Personal Bio

Name: George Griffin
Age: 43
Gender: Male
Height: 5' 7" (1.7 m)
Weight: 223 lb (101 kg)
Email: griffin42 (at) tiscali (dot) co (dot) uk
City: London U.K.
Date: 27 July 2005

Backpacking Background

I have been backpacking since 1986, mainly in the Peak District, Lake District, Wales and Southern England. I am also the London liaison member for the Backpackers Club.  In recent years I have backpacked with two friends.  Most of my trips are from September through to May, I normally get four 4+ day trips in that time, plus the occasional weekend.

Terrain and elevation on these trips can be anything from coastal paths to mountains, sea level to 3,000 ft (900 m). Temperatures range from -5 C to 23 C (23 F to 75 F).

Additional Information

Torso: 53 cm (21 in)
Waist: 99 cm (39 in)

Other lightweight packs owned

Home-made GVP G4
GoLite Gust
GoLite Trek

Product Information

Manufacturer: Six Moon Designs 
Website:www.sixmoondesigns.com
Year of manufacture: 2005
MSRP:  $ 170 
Optional stays $10
         
Listed weight (with stays):     765 gm (27 oz)
Listed weight (without stays): 624 gm (22 oz)

Measured weight (with stays):  780 gm (27.5 oz)
Measured weight (without stays): 652 gm (23 oz)

Capacity: 61 litres (3700 cubic inches)
Size: adjustable to fit torso length from 38 cm to 51 cm (15 to 20 in)
Colour: Gold/Black

Main Features

Advanced Suspension System
Two full length side mesh pockets
Large rear mesh pocket
Padded shoulder straps
Padded hip belt
Dual ice axe loops
Dual hydration ports
Lumbar pad
Aluminium stays (optional)

Materials used in construction

Body: 70 denier silicone nylon
High wear area: 420 denier pack cloth
Extension collar: 30 denier silicone nylon

Field Testing

So far I have managed to use the comet on eleven days.  Of these five were on a backpacking trip, the rest of the time it was used as a large day pack.

The non-backpacking trip was a family holiday in Wales and the pack was used as the main carry all, mainly carrying food, drink, swimming costumes, towels and a beach shelter (which weighed around 2.2 kg (5 lb)) to the beach.  Other times we were just visiting the tourist traps and items carried were normally waterproofs, cameras, food and drink. The equipment carried was for two adults and two young children.  The weight carried for these days were between 3-6 kg (8-15 lb).  Also on this trip to Wales I did two day hikes, one of 10 km (6 m) and one of 16 km (10 m) using the pack, again carrying waterproofs, cameras, food and drink.

During this trip I had removed the hip belt as with such small weights, I didn't really need it attached. I did leave the aluminium stays in though.

I did have a little bit of trouble undoing the straps that attach to the hip belt, mainly pulling the webbing through the ladder lock buckles.

Most of the time when using the pack on this trip, I carried it only on one shoulder and occasionally when it was heavier I would wear it on both.

After this trip I did notice that some of the webbing straps were starting to fray on the ends.

One thing I noticed with the aluminium stays was that although they stayed in the long stay pockets, they did keep popping out of the top near the hook & loop fasteners.

Doh! moment number one

It wasn't until much later that I discovered that there is a pocket on the flap for the top of the aluminium stays to go into.

Field Testing Two

The next time the pack was used, was two weeks later for my 5-day backpacking trip along the South West coast path.
Having packed my equipment into the pack on Saturday afternoon, I left it lying on my bed.  Later that evening I brought the pack downstairs ready for the next day.  In the meantime I was still adding the odd pieces of equipment to the pack when I noticed the rip on the front pocket. (Fig 1).

How this happened I don't have a clue.  As far as I know the pocket never got caught on anything and it definitely wasn't ripped when I got it out of the cupboard.  By the look of the rip, it looks like it came away from the yellow banding but the stitching all looked fine.  The only other way, is that the pocket was overloaded but I don't think the pocket had too much in it. (Fig 2).  Anyway two minutes with a needle and cotton and my wife had repaired it.

Doh! moment number two

When I first received the pack and after checking everything was O.K. I took photographs of the items on the pack which I thought were interesting parts.
One of these was the aluminium stays. I only removed one to photograph and then replaced it exactly the same way.

The night before I left for my trip one of the other testers posted a note on the group enquiring about which way the stays should go, convex or concave. As I had the pack at hand I looked and the stays were convex, so I posted this back to the group.

