Sleeping Systems

[tflaris]

While I understand this is a subjective subject I’ve come to the conclusion that to reduce base weight I need to use a few items in more ways.

When I breakdown the weight of my gear I’ve noticed that my sleeping clothes are a large chunk of my base weight.

For typical 3 season hiking has anyone tried the following:

1. Using a lower temp sleeping bag/quilt (10 degree) with a silk base layer and incorporating a puffy as part of their sleep system

2. Using a higher temp sleeping bag/quilt (30 degree) with a silk base layer incorporating a wind jacket & wind pants (Mont Bell Dynamo) and supplement with a fleece style jacket (Patagonia R1 or equivalent).

Typically I have found merino wool system sleep systems tend to be heavy but yet offer a high warmth in return.

Thanks in advance for your thoughts.

TF


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[egilbe]

The warmest insulation by weight is down. Better off getting more down in your quilt, then trying to stay warm with a wool blanket. Wool is heavy. Heavier when wet.

[Deadeye]

Are you a particularly cold sleeper or planning on extra cold temps? I think most would find a 30 degree bag sufficient for three-season use with no special clothing consideration, and a 10 degree bag to be overkill. My personal three-season kit is a 40 degree down bag, and if I need to wear clothes for warmth on those extra cold nights, I have a long sleeve T, a fleece layer and a down vest and a hat... good into the high teens in a tent.

[Slo-go'en]

The OP is from Florida, so he isn't as used to cold as us northern folk :)

Sleeping in rain gear is not a good idea as you will get soaking wet from sweat. It would be like sleeping in a plastic bag.

I can't afford Merino wool so I use cheap, light weight poly thermal tops and bottoms for sleeping. If it's cold enough to need them for sleeping, it's usually cold enough to put them on well before bed time. I supplement my 30 degree bag with a silk liner. A fleece neck gaiter can help a lot, along with a good hat.

I think a fleece vest or jacket better then down to wear inside the bag, since the down will crush and not add much additional loft.

[Just Tom]

The OP is from Florida, so he isn't as used to cold as us northern folk :)

Sleeping in rain gear is not a good idea as you will get soaking wet from sweat. It would be like sleeping in a plastic bag.

I can't afford Merino wool so I use cheap, light weight poly thermal tops and bottoms for sleeping. If it's cold enough to need them for sleeping, it's usually cold enough to put them on well before bed time. I supplement my 30 degree bag with a silk liner. A fleece neck gaiter can help a lot, along with a good hat.

I think a fleece vest or jacket better then down to wear inside the bag, since the down will crush and not add much additional loft.

+1 on the neck gaiter and +1 on the fleece vest. Exactly what I use.

[MtDoraDave]

After spending a night freezing my butt off wearing every layer I had, I bought a zero degree down bag.
I wish, now, that I would have sprung for better fill power (for the weight savings), but the 650 fill Marmot never summer 0 degree has kept my Florida-cold-sleeping-butt warm on nights in the mid teens wearing only my base layer.

[Venchka]

Something I learned ages ago on a bicycle tour through Yellowstone:
A down vest or down sweater/jacket with the sleeves next to my body spread over my torso from my armpits to below my waist was warmer than wearing the vest/jacket normally. I would periodically have to put the garment back in place but not too often.
Following Colin Fletcher’s advice from the 1960s I only carry as much clothing as I can wear at the same time on the coldest night that I anticipate. To date that has been a personally observed thermometer reading of 15 F. in my 20 F Alpinlite on the Xtherm Long in my backyard. I wasn’t paying attention to the weather and missed a 10-6-12 degree plunge about a week later. All exposed skin was covered with something at 15 F.
Wayne

[swisscross]

I too am a wear all your clothes to achieve desired temp rating person. I can push my 30 degree bag to the mid teens without issue.

[reppans]

I flip it around a little bit - leave the idle-time/campsite puffy jackets at home, and wear my sleeping quilt (JRB Sierra Stealth/Sniveller) as a down poncho. Just need enough daytime active hiking insulation, which serves as my back-up insulation. In colder weather, pairing a down poncho/quilt with a summer down bag is really nice - I find ponchos warmer than equiv. weight jackets due to mitten effect of keeping all limbs inside (when sitting cross-legged on a pad), and the down sleeping bag eliminates the drafts inherent with quilts.

