Hello!
After hours of research, I finally purchased an MSR Hubba Hubba. I've had it out for couple of trips and I love the interior space and the two openings.

However, they were the coldest, draftiest nights I've ever spent in a tent and it was only April in the Mourne Mountains in Northern Ireland! The wind blew straight into the tent along with moisture in the air and it made for a miserable couple of nights. There is a gap around the fly that seems excessive to me and I'm wondering if someone can advise if this looks like a manufacturing fault or not.

I've uploaded a couple of images that I took in the back garden so please take a look (note that I realise the tent isn't pitched well in these pictures but it was pitched very well up the Mournes and the gap was the same).

http://www.outdoorsmagic.com/gallery/image.asp?sp=&v=1&uabn=1829&uin=9845

http://www.outdoorsmagic.com/gallery/image.asp?sp=&v=1&uabn=1829&uin=9846

Many thanks to anyone who takes a quick look!
Gavin

Can't answer your question Gavin but to make it easier here's the pics as links:

One
Two

Oops, thanks for pointing that out, I've amended my message.

Hi Gavin,

It's all the mesh, the cold damp air just fills the inner net. It's not that far removed from sleeping under a tarp in cold damp conditions, miserable. Save it for the late spring, summer and early autumn conditions. Unless you've got a good sleeping bag and a dry bag for your clothes etc.

Gavin, I have the MSR Zoid 1, and it's much the same.
Does the Hubba have the weird clip things linking the inner to the fly? I found that by pegging the fly separately, using a shock cord loop around the clip, it got a better amount of tension and didn't flap as much.
-Still draughty though, but that's the price of a (fairly!) budget lightweight tent like the Zoid.
A good sleeping bag is your next purchase, just like mine was!

Gavin, MSR importers First Ascent are brilliant at customer service, why not give them a ring (01629 580484) and ask their opinion?

My personal view is that the Hubba Hubba was probably designed for rather less wet and windy conditions than we are used to.

Hang on - if the objective of a light weight tent is to... save weight... then what's the advantage if you have to up the rating of your sleeping bag and stick everything in dry bags? Maybe I'm missing something?

I've got a couple of tents with almost complete mesh inners and while obviously they're not as warm as other tents they've never let any rain in even when it's been windy.

A large amount of US based tent designers do actually design there tents primarily with warm conditions in mind. Tents designed in the UK are designed around british weather which means a lot less venting and saldy more condensation, where as in the states there is often less rain on most trails so they design tents with ventilation, which can include large gaps around the bottoms, obviously a disadvantge in Britain where it always rains and cold and water can splash in under the flysheet.

I don't think there is much your going to be able to do about it unfortunately, maybe a lesson learned. Buying the wrong design, size or type of tent is something I've done a few times but you can always get another and sold the old one on Ebay where you can often get a good price for a tent.

If your going to use it only in the summer in good weather it may not be a big problem and to be honest the extra ventilation will be beneficial in really good weather.

I think if mesh inner tents worked in northern Europe Hilleberg would have manufactured them.

Blacks might have missed a great opportunity with their new Krypton if the inner tent was made of material similar to the Akto. A mesh door panel and maybe a secondary mesh vent opposite the door might be all that is needed to ventilate the tent. Assuming they could keep the weight down then they would probably have had a best seller.

It would be nice to see a British tent maker challenge Hilleberg, there's no doubting the Nallo 2 is a great tent but it is very expensive. I would love to own a 2 man tent that was light weight (2000+gms) pitched outer first or both together, had enough room to sit up in, stretch out in store wet stuff and cook under the porch with no mesh walls. And didn't cost near £400.00

> It would be nice to see a British tent maker challenge Hilleberg

Robert Saunders?

The Sunders Space packer was a great tent in its day, very impressive when compared with what was available at that time. I nearly bought one but settled for a Phoenix Phreerunner instead. I sometimes wonder whether I missed something.

I don't think there's really a Sunders tent that comes that close to the Hilleberg Nallo in terms of weight, space, and strength. The closest I've seen thus far is probably the Vango TSB Spirit 200 and the 200+ . I just wonder if the 95cm hight is the lowest part of the inner tent hight or the highest?

To my eyes with no experience of MSR tents the fly looks a bit small for the rest of the tent.

another point, those little tabs on the bottom of the flysheet don't they normally have a bungee or rubber loop on them which you also peg down, to keep the tent fly properly tensioned and away from the inner.

I have an MSR Microzoid and it seems to be a feature of MSR tents that the fly is cut a little "short" - ie it does not reach the ground as you would expect from a decent British design.

You can get a needle stake in through those black tabs to crank the fly down a bit more, or add a bit of shock cord for a better pegging point.

The mesh inner of my Microzoid does seem drafty after my Terra Nova. I bought it primarily for it's light weight and it has never let in rain in strong winds.

You'll probably have to learn to live with your Hubba Hubba, like I have done with my Microzoid, or just flog it and get something else. Good luck either way.

Many thanks to those who have replied. I read that the tent was a 3-season tent from the MSR website but of course, that's an American site, and probably isn't 3 season in the UK.

Still, I do love the weight of the tent, I love the pack size, I love the two vestibules, so I'm going to try and live with it. I'll try and use the little tabs to keep the fly nice and tight as Hamish and Lord of the Crinkles has suggested. I've also invested in a much better sleeping bag so I look forward to trying this out on another trip.

Thanks guys
Gavin

Rather than up my sleeping bag specs, and therefore the weight too, I think I'd prefer to go for one of the Aztec 4 season offerings which, admittedly, are heavier but are relatively cheap too. As it is I have a TN Voyager superlite which has none of the problems outlined in the OP.
IMO such tents as the Hubba Hubba are not designed for and are therefore not suitable for a maritime/oceanic climate. At best they are a one season option in the UK.
I think the same goes for the Big Agnes range too.

John Burley,

I upped my sleeping bag by buying a lighter weight, but better performing, down one. As for dry bags, I'm a green garden waste bag kind of guy!

I was in my Zoid t'other night, in the rain - no problems at all.

My TNF Merlin 33 suffers from exactly the same issues, the inner I feel is more of a "Bug Barrier or Critter cage" as i like to call em' rather than keeping the weather out. TNF rate the merlin as a 3 season and one of it's biggest competitors is the Hubba Hubba. I do feel that a 3 season USA tent is more like a 2 season tent in the UK.

Drew