I was gratified upon Dutch's announcement of his exclusive Xenon Wide 75" coated polyester fabric, available at Make Your Gear.
Recently, Dutch has released a Wide Asym Tarp with an adjustable ridge line length in both kit and finished form (at Dutchwaregear.com), which uses this amazingly lightweight, waterproof Xenon Wide fabric.
I was inspired after seeing the versatility of tarps made from this fabric -- and reading through Dutch's easy-to-follow kit instructions -- to take advantage of the width of the Xenon Wide to make an ultralight minimalist version of his Wide Asym Tarp that provides excellent coverage while maintaining a small packed size and a feathery carry weight.
My philosophy for the build was "Keep It Super Simple" (K.I.S.S.), so I simplified Dutch's basic design (e.g., no adjustable ridge line, storm flaps, or extra tie-outs) but followed his recipe for materials and techniques. I calculated that a simple rectangular shape made from this wide fabric would give me a diagonal ridge line length sufficient to cover comfortably any of my 11-foot hammocks.
Here was my result...
I used the following components:
3 yards Xenon Wide 75" 1.3 oz coated ripstop polyester ($27)
2 yards 1/2" grosgrain ribbon (for corner tie-outs) ($3)
4 Beastee Dee 1/2" D-rings (for corner tie-outs) ($1)
1/2 yard 300D pack cloth (for corner reinforcements) ($4)
First, I trimmed 1" of selvage of each long edge of my 9-foot piece of Xenon Wide, leaving me with a blank that was 108" x 73". Then I cut an 8" square of the 300D pack cloth into quarters along the diagonals and sewed them into the four corners of the tarp with two rows of stitches 1" apart, hiding the long raw edge (The two short edges of each triangle would be folded within the roll hem. I ran a roll hem around the entire perimeter of the tarp for strength and durability. Then I stitched the four Beastie Dees into folded 8.5" lengths of 1/2" grosgrain and sewed them onto the corners of the tarp with a series of bar tacks; all four corners of the tarp are identical, so one can switch diagonals and use the tarp for coverage of an asym lay in either direction. (I had enough grosgrain and pack cloth left over to make four additional midpoint tie-outs if so desired.)
That was all I used; the whole project was very inexpensive ($35) and took less than two hours to cut and sew! It's not super-pretty, but it very functional and was very easy to make because I could use the width of the fabric to get good coverage without having to sew a ridge line seam. Finished size is 107" x 72" with a 130" diagonal ridge line length. Packed weight inside a stuff sack slightly larger than a soda can is a gossamer 230 grams (8.1 ounces)!
It's raining here right now as I lie in my DIY Multicam Epsilon hammock with integrated zippered bug net typing this project report; the Xenon Wide K.I.S.S. tarp is performing admirably so far. While it stretches on the bias like most asym tarps, the straight sides pitch plenty taut to withstand the moderate ambient breeze. It can be tied out wide for views or tighter for "storm mode", and it's keeping me quite dry, so I'll say so far that the project looks like it was worthwhile -- certainly for the minimal time and resources invested...
Bookmarks