Reviewer Information:

Name:	Mark Roberts
Age:	34
Gender:	Male
Height:	6’1” (185 cm)
Weight:	180 lb (82 kg)
Email address:	mroberts AT biol.sc DOT edu
City, State, Country:	Columbia, SC, USA
Date:	08/10/2004

 
Backpacking Background:
I have been backpacking since I was about 15 years old.  A lot of early outdoor experiences, however, involved canoe camping.  Because of that, I rarely took the weight of my camping equipment into consideration.  I have been trying to break that habit since I was about 25 and am finally starting to get better at it.  I am not an ultralight, and probably not even a light, backpacker but I do try to buy the lightest equipment that I can find.  Since I have really only had a decent income for the last few years I am slowly replacing my old, cheap, heavy gear with bright, shiny, fancy, light new gear.  My typical excursions are long weekends (3-4 days) but they sometimes go longer.  My wife and I hike together a lot with our two dogs and are hoping to build up to much longer hikes sometime soon since our first child was just born in May 2004.  Most of our nearby hikes are either in the Congaree National Swamp or the on the Foothills Trails of the Appalachian Mountains, so our hiking conditions can vary considerably.

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Product Information:

Manufacturer:	GoLite
Year of Manufacture:	2004
URL:	http://www.golite.com
Listed weight of tent and stuff sack:	2 lbs 15 oz (1332 g)
Listed weight of stakes and stuff sack:	6 oz (170 g)
MSRP:	$199 (US)
Weight of tent and stuff sack as delivered:	3 lbs  6 oz (1542 g)
Weight of stakes and stuff sack as delivered:	6 oz (170 g)

For further information on this product please see my Initial Report.

Field and Test Information:

My Trig 2 has been used for three trips during the first two months in my possession.  These trips have included a weeklong canoe-camping trip and two weekend trips to the Congaree National Park in South Carolina.  These areas included sandbars along a river, cypress swamps and longleaf pine forests.  The nighttime lows have generally been approximately 75 F (24 C) and relatively humid conditions (often >80% at night) with 3 nights of rain.  In addition, I have left the tent pitched in the woods behind my house for almost the entire time to test its long term durability and have spent at least one night per week in that location to add to my experience in this tent.  

Performance:

Learning to pitch the Trig 2 properly took a few tries but I can now pitch the tent in about ten minutes.  The first step is to ignore the instructions that come with the tent.  They suggest first installing the front pole (trekking pole) and guying it out and then do the same to the rear guy out point.  After this is accomplished they suggest staking out the floor and the "flaps" that serve as rain awnings.  I struggled to get a taut pitch using this method and wasn't convinced that I really had it pitched properly - especially since the tent was flooded the first time it rained.  The minimal instructions didn't really offer any help, so I went to the GoLite website looking for tips.  There were suggestions for several other GoLite shelters but not the Trig 2.  I decided to contact their Customer Service.  I emailed them at info@golite.com , which is one of the options they provide for contacting them, and asked for tips to pitch the tent.  Currently, it has been 14 days since I sent the email and I have not received a response.  Regardless, after a bit of experimentation with some trekking friends we decided that the best way we could achieve an adequately taut pitch was to first stake out the bathtub floor.  Once the tent floor has been staked out we put up the front pole and guy out the front and rear.  Finally, we stake out the awnings.  This is much easier and has been the only way I have been satisfied with pitching the tent. 

One other issue with pitching the tent has been the use of a pole or tree branch for the rear guy out point.  Basically the entire height of the Trig 2 is provided by attaching a guyline from the two guy out points (1 front and 1 rear) to something higher than itself or wrapping the guyline around something higher and then staking to the ground.  Alternatively, the front can be supported by a trekking pole (or similar item) and then guyed out directly to a stake (as in the picture at the top of this page).   In most situations I have encountered this hasn't been a problem.  Most of my campsites have had a nearby tree that I could pitch under and use a low branch to wrap around.  However, some of my camping has been where there were no adequate trees nearby - such as on sandbars along a river.  When faced with this situation, I simply guyed out the rear of the tent to a stake placed as far out from the tent as I could.  Unfortunately,  this means that the rear of the tent isn't nearly as high as it should be.  Because of the very shallow bathtub wall in the rear of the tent (more on this later), this provides plenty of opportunity for rainwater to flood the tent as I found out all too well. 




