Moun­tain Trails Grand Pass 2-Room 7 Per­son Fam­ily Dome Tent Review

The Moun­tain Trails Grand Pass is one of the cheap­est fam­ily sized tents I’ve seen lately. But I’m talk­ing about the price, not the qual­ity. You can eas­ily find bet­ter  large tents, but you will rarely find one at such a low price. The only other qual­ity tent for this cheap that I can think of is the Cole­man Red Canyon.

Size

The Grand Pass is large enough to accom­mo­date up to seven peo­ple. Six is a more comfy fit. It mea­sures to eigh­teen feet of length by ten feet of width. The cen­ter height is 76 inches, so stand­ing in the tent is pos­si­ble, but there is a dome shape so only the cen­ter area is tall enough to stand. I don’t do much stand­ing in tents any­way, I pre­fer to just use them for sleep­ing. There is a divider cur­tain that can sep­a­rate the tent into two rooms. This is always a wel­come fea­ture on tents of this size.

 

 Set Up

The set up dif­fi­culty for the Moun­tain Trails Grand Pass is about aver­age for a tent of this size. A sin­gle long per­son can get it done with a lit­tle time, but two peo­ple make it a lot eas­ier. It took me approx­i­mately 25 min­utes to get it up alone. There is a pin and ring sys­tem that you see on many tents these days,  to help sim­plify the set up process. One of the best fea­tures of the Grand Pass is how it fits into its duf­fel bag. Once the tent is rolled up, you sim­ply wrap the duf­fel around the tent, as opposed to try­ing to squeeze a loose tent back into a tight bag. This can save a few nightmares.

Weather

The rain fly seems to do a good job keep­ing the place dry in light rains. The floors didn’t seep either, but we had a heavy duty tarp under­neath the tent. I haven’t seen the Grand Pass tested in hard rains. I have heard from fel­low campers that the tent has stood up in 25 mph winds, but have also heard a com­plaint that the cen­ter pole gave in dur­ing 25 mph winds. I have seen it with­stand 15 mph, but haven’t seen a Grand Pass in more severe weather. A mesh ceil­ing and end win­dows seem to offer enough ven­ti­la­tion to avoid stale air, while offer­ing good views of what’s hap­pen­ing out­side of the tent.

Other Fea­tures

The Moun­tain Trails Grand Pass has two D shaped doors that make access in and out of the tent easy. No crawl­ing in is nec­es­sary. Each door also has its own door mat to help keep mud and dirt where it belongs, out­side of the tent.

Over­all

The Grand Pass doesn’t have all the fea­tures avail­able on mod­ern tents, nor is it made of the high­est qual­ity mate­ri­als. It is what it is , a decent tent that is avail­able at a great price. Pick up a Moun­tain Trails Grand Pass Fam­ily Tent from Ama­zon today! Free ship­ping is available!

 

McNett Seam Sure Water based Sealer Review

 

Pro­tect­ing your tents seams from water is very impor­tant. While most tents made today offer weather resistance,some can still be leaky if caught in a hard rain, espe­cially if your rain fly is not installed prop­erly. Extra pro­tec­tion is always a safe bet.

Also once tents become aged, their sealants applied from the man­u­fac­turer may wear away.

Seal­ing your tents seams is an impor­tant part of gen­eral tent maintenance.

The McNett Seam sure water based sealer does a good job of pro­tect­ing your seams. If applied prop­erly, it will pre­vent rain from com­ing through your seams, even in per­sis­tent heavy rain. The brush on the tube is sup­posed to make the appli­ca­tion a smooth process. The sealant itself is a lit­tle runny, so you should take some pre­cau­tions to keep it from get­ting on you and all over the tent. Also, the brush is a bit stiff for use on some fab­rics, such as lower end tents. This prob­lem is eas­ily over­come. My sug­ges­tion is to pour a lit­tle of the sealer in a con­tainer and then apply it to the seams with a sponge. There­fore you avoid the hard brush and the runny mess.

McNett Seam Sure Summary

The McNett Seam Sure Sealer is a really good prod­uct that will keep you dry. The built-in appli­ca­tor brush is far from per­fect, but you should not let that stop you from using a qual­ity prod­uct. Pick up your own tube of McNett Seam Sure Water based Sealer at Ama­zon now!

 

 

Swiss Gear Élite Series 12 Per­son Huge Fam­ily Dome Camp­ing Tent SG33151 Review

3 room tent                       

The Swiss gear Élite Series 12 per­son tent comes with enough room to sleep the largest of fam­i­lies. Equipped with a cloth divider that splits the tent into three sep­a­rate rooms, the Élite series has much to offer in the way of pri­vacy. Also, both of the back rooms have their own door so if you are up later or ear­lier than your fel­low campers, you do not have to crawl over or dis­turb them. The nine­teen by nine­teen foot base pro­vides enough space to allow all three rooms to fit a queen size air mat­tress. The mid­dle room has screened walls that can be zipped up to allow  you to turn it into a sleep­ing area. If not sleep­ing in the mid­dle room, the walls come down to let in the fresh air and give you an area for eat­ing, play­ing, or stor­age. The cen­ter height is around six feet and ten inches so unless you are a NBA cen­ter, you should be able to walk around inside of this tent. This tent might be too big for some tent pads that are present at some camp­grounds. If you are search­ing for a huge tent that is in an afford­able price range, this one will surely sat­isfy your spe­cial needs.

Swiss Gear Élite series Set Up

Set­ting up the Swiss Gear Élite Series is pretty straight for­ward. Noth­ing too com­pli­cated. The size of the tent can make it a chore though. One per­son can assem­ble the tent alone but it will not be easy. Two peo­ple will be able to get it up with­out a prob­lem. With a tent this large, it is impor­tant to fol­low the direc­tions care­fully and not skip any steps. Color coded pole and sleeves make things a lit­tle eas­ier to fig­ure out. Set up is time con­sum­ing. The few times we’ve set up this tent, we were never able to get it up in under twenty five min­utes. That was with two peo­ple. But if you need the space, it’s worth it. Tak­ing the tent down can be a bit of a time sink as well, just make sure you fold it up prop­erly and care­fully or it will take up more space than it did before.

                                                                      Swiss Gear Élite Series Weather

The Swiss Gear Élite Series 12 per­son is  fully weather resis­tant. It is coated to keep out the water and is designed to be wind resis­tant. That being said, a heavy rain can allow for some leaks if you don’t apply the rain fly prop­erly. You should treat the seams and apply a  sealer before tak­ing the tent out as well. This will ensure you stay dry dur­ing wet weather. I’ve only seen this behe­moth in low to mild winds, so I haven’t per­son­ally seen it wind tested.

 Extra Features

The Élite Series 12 per­son is equipped with an e-port that allows for access to elec­tri­cal cords with­out hav­ing to leave the door open. Pri­vate doors to avoid other sleep­ers. The green color is nice in a wilder­ness setting.

Cons of the Swiss Gear élite series

I’ve read reports of the mate­r­ial tear­ing on a few occa­sions, but I believe this is due to improper han­dling dur­ing set up. Most likely from inex­pe­ri­enced peo­ple try­ing to set it up by them­selves or not fol­low­ing the direc­tions properly.

 

 Élite Series Summary

This isn’t the best tent on the mar­ket, but it does offer a lot of space at a rea­son­able price. Click here to check the cur­rent pric­ing at Amazon.