Next day after arriving at our campsite and before setting up camp my backpacking buddy, Peter was eyeing up the pack.  As normal we were talking and trying out each others new gear.  Peter had the fully loaded Comet on but said that he couldn't get the pack comfortable and felt that something was digging in his shoulders. After taking the pack off and checking the stays in the Comet against the ones in his frame pack we realised the the stays should be concave; this is when we also found the pockets on the top of the stay flaps.

Changing the stays to the correct way did make the pack feel more comfortable.

On returning home I posted back to the group that the stays should be concave and within a couple of days, Ron Moak (the owner of six moon designs) replied saying that unfortunately some of the packs had been sent out with the stays incorrectly placed in the pockets and would make sure that all stays would be checked in future.

Field testing two (continued)

Although we were out for five days we were only averaging about 12 km (8m) a day, mainly because of lots of combes (which means loads of ups & downs).  The pack weight was a little over 11 kg (24 lb) and this put it inside the 15 kg (30 lb) recommended by the manufacturers.

The pack easily took all of my equipment that needed to go inside, and the front and side pockets took the items I needed at hand; namely waterproofs, sunscreen, platypus bootle, spare batteries and my cooking equipment.  I did find that some of the small items did sink to the bottom of the pocket, I solved this problem by packing my waterproof jacket in one side pocket and trousers in the other then placing the items on top of these. The elastic at  the top made sure that nothing fell out.

The lumbar pad has worked really well to keep the lower part of the pack away from my back and although I had still sweated up, it definitely wasn't as bad as with the other lightweight packs I own.

The shoulder straps and hip belts have performed well especially the hip belt.  The extra padding on the hip belt is great and I found that I could get the belt sitting nice and comfortably on my hips, unlike the other packs which only have webbing for the belt.

One of my concerns in my Initial Report was the length of the webbing strap from the shoulder straps to the anchor point on the pack. Initially I used the pack with only a T-shirt and a lightweight fleece and I found that I only had about  1.3 cm (½ in) of play in the strap.  On the second day of the trip we had rain and I was wearing a t-shirt, fleece and waterproof jacket and had no problems with the length of the straps.

On this day it rained for about four hours, on and off.  The worse part was crossing Woolacombe Bay which is a 3.2 km (2m) stretch of sandy beach.  There was an offshore wind blowing the rain continuously into our side and after crossing the beach and finding some shelter I had a quick look at the pack and found although the outside was quite wet, the inside was only damp.  By early afternoon the rain had stopped and by the time we reached the campsite (at about 4:30 pm) the pack was nearly dry.

I do carry some of the weight of the pack on my hips through the hip belt but I do like most of the weight on my shoulders. This means pulling the load lifters quite tight; and this created one problem for my back.  The shoulder straps run up to the back of the pack and then go on to two webbing strips which in turn connect to a single piece of webbing which is about 11 cm (4½ in) long, which attaches to the tri-glide system.  This single piece of webbing passes through a ladder lock buckle and then doubles back to lock it off.  As this strip of webbing is only 11 cm (4½ in) long it only just reaches down to the top of the ladder lock and part of it sits a little proud (Fig 3) which then presses into my back (Fig 4), this was after the first day. 

This only happened when I was wearing a T-shirt, when wearing a fleece it was to thick to rub on my back.  This wasn't sore just red, and I never knew it was there.  It was only Peter seeing it when I had my T-shirt off that I became aware of it.  As I didn't want to aggravate my back anymore than necessary I stuck a plaster over the area on my back for the rest of the trip.  If the strip of webbing was 2.5-3.5 cm (1-1½ in) longer it would go under the other side of the lock and be out of the way.

Also on this trip; I noticed that the fraying on the webbing was getting worse.  It seemed that the ends either hadn't been sealed properly or the sealing was rubbing away somehow. (Fig 5).


                                            
Overall

I like this pack. The stays give it a much more stable feel more like a traditional frame pack.  The side and front pockets are nice and big and I can get everything that I would need during the day in them, so I don't needed to keep opening the main body. 

The material of the main body of the pack, is quite strong and resilient the 70 denier silicone nylon, 30 denier silicone nylon, and 420 denier pack cloth all look the same as when the pack first arrived, only a bit dirtier but still in good nick.

The same can't be said for some of the webbing.  The webbing on the hip belt seems to be the worse at unravelling especially on the end and where the webbing joins the padded part of the belt.

The Strip of webbing on the tri-glide gives me the most concern although I didn't have any pain from it, it was only the first day.  What would it have been like after a week if Peter hadn't seen the red mark on my back.