[peakbagger]

I just fill up a water bottle with boiling water and throw it in the bottom of the sleeping bag. Instant bump up in temperature rating. Worse case in really marginal conditions is leave the stove setup and if I wake up in the middle of the night cold I just fire off the stove and heat up another bottle. Worse case is the next supper I cook over a campfire to make up for the fuel I used.

[Just Bill]

While I understand this is a subjective subject I’ve come to the conclusion that to reduce base weight I need to use a few items in more ways.

When I breakdown the weight of my gear I’ve noticed that my sleeping clothes are a large chunk of my base weight.

For typical 3 season hiking has anyone tried the following:

1. Using a lower temp sleeping bag/quilt (10 degree) with a silk base layer and incorporating a puffy as part of their sleep system

2. Using a higher temp sleeping bag/quilt (30 degree) with a silk base layer incorporating a wind jacket & wind pants (Mont Bell Dynamo) and supplement with a fleece style jacket (Patagonia R1 or equivalent).

Typically I have found merino wool system sleep systems tend to be heavy but yet offer a high warmth in return.

Thanks in advance for your thoughts.

TF


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https://enlightenedequipment.com/enigma/

The difference (in REg/REG) between a 30* and a 10* enigma is 5.73 ounces.

So the better question- what are your sleep clothes doing for you?
What are your other clothes doing for you?

By far (as others mentioned) down is the lightest insulation you can get.
By far- going overkill on a quilt in terms of rating is your best solution.

So the question becomes twofold:
For 6 ounces or less... what else could you 'get'?

If the point of the silk liner is simply to keep your stuff clean- https://dutchwaregear.com/product/quilt-liner/
That's 2.5 ounces, lighter than any silk liner I am aware of and serves the function of putting a washable layer between you and your quilt.

If you are not willing to sleep naked or simply prefer having a base layer top and bottom to sleep in or for modesty at group camp sites... then put them in your pack.

Is the point of the other clothes to actually wear them?
Wind jacket and pants (or for me an actual WPB jacket in cooler temps) are not really insulating items- but make sense to have in your pack regardless.

Are you wearing the clothes as clothes otherwise? Do you sit around camp, do you put on that fleece, vest or puffy in the early morning chill? Do you pull it out of your pack and wear it on a ridgeline?

Examine your clothing system as a clothing system first.
If you would carry those clothes regardless of your sleeping system then carry them. Once you've made the choice to bring them; perhaps you could revisit the sleep system in light of this extra insulation you have along.

However if you find you find that the only reason to carry these clothes along is to supplement your bag... there is no 6 ounce item of clothing that will leap your sleep system up 20* in the same manner a little more down will.

The other item to consider is a safety piece. While it's fallen out of fashion a bit... it's not great to always be 'maxed out'.

If it takes every scrap of fabric to get you through the night all the time... you pushed too far.
80% of the time your primary insulation piece should do the job.
15% of the time you may need to put on your 'safety piece' and use that vest, puffy, or fleece to sleep well.
5% of the time... it'll be too hot or too cold and you have to deal with it. Waking up for a hot meal, or breaking camp and walking. Sometimes it's as simple as a two day front; you get by on day one okay... but by day two your clothing has gotten a bit damp, because you used it in your bag the moisture migrated into your down and by night two the whole system isn't quite up to snuff.

Poop occurs.
If it's really cold, generally you're bundling up long before you hit camp. If that puffy jacket is down... at best it got moisture in it from body vapor, at worst it got soaked.
In many ways- sizing up the warmth of your quilt can serve as your safety piece. Rather than a 30* bag and relying on a pile of clothes that can get diminished in some way... with a 10* bag you always have the 'nuclear option'.
So pack the minimum clothing you think you need and if that strategy isn't working you can always hole up in your dry quilt and deal with it.
Right after down... the lightest thing you can carry is headwear. I'd take a good insulated hat, light gloves and spare socks over a spare base layer or liner any day. Those options also allow you a wide range of insulating and venting options while on the move.

[Crushed Grapes]

I just fill up a water bottle with boiling water and throw it in the bottom of the sleeping bag. Instant bump up in temperature rating. Worse case in really marginal conditions is leave the stove setup and if I wake up in the middle of the night cold I just fire off the stove and heat up another bottle. Worse case is the next supper I cook over a campfire to make up for the fuel I used.
Can't fill up a SmartWater bottle with boiling water :D

[Ashepabst]

i find that having separate sleep clothes is pretty important to sleeping well. I think the best solution is to find the lightest weight sleep clothes you can find and be sure your bag is warm enough to keep you comfy in your sleep clothes. the puffy is definitely a good back-up for extraordinary nights but it doesn't seem ideal to rely on that for typical nights. even with a liner, if you're sleeping in sweaty clothes it's going to sap your body heat and add moisture to the inside of your bag. wool sleep clothes seems like overkill --that's your bag's job.