The Trig 2 has plenty of mesh.  The entire front door, the bottom panels and most of the rear wall are all mesh.  With the awnings rolled up this creates an amazing amount of ventilation, even with the vestibule closed up tight.  In this configuration the temperature inside the tent is nearly the same as outside.  It was hard to tell much of a difference between the two.  With the awnings rolled down, they provide storm protection and increase the internal temperature somewhat.  Most of the time, I slept with the tent sealed up tight, awnings down all the way around because I wanted to test the breathability of the tent as well as to avoid a wet nighttime surprise.  When packing in for the night or venturing off on a little hike away from camp, one must decide whether it might rain.  If it is hot out, it is tempting to roll up the awnings and enjoy the relative cool that it provides.  However, once awakened from slumber to rain coming through the mesh on the side of the tent, it becomes a huge pain to run out in the rain, unsecure the nifty loop devices that keep the awnings nicely out of the way (there are quite a few of them), roll down the awnings, zip them all together and then get back inside, by this time quite wet.  Having experienced that once, I chose to sleep with the awnings down unless I was absolutely sure there would be no rain.  Luckily, I found this configuration to be quite comfortable as well.  It provided enough ventilation to keep me from roasting during the night.  I expected there to be plenty of condensation buildup in this single-wall tent when it was all closed up.  Surprisingly, most mornings I woke to a tent that was nice and dry.  The awnings must be staked out a few inches further than the floor of the tent in order to provide adequate tautness.  The result is that they really do act very much like an awning.  While they keep the rain out, they are several inches off the ground and allow plenty of welcome air flow.  The only night that I experienced any condensation was on a rare summertime cool night.  We had a very unusual cold spell come through ("near record lows") with resultant overnight temperatures down to 58 F (15 C).  When I awoke after my one night spent at this temperature, there was a decent amount of condensation on the ceiling.  It wasn't what I would call a lot of condensation and it didn't appear to have dripped down on the floor or on any of my things, but there was still a decent amount.  The other thing that I noticed when I stepped out of the tent that morning was that it was quite a bit warmer in the tent than it was outside.  Given how airy the tent is, I was not expecting this. 

The tent is a bit small but two friendly adults could exist in it.  I would not want to be trapped in it for a long period of time with another adult, however, since the only place that I was able to sit upright without hitting my head was at the very front of the tent.  This isn't much of a problem by myself but when two larger adults try to sit upright, both at the front of the tent, there is some body overlap.  Again, if one wants to be very friendly with their tent mate, this won't be an issue. 

The one thing that is most confusing to me about this tent is the bathtub floor.  Near the front of the tent this floor is about 5 in (12.7 cm) deep, however, at the rear of the tent the floor is only 2 in (5 cm).  And that is with a perfectly pitched tent.  The rear floor was nearly non-existent when I had to use it without a tree for vertical support.  Early on, the tent was exposed to a downpour rain that flooded the tent floor by pooling over the sidewall near the rear.  Since I have learned to properly pitch this tent it has only been exposed to light rain so I am not entirely convinced that another heavy rain wouldn't produce the same result.  However, in light rain it has performed beautifully and kept me "high and dry". 

Despite quite a bit of rough wear, including housing a 100 lb (43 kg) dog, the floor hasn't leaked one bit, even in the boggy ground of a swamp.  In fact, this entire tent appears to be quite durable.  It has withstood quite a bit of rough handling and has been pitched, either in the field or near my house, for almost the entire 2 months that I have owned it.  Aside from getting a little dirty, it shows no real wear.  The zippers all work fine, the mesh is all still intact, and the tent does not leak.  And even though it has been exposed to quite a bit of sun, the colors haven't faded at all.  I have intentionally pitched the tent on some pretty rough ground and I haven't found any damage at all in the floor.  Hopefully, this will continue so that a ground cloth isn't a necessity. 

Aside from being tough, this tent is light light light.  A few pounds here or there don't sound like much but compared to my other tent, this thing is a featherweight.  It really does make quite a bit of difference.  It also breaks down very easily and packs down quite small.  To break it down, just reverse the order of setup, make sure everything is flopped over into the bathtub floor and then fold it like one would a blanket.  I can break it down in no time at all.  The small packed size means that I have been just cramming it into my pack where I would put a sleeping bag in the winter since I usually only carry a thin sheet during hot summer trips.  Since there are no poles I can push and pull it as much as I like and cram it into very small spots - it has no rigid parts to slow me down.  The packability of the thing is great.  And despite taking a bit of time to figure out how to set it up, it isn't overwhelmingly difficult and I don't have to fiddle with adding on a fly on top of the tent.  Its all one big piece.  And the vestibule is pretty generous as well. 

I have also been impressed with how well this thing stays up in heavy winds.  I thought it would flop all around but it has been very sturdy.  After extended periods of wind, or when my not-so-bright dog walks into the tent mesh, a little readjustment of the guylines is all that is usually required. 

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Four things that I would like to see on this tent at this point are:

1.  Deeper floor in the rear of the tent.
2.  Stake out point in the middle of the front of the tent, just behind the trekking pole.  Without this stake, the floor tends to come up when I attempt to unzip the door, interfering with the zipper. 
3.  A loop on the inside of the tent, near the point where the trekking pole inserts, where I could hang something like a headlamp. 
4.  Reflective cord, or at least a reflective patch, on the the stuff sacks.  Since the sacks are "earth tones" they blend in with the ground, especially at night.  A little bit of reflective cord would make them a breeze to find.

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Things that I am particularly interested in further testing for the Long Term Report:

1.  I have primarily used this tent solo or with my dog.  I would like to spent more nights in it with another human to test for comfort and ventilation.

2.  Monitor the breathability/ventilation of this tent under more varied conditions. 

3.  Compare the breathability/ventilation of this tent with a similarly sized double-wall tent. 

4.  I am hoping to encounter a few more really heavy rainstorms and test ability of heavy rainwater to flow over the shallow rear bathtub floor.

5.  I am eager to see how well this tent performs in the colder fall weather.

6.  I will try to contact GoLite Customer Service by calling them instead of sending an email.

7.  Longterm durability.

8.  Further examine the functionality of the vestibule including gear storage. 


Many thanks to BackpackGearTest.org and GoLite for this testing opportunity.