:Danother thing i dont like about underquilts is they look wierd lol:cool:neo
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:Danother thing i dont like about underquilts is they look wierd lol:cool:neo
Neo, having said all of that in favor of pads, and about all of the threads with folks confused when they were not near as warm as expected with their uQs, I must say I have personally never had such problems unless something was obviously out of adjustment and I could always fix it.
I also put my Claytor No Net near the top of the heap, but I have never used a pad in it. But:
1:I have been warm at temps from 40F down to 10F ( with addition of space blanket ) using this Claytor with a PeaPod. I have never for one moment come close to a cold back using this 20F rated Claytor/pod combo. I have also never seen a thread where someone complained of a cold back in a PeaPod at or above rated temps. Some things just always work!
I can't quite reach the 20F rating on top due to the way all hammocks raise the top layer of the pod off my body. But once I add the clothes I have with me any way to fill the gaps, I can come real close, and if I add even the lightest summer TQ, I can easily exceed 20F on top, especially in the narrow Claytor. So many of the little variables that can make a quilt cold just don't seem to be a problem with a Speer PeaPod.
2: Never had problem down to 10F or heard of a problem from anyone having a cold back using a JRB MWUQ and a JRB BMBH. There are so few adjustment variables with that combo that it is hard to get it wrong. In fact, I'm not certain any of these threads I've seen that are complaining of cold are ever about a JRB MWUQ no matter which hammock is used, bridge or gathered. I had a taost 18F very windy night with an MWUQ on a WBBB. Just curious: any one here been cold with an MWUQ on any hammock? I suspect it is a suspension thing, but who knows. But I can tell you that not once have I felt a hint of cold with a JRB bridge/MW combo.
3: Once I learned to get my suspension tight enough, I have never been cold ( nor has my step-son) with my Climashield Warbonnet Yeti. Now it has to be tight enough, and must be positioned perfectly at my neck/shoulder intersection, and this can get out of whack when I move in my sleep plus it has a tendency to slip off my left shoulder if I breath ( all solved with a quick adjustment), but as long as it is positioned correctly and tight enough, I am toasty. I have been warm using it on a WBBB in the 40s using one 2.5 oz layer of CS in it (~ 10 oz total quilt weight ) and wearing no other layers, and my step-son was toasty his 1st night using it on his Claytor No Net, with 3 layers of CS installed, in the 20s. He was always warm for one full week of cold temps in Wyoming at 10,000 feet, plus on other trips in the 30s with 2 layers. Any one here ever seen complaints of being cold in a WB Climashield UQ? Oh, OK, it's true: there are only a handful of them out there, sadly. Still, I don't think any one has ever reported a problem. And Cannibal has used one extensively.
So what I'm getting at is: maybe it is not so much UQs that is the problem, but certain UQs used on certain hammocks. Maybe it is all a matter of correct adjustment. And it would seem that some combos are just much easier to get right every time, and hard to get wrong.
Maybe what it is is: If you have adequate loft, snugged up nicely against your back with zero gaps and zero drafts along the edges or sides, AND no bunching up of the hammock fabric creating little ridges/tunnels for cold air to travel through like this:
http://www.hammockforums.net/gallery...3036_thumb.jpg http://www.hammockforums.net/gallery...3037_thumb.jpg
then maybe if all of the above you are just as certain to be warm as with a pad, while being even more comfy and saving some bulk. But the devil can be in the details! Also notice that re: those little ridges/tunnels in the above pic, a BMBH has no such "funnels", and a PeaPod cinches tight around the hammock on the ends, covering the entire potential path of cold air travel.
That's great that the OP feels comfortable with a pad. No gear is "one size fits all" and what works for one doesn't necessarily work for everyone else. I'm 30+ years buying up gear and seen a lot in my pursuit to keep getting outdoors.
Being a warm sleeper, the OP sounds like he's tweaked his system to where he needs to be, is comfortable and confident with it and probably saved a lot of $ in the process. If the pad works, great!
The 'Art of the Possible'. That's what I like most about this forum. I love the fact that Neo and others prefer pads and can explain how they get them to work so well in cold temps. I also love the comments about UQs and responses from guys BillyBob58 that contrast the options.
My limited experience has shown me that I actually haven't gotten the pad method right over the last 6 months but have managed to 'dial-in' my recently purchased Hammock Gear Incubator in just a couple of hangs. I always slept a bit cold in my pad setup, but knew that others like Neo have gotten right - so I kept reading the forums and just kept adjusting it every time I camped. For me it just took far less time to get my UQ setup to my personal taste. With both there is quite a bit of fiddle involved, but I think UQs have come a long way since the early days (addition of baffles and improved suspension etc.) and are far easier to setup than they once were. I just cinched my Incubator up, adjusted it to remove any gaps and settled in for the night.
Bottom line is that you can be wonderfully comfortable with either method, but it has a lot to do with your personal setup, your preferences and the knowledge shared in these forums.
When I got into hammocking, I used a pad, too, simply because I had one and wasn't entirely sure if I would stick with the whole hammocking thing. I have to say that I liked the feeling of the pad (a Therm-a-Rest) in the hammock (a WBBB). The pad was plenty warm, and it kept the hammock open. The only problem I had was cold shoulders and that my feet slipped of the pad occasionally.
During the summer, it worked fine for me. But when the temperature dropped, the cold shoulders became a big problem. Therefore I bought an underquilt. It took me half a year and many nights to get it to work as it was supposed to be. I think underquilts need a lot more fiddeling than pads. If I were you, I wouldn't give up yet. You already spent the money, so just keep trying. The problem I had with my underquilt was, that it was prone to sag and create pockets of (cold) air. The underquilt only works if there is no gap between you and the quilt. If you can keep it from sagging, you'll find that it is better suited to hammocking than a pad - mainly because it covers the shoulders as well.
I only ever used a full length underquilt; I wasn't aware that a 3/4 underquilt might have similar problems. But what I did is this: I added shock cords to the head and foot end of the quilt to keep it from sagging. This and pulling the main suspension pretty tight. Maybe this will help you as well.
sounds more like the operator error than the underquilt :D