Teepee Tent Construction Journal

[DoctorIknow]

Where is this beauty gonna be located?

[sharke]

Interesting project. Thanks for taking the time to document this!

[mhead]

Here is the door being sewn at the detail stitching step and the top. I placed an additional fabric disk at over this stitching to keep the rain out.

[mhead]

After the tent is complete it is time to make the sun fly. This is constructed of 'pie wedges' cut in the same way as the tent. I seamed a perimeter nylon web at the bottom but didn't bother to reinforce the seams with nylon web. I just installed nylon web at regular intervals from top to bottom, making a loop for staking at the bottom end. The sun fly webs have a loop at the top, all of which pass through a large carabiner, which itself is clipped to a loop in the top of the tent. I didn't bother to reinforce the reflective material with tyvek. I'm running out of time.

One thought is that the reflective material is a plastic matrix coated with metallic aluminum. The playa is an alkali flat. Aluminum will fizz if exposed to strong alkali. I expect that my sun fly will be a 1-use item since the reflective coating will likely be chemically attached by the alkali, especially if it rains. Oh well, it was relatively easy and cheap to make.

[mhead]

Jumping ahead through many hours of work, here are pictures of the final result. Well, I guess not. The system won't let me upload pictures since I just did this. Guess I'll have to wait until tomorrow.

[mhead]

Here are the completed photos.

First is inside looking up. You can see the plastic PVC pipe receiver with tent poles inserted, holding up the tent. Note that this plastic assembly has a fabric jacket that has velcro on its outside. The tent top has straps with velcro and so makes a very strong attachment to the PVC. Also, each pole has velcro at the top so the pole can not fall out when the other poles are lengthened.

Second picture is inside the tent looking out the door. Note there is screen that has a cover that rolls down and velcros. All the vents except the two at the top have velcro closures. This tent is very well sealed against the playa. Of course you can also see it as a big laundry bag in which the kids are playing. There is a suffocation risk. My plan is to leave the screen open in good weather, and closed in windy weather, but I expect the wind will provide enough ventilation.

The last picture shows the completed tent and sun fly. Not visible in the picture are 140 watts of solar panels. These feed the solar controller and switch system shown next to the door in pic #2. This system controls the swamp cooler fan and water pump, interior and exterior lighting, and interior fan. Battery storage will be provided by linking to my vehicle's second battery which will remain in the vehicle.

I had hoped to give a little better construction description as construction went forward but I ran out of time.
I hope to camp in hushville this 2014 so stop by if you want to see more up close!

[SourPatch]

Very nice! I created a positive pressure silver tarp cube tent myself, suspended from and protected by a 1" square steel tubing frame. The frame is covered in Aluminet.

Someone posted earlier that PVC joints "explode" when subjected to playa conditions. Your top ring uses those joints. Do the aluminum poles fit loosely into them or, if not, are you confident they will hold up?

[mhead]

Tubes fit loosely. I suspect that joint failures are due to bending stress at the joint. Since the tent edge is pegged to the ground, wind stress on the side of the tent should place just downward force on the tubes. And there are 8 in just a small area to divide up the force. If there is a mechanical failure I expect it will be buckling of the aluminum tubes. The playa will tell...

[mhead]

Here's the post-playa 2014 roundup.

Tent worked really well. Air inside the tent ran at exterior air temperature. The sun fly performed as hoped. We placed blankets between the interior poles and the tent wall to keep heat flux down for the A/C. This had the added effect of dampening the noise some. Tent itself, owing to the heavy material, didn't flap in the wind. The sun fly did but didn't make an unacceptable amount of noise.

Very little dust entered. It was really great to have a quiet clean place to go to leave Burning behind for a few hours.

Tent did well in the rain. The sun fly had a little corrosion of the aluminum from alkali and water but this was very minor. Sun fly can be used again.

Solar electric worked well after a few on-site modifications.

The swamp cooler did get a temperature reduction from 99 F to 92 F at the air inlet to the tent but the free-air temperature of the tent was little changed. So the swamp cooler was a failure, even in this small volume. I noted when disassembling that the water pump had come loose from the hose that routed water up to the distribution above the DuraCool. I believe this occurred during my disassembly but it could have occurred earlier. If so this might explain the lack of much cooling. I can't test here in San Diego since it is too moist. So I'll try again next year.

Tent clearly had no problem with wind. The 70 mph winds sometimes mentioned are likely at significant height above ground or out on the playa. Within the camp there are enough trailers, RV, tents, trucks, domes, teepees and other structures to take most of the oomph out of the wind. I saw lots of 10 X 10' canopies in addition to my own. Even staked these can't handle 70 mph.

Success overall! But all the sewing took most weekends this summer. Maybe this was not worth the effort.

IMG_3333 small.JPG

[chuckularone]

It looks like an Apollo capsule! I love it!

[mhead]

Looking for a name..."command module"?

[SourPatch]

Are you bringing this back to the playa this year? Any modifications/alterations?