My First Down Foray

**stalker42** · 11-13-2013, 20:25

Well here it goes. My first shot at a down UQ. I have to say that down is NOT my friend however it will be in my house for a long long time... in my house, on my table, on my furnature and every other darn place it can get. First a shout out to, well just about everyone on HF for all the info and help they provided without which I never would have even attempted this. The catsplat down calc was absolutely invaluable. I used precut baffle material supplied by Dutch. Let me tell you a few things about this stuff. Dutch sent me a nice big roll of precut no see em netting and it was wonderfull to work with. I just calculated the total amount I needed and it arrived cut to width in a single continuous roll. The width was very even though out the entire roll, much more so then if I tried to cut it myself. It worked out well that it came in one long roll also since the finished length of the UQ was not what it started out as due to my wonderfully deficient measureing skills. It really was a pleasure to work with and I highly recommend having Dutch do all the dirty work of measureing and cutting it all out. Great job guys on yet another great product. I used 850 fill down and the shell is made of Argon which is great stuff. Slick as all get out but not really any worse than sil.

A fast story about working with down. I used the old wet/dry vac to suck and blow the down into the chambers which worked wonderfully after the first attempt. Important safety tip...... when you blow the down into the camber make sure you have a secure grip on the shell... I, I am sorry to say, did not have said secure grip.

I turned on the power to blow the down out, the shell went shooting across the room and a ounce of down exploded into the air of my dinning room to fall like a winters cascade of snow over EVERYTHING. you know.... 1 oz of down does not really look like THAT much when its in a bag. Oh and of course my wife was sitting there watching me at the time....sigh.Anyway I moved into the bathroom and it worked seamlessly from then on.

**Dutch** · 11-13-2013, 20:30

I love the two tone look. That really turned out nice. The down never really goes away.

**fallkniven** · 11-13-2013, 20:39

Ha, wish I was there to see that. The quilt came out real nice.

**FLScouthanger** · 11-13-2013, 22:49

Looks great!

**SimonMc** · 11-13-2013, 23:16

That looks really great.

I can see that down flying everywhere - thanks for the visual

. The look on your wife's face would have been priceless, well at least I can picture my wife's - I know it well.

**Mouseskowitz** · 11-13-2013, 23:23

Make a video next time.

Nice work. Having cut baffle material, I can say you made a wise choice. Dutch probably has some easy way of doing it, but I don't.

**LostCause** · 11-13-2013, 23:26

Nice work!

**gmcttr** · 11-13-2013, 23:34

Originally Posted by stalker42

:lol...I, I am sorry to say, did not have said secure grip.

...

I had a SINGLE piece of down I was trying to get rid of today OUTSIDE. Three attempts from several feet away and it would slowly be sucked back to my hammock every time. I finally walked around the corner of the house and let it go in a breeze blowing away from the hammock.

Good luck with your one ounce indoors...and at the risk of being repetitious...

**e_2** · 11-14-2013, 00:46

Oooohh nice. Racing stripe! Design choice or just a matter of available material?

I'm ready to sew up my UQ, but not enough down yet. I might have to resort to wildernesslogics.com in order to get a (roughly) 0º quilt. I may still change my mind and go with climashield/primaloft.

Hearing your struggles makes me doubt the down decision... especially since my shopvac doesn't blow (no exhaust port for hose), and I don't have an accurate enough scale right now.

**stalker42** · 11-14-2013, 01:40

The two tone idea was blatant theft from Underground Quilts. I wanted something a little different. It sure added to the challenge getting everything matched up right. I was afraid to measure the down so I used the calsplat down calculator and entered my basic ideas then tweaked the numbers so each baffle got 1oz of down. Then I ordered the 1oz bags from wilderness logics.

I will never cut baffle material knowing how much easier it is to have Dutch and crew do it. Whatever magic they use is beyond my simple mortal skill.

I was able to recover most of the down..... Well I should say a lot of the down but a ounce is one honking bunch of stuff when it's let free to fly on its own..... All over my dining room. My wife already posted a picture on Facebook with me standing in a blizzard of goose stuff.