Originally Posted by
warbonnetguy
I recall reading about this too, if I recall the conclusion I read was something like "you can compress the down something like 40+% with no loss of warmth". If that is true it says to me that if the fill amount stays the same while baffle height is shortened by say 30% (partial compression)... nothing happens to the temp rating. That implies to me that overstuff does actually add warmth because...
If you can indeed compress by 30-40% and not lose any warmth then that would mean you could take a "regular stuffed" quilt with a 3" baffle height (say 3", 0 deg and 16oz down) and shorten the baffles to 2" (but use the same 16oz fill wt).... So same amount of down just 33% compressed by using a shorter 2" baffle instead of 3"... and it should result in no change to the temp rating (0deg). So you're still getting the same 0deg rating from 16oz of down regardless of wether the baffle height is 2" vs 3", because the 33% reduction in baffle height is not "enough" compression to reduce the warmth of the 16oz of down and so the rating doesn't change.
That would mean that you can take a 2"/12oz fill/20deg quilt, and simply overstuff it to match the 0deg fill weight (16oz) to make a 2" zero deg quilt, because as long as you don't go over 40% compression(or whatever the limit is) then 2" vs 3" baffle height would be irrelevant to the temp rating because it isn't enough compression to have any effect...That leaves the fill amount as what largely determines the rating.
I feel like there is a fair amount of leeway in regard to baffle height and I can pretty much guarantee if you got all manufactuers to tell you their 20deg baffle height they won't all be the same... even though they may all be accurately rated at 20 deg. However, manufactuers making very similar sized products (50" wide x 72" long topquilts with a taper for instance) will often have strikingly similar fill amounts for any given rating, and this is no coincidence, fill amount is the major factor effecting temp rating, not baffle height which can and does vary from shop to shop. Also companies making a quilt in 5 or 6 different temp ratings are not all using 5 or 6 different baffle heights...Some may so but some do not...some use the same baffle height for 2 different ratings and just adjust the fill weight, and nobody to my knowledge lists the actual baffle wall height anymore because most customers give it way to much importance while in reality the exact baffle height for a given temp rating is probably one of the least important factors and shouldn't even be considered by anyone other than the designer.
So I know I am talking about baffle height alot here, but for anybody that is confused, slight compression and reduced baffle height are the same thing. If you can compress the down to a signifigant degree without losing warmth, then you can overstuff to a signifigant degree, putting say a 0deg winter fill amount in a 20 deg sized shell without losing the 0deg rating because yes, you are overstuffing/compressing but not enough to have an effect. So if 16oz makes your 3" quilt 0deg then 16oz should give you the same 0 deg rating if adjusted down to a 2" baffle wall height.
This is all dependent on that origional premise being true, but I believe that it is, and as long as you don't overstuff (compress) too much you will find that more down equals a warmer quilt while the baffle height can fluctuate some without any negative effects at all. I think going with too short a baffle obviously can cause too much compression and reduce the warmth while too tall a baffle results in the down being able to move way too easily resulting in more thin/dead spots which also reduces warmth, but the sweet spot (correct baffle height) can vary by a reasonable amount without any effect, So if two manufactuers have 2 exactly same sized items with the exact same fill amount you can bet the temp rating will be the same while baffle height may not be. I have done this (put a winter fill amount in a 20deg shell) and it results in a winter quilt.
Bookmarks