[Kerosene]

Note that you can de-loft a snug mummy bag if you're wearing too many clothes to bed (I learned this on a sub-freezing night in GA in April in a new 20F Western Mountaineering UltraLite; I've never had an issue with warmth down to 22F in that bag, as long as I had sufficient insulation in my pad).

Eat something before you go to bed (soup and hot cocoa or tea work well, but a power bar is better than nothing), and take advantage of the hot water bottle in the bottom of your bag, wrapped in spare clothing so you don't burn yourself!

For shoulder season backpacking on the AT (March-May and September-early November) my 20F bag works just fine, especially after I've been out for a few days and my internal thermostat adjusts to the cool outdoor temps.

[Just Tom]

If the point of the silk liner is simply to keep your stuff clean- https://dutchwaregear.com/product/quilt-liner/
That's 2.5 ounces, lighter than any silk liner I am aware of and serves the function of putting a washable layer between you and your quilt.


A side note on this (sorry for the distraction). I use a liner for the keep-the-downy-goodness-clean reason. I used to use a silk line for this purpose but due to the sack-shape these come it I tore it, hand sewed it (poorly) back together, repeated several times over. So I bought the Dutch liner, which uses a quilt shape and concept applied to a sheet. Works great, no more problems getting in and out. But it is more clamy and not as comfortable as the sik was.

If someone were to make a business of making silk liners with the quilt-cut like the Dutch liner, I think they would do well!

[Just Bill]

A side note on this (sorry for the distraction). I use a liner for the keep-the-downy-goodness-clean reason. I used to use a silk line for this purpose but due to the sack-shape these come it I tore it, hand sewed it (poorly) back together, repeated several times over. So I bought the Dutch liner, which uses a quilt shape and concept applied to a sheet. Works great, no more problems getting in and out. But it is more clamy and not as comfortable as the sik was.

If someone were to make a business of making silk liners with the quilt-cut like the Dutch liner, I think they would do well!

Well... there is someone who quietly still makes and sells some Primaloft Gold quilts using Membrane 10. And quietly sent several very similar liners to some speedy friends over the years.
But his Dutcheness got the liners to market before someone had the chance and there are more unique products someone has to work on instead.

Though someone might advise that this type of fabric by it's nature requires calendaring and DWR to achieve a downproof rating. Using full strength detergent a few times in the wash helps quite a bit to cut down on the clammy issue caused by the DWR coating. Just keep an eye on the stitches as you do it, but the elves at his Dutcheness's shop sew well.

Silk is tough. It's one of those things that can be found in decent quality at a decent price from time to time, especially for DIY use.
To do right... you'd need a pretty large buy on material and a contract sewing shop to do it at a decent price.
Hard to compete really.

Much like someone realized a few years back... once you've already got the rolls of fabric sitting there to make a quilt... an hour of cut&sewing time and 2.5 yards of material makes for a nice quick $50 liner without having to enter the silk trade.

[Venchka]

Can't fill up a SmartWater bottle with boiling water :D
The water doesn’t have to be boiling to heat up a sleeping bag or quilt.
The water probably should not ever be boiling for safety reasons.
Common sense works.
Wayne

[Just Bill]

Platypus bladders can take boiling water. And still handy to have to keep said water from freezing in winter. Though I always like to have at least a cup or two of water to pour onto rather than pouring right into an empty.
Good trick to know regardless of you container of choice; but also good to look into plastics and see which ones can be exposed to heat and which cannot if you don't use a bladder.

Granted a smoke or evening whiskey is probably more dangerous... leaching plastics used outside their intended designs probably ain't a great thing for you either.

[Venchka]

My personal safety concern: Handing a plastic container of near boiling temperature water. Even 150-160 degree water is dangerous.
Wayne

[MtDoraDave]

With the zero degree bag, I put cold fuel, cold water, and my Sawyer inside with me, and I'm still warm wearing a base layer.
The base layer keeps the cold items from touching bare skin until they warm up.
...but I seem to be in the minority here - willing to carry an overkill sleeping bag because I am unwilling to be miserably cold.

[jward]

What kind of bottle do you use for the "hot water sleep bottle"?

[Hikes in Rain]

Nalgene seems to be the standard for that. They're heavy, though!