Stuffing the goose

[angrysparrow]

But some of us Hammock Loyalists don't own tents anymore. We burned them. It's the right thing to do you know.

If you own a hammock that can be pitched on the ground, like a HH, you can use it the same way! For that matter, you could probably just take the quilt shell and your down into a HH and stuff while hanging.

[Cannibal]

But some of us Hammock Loyalists don't own tents anymore. We burned them. It's the right thing to do you know.

I have a hard time parting with stuff.

[Nest]

If you own a hammock that can be pitched on the ground, like a HH, you can use it the same way! For that matter, you could probably just take the quilt shell and your down into a HH and stuff while hanging.

You mean a hammock can be usead like a tent? I must now burn my hammock too!

[headchange4u]

Hammock Engineer said he put a large container filled with down on his scale and zeroed the scale out. He then took handfuls of down from the container and it would register how much weight he had removed from the container. I think that's the method I will use.

[FreeTheWeasel]

I had great success using gallon sized ziplock bags. I had a very accurate scale from work and a large (3 pound bag) of down which I split with a friend. I took the ziplock bag, dropped it into the larger bag of down (about the size of a large outdoor leaf bag) and stuffed the ziplock by hand. Because the ziplock was below the level of the larger bag's opening, any down that escaped simply floated down where it joined its brothers. I would stuff what I thought to be the right amount of down, seal the ziplock, and then bring it out of the larger bag and weigh it. A few iterations and I had exactly the correct amount of down +- 1 gram. Be sure to subtract the weight of the empty ziplock.

I had ten baffles so I prefilled ten ziplocks. When it came time to stuff the tubes, I compressed the ziplock to squeeze out the air, shoved it to the back of the baffle, opened the ziplock inside the quilt and inverted it. This left a large plug of semi-compressed down at the end of the quilt. Down loss was minimal and the down was out of the way when it came time to pin and sew the opening shut.

FreeTheWeasel

[tight-wad]

You can still only suck up ~.25 oz of down into the hose. The down compacts in the nylon stocking (I use a mesh tube) and blocks the airflow. So you empty it and start over. Takes a little while, but it's clean and easy...just tedious.

Thanks for all the replies and ideas. The key word is "shop" as in shop vac. My "home" vac just doesn't have the oomph to suck up .25 oz. I'm getting maybe .1 oz. With 1.5 oz per baffle, that's 15 trips. With 10 baffles, that's 150 trips!!!

But, with time off for the holidays, I'll have time to do it little by little.

However, the vacuum definitely keeps the mess down (terrible pun).

I'm now thinking about having someone nearby with the vacuum and "filter wand" going while I grab it and stuff by the handful. That should speed it up and the someone can catch all the strays as I go.

[Nightwalker]

Wet it. It transfers really Easily after that!

(weigh it before wetting, duh.)

[Just Jeff]

Ed sells his down in 3.1 oz bags. Just make sure your chambers are sized for 3 oz and let him do the work for you!

[warbonnetguy]

But some of us Hammock Loyalists don't own tents anymore. We burned them. It's the right thing to do you know.

don't forget to harvest the poles for making curve cuts with

[Nest]

don't forget to harvest the poles for making curve cuts with

Ah yes. Use the remains of our enemies to further our hammocking future.