Cold Weather Gear Test & it's your fault

[dkurfiss]

Seeing everyone testing out their cold weather gear set up has given me the bug. So here we go:

Location:
Unheated Garage

Gear:
Turtle Stand
HH Explorer
JrB The Nest (25 - 30F rating)
DIY top Quilt (rating unknown)
Hot water bottle
2nd down blanket rated to 30F if needed

Clothing
UA hat
fleece top/bottom
down booties

Weather

Tonight Mostly clear, with a low around 17. West wind 7 to 14 mph.


My goal for tonight is to test the temp rating (no wind which is why I am set up in my garage) for my UQ and TQ. When I purchased the DIY TQ I was told by the guy who built it he had used it down to 20F. Last time I tried it I think I got it down to 40 and I froze my butt off but the wind was blowing on me bad so I do not believe that was a valid test. The temps in the garage tonight should go down to at least low 30's as it is 39F out there now and outside temp is 29F.


Assuming all goes well tonight, I will move the set up outside tomorrow night or I will make changes and try it over again.

[BillyBob58]

Hope you make it through the night! I look forward to your results if you do.

[Kaycee]

Have a good night!!!
Let us know the results

[Steelwolf]

Good luck.

[IRONFISH45]

CHICKEN, really testing in the garage. Come on be an idiot, get outside and see if you freeze your backside, much like so many of us have done.

I think of freezing your back side as part of the initiation to Hanging. LOL

[dkurfiss]

CHICKEN, really testing in the garage. Come on be an idiot, get outside and see if you freeze your backside, much like so many of us have done.

I think of freezing your back side as part of the initiation to Hanging. LOL

Oh this will move outside at some point but want to establish lower limits on the gear without wind before I join the ranks of equally dumb

[dkurfiss]

Spent from 10PM to 1AM in the garage. Temp when I went out was 34F and was 29F when I left. I would say that some place in the 30F range is the bottom line for the setup/clothing I used last night. I did not have cold spots but was cold all over which to me indicates I had pretty much reached the bottom limit of the combined gear. What I did not do was add in the down blanket.


The one bright spot was the down booties from REI. My feet were anything but cold and in fact were actually almost too warm.


Tonight will be another night testing in the garage. Below are the changes I am going to make to my set up. I am a spare PL that I may tie over the ridge line also. Anything thoughts on how much that would raise the temps?

Gear:
Turtle Stand
HH Explorer
JrB The Nest (20F rating)
DIY top Quilt (rating unknown)
Hot water bottle
2nd down blanket rated to 30F if needed


Clothing
UA hat
fleece top/bottom
down booties
LL Bean long johns top and bottom

Weather forecasted

Monday
37° | 17° 2° | -9°
Partly Cloudy
Hum.: 57%
Precip.: 10%
Wind: WNW at
12 mph

Tuesday
44° | 28° 6° | -3°
Wintry Mix
Hum.: 59%
Precip.: 100%
Wind: WNW at
8 mph

[BillyBob58]

Well that is the way to test: uber safe. Limits established. So tonight you will add the 30F down blanket on top?

[SemperFiGuy]

dkurfiss,

It depends on how big the poncho liner is, but generally speaking, if its over the ridge line and covering the majority of the exposed top side of the hammock, you can probably plan on 5 to 10 degrees or so. Pretty much the same principle as a sock, but with a sock you'd probably get more like 10 to 15 realistically because of the envelope effect.

Keep up posted. It looks like BillyBob and I are interested in seeing your results.

Just one other thought, and I'm sure some of out other brothers and sisters from the Forum will jump in as necessary.......... Testing in a static environment is a good thing, as you are doing, in order to establish your baseline. Once you add in the element of a howling wind, moisture, either in the form of rain or snow, and/or relative humidity, the paradigm changes and you have to do some new benchmarking.

I know you already know that, but just throwing it in, in the event someone less acquainted may be following the thread.

Over the years, I've kept a journal so that I can pretty much calculate the effect that the variables are going to have on the environment that I'm heading into. (Weather forecast, altitude, wind velocity, expected relative humidity, barometric changes, etc.....).

Speaking only for myself, I don't make those mental calculations because I'm smart, I make them because I've learned by freezing my butt off too many times, what works and what doesn't.

You're on the right path to the necessary benchmarks. Best of luck and keep us posted.

Gil

[Shug]

Our fault???...
We could have been selling you on a Ponzi Scheme. You got lucky feller.
It is fun to figure out how low you can go with what ya' got.
Shug