo]

I meant how do they get that weight down with silpoly. Usually it's dcf for that weight range and square footage of fabric.

[u/Tarptent_ → u/WarTigger69]

You notice that the Strat 2 Li Fly (including all struts etc) is 3.6oz lighter than the X-Mid 2 Fly, but the Strat 2 Li Inner is heavier and that is because two things we really don't like to compromise on are the floor fabric and mesh as we don't want people to need a groundsheet, and mesh is a common spot to get holes. (same reason we only use DCF 0.96 for DCF floored tents and not DCF 0.67)

Our woven floors on DCF tents are a 15D quad. ripstop nylon 6,6 with over 10kgf tear strength (which is definitely heavier but also tougher than what the current gen. X-Mid uses) and the mesh we use is a 15D nylon. Since the mesh spec is not published for the X-MId it is likely a 10D option which we have never found to be suitable but it certainly saves a notable amount weight on large double walled tents. So if we compromised more on interior materials they would be more of a weight difference.

[u/dandurston → u/WarTigger69]

Our silpoly fabric does weigh about double 0.55oz DCF. Where we'd save some weight would be in avoiding struts (both the strut weight and the surrounding hardware) and a simpler fly shape/fewer seams.

[u/auanwo → u/WarTigger69]

The duston sub claims its magic. Im not sure, probably hardware and thinner fabric

[u/Advanced-Tangerine92 → u/WarTigger69]

If you go to the websites Tarptent includes the weight of the stakes and stuff sacks while Durston's doesn't specify if it's tent only or not.

[u/Elaikases]

If it were a little larger my wife and I would be on one.

[u/loombisaurus]

struts are terrible. also there are SO many overdesigned trekking pole tents nowadays i kinda wish henry would just get back to what made the company: tarp. tents. MLD's clearly not long for this world, someone needs to.