What tent?

I'm looking for a new tent. Ideally a 10x10 cabin. Top of my wish list is the Eureka Silver Canyon 6, but it is $400, and looks to be discontinued. The lower Copper Canyon 6 is $250. What other brands should I look at? No Ozark Trail. Coleman tents any good these days? Any good house brands?

My family tent is a Columbia Cougar Flats II 8 man that easily accommodates a family of four sleeping on cots with all the backpacks and gear inside. It was $300 five years ago. I have no complaints except that you should not try to set it for the 1st time in a dark mosquito infested woods with tired, wife and kids impatiently badgering you because it is kindof complicated to route the poles when you can't see the color coding. Other than that - it's damn hard to find anything to complain about.

Came in here to recommend the Ozark Trail we just stayed in for a week. I'll back out now.

I have no idea if they are any good or not, but the teepee tents at Sportsmans Guide look real interesting. 10x10x can stand up and put your pants on. If I needed another tent, I would try one of those.

I pitch a tent every morning.

I have one of these.

It's 6-8 years old and seems to be holding up fine.

It's a Coleman Hampton 9. It's 9' X 14'. It was just under $300.

I also have a Kelty Acadia 4. It is a outstanding tent. They make a 6 man as well. I like that it has a vestibule for storing gear and shoes, without them being in the weather.

BoostedBrandon wrote: I pitch a tent every morning.

humblebrag

We’ve got a Coleman eight person tent that works great for our family of four. It has never been subjected to heavy rain or wind but we’ve used it about eight times / twenty days and it shows no sign of wear. The plastic stakes that came with it are a joke however so you’ll want to throw them against a wall before you even carry the tent out of the sporting goods store.

I'm not going to recommend a brand, but I will recommend you take the number of people the tent is advertised to hold and cut it in half to get a realistic estimate of the space available.

I rent the rei brand tents 2 times a year. Well built and easy to set up.

We quite like our REI tent. Well built, lightweight, easy to setup, and reasonably priced from the REI outlet online

Honestly, this is for 2, using air beds or cots, looking to stand up for getting dressed. I have noticed how cheap tents are miles ahead of 10 years ago, and new cabins are easy to set up with separate roof and wall frames. Maybe I shouldn't dismiss OT.

I bought a Coleman instant tent on sale for race weekends. We liked it so much, it's what we use now for our camping trips to northern Ontario. Lent it to one our kids last month and they bought one when they got back from their trip.

We love our Kelty. It's a great tent. It cost more than a Coleman but it's been worth it so far.

I've just been looking at cabin tenets too. We're probably selling our pop-up camper and going back to a tent but it has to be big enough to fit a queen aerobed type mattress. I've been looking at the "10 person" 10x14 type tents. Mainly the camper needs some roof work if I were going to keep it long term, we havent had it out in a year, it takes up a bunch of space, and I can't tow it AND my boat anywhere at the same time.

I've read a lot of reviews, and I'll probably be getting an OT 10x14 "instant up" tent. It's less than $200, has a crap load of 4 star reviews on Amazon, and is available locally too. It probably won't survive a winter storm or a hurricane, but that's okay by me. I'm car camping at state parks in Georgia. I'll spend the extra $20 for two cans of spray water proofer and to the rain fly and the walls, and that should be good enough to ward off pretty heavy thunder storms. And it goes up in like 2 minutes. Seriously, go watch the videos on the Wal-Mart site.

It's not as well built as a Great Agnes for $700, or even the REI, but it will probably be fine for what I want. If it sucks too bad I'll CL it for $50 and buy a nicer one, but my experience with the OT stuff is generally pretty good. I've found most of the problems with cheap tents can be prevented by smart set up - staking it out well with the guy lines, choosing a spot carefully, taking an extra tarp.

The place that breaks down is lightweight hiking gear. Spend the money there. But for car camping? eh, it'll be fine.

I have one of the Coleman 10x14 "instant" tents, decent build quality, goes up very fast, down a little slower but still not bad. However its huge and heavy folded up still, and dont expect it to take heavy rain too well. But 2 kids, two adults and 200 lbs of dogs fit in it just fine.

java230 wrote: However its huge and heavy folded up

That's why my backpack says F250 on the front fender.

ultraclyde wrote:

java230 wrote: However its huge and heavy folded up

That's why my backpack says F250 on the front fender.

Its perfect for that, but literally doesn't fit across (driver -passenger way) the back of my 4runner.... I still like the tent, its just big and heavy when folded.

This is what you want for seam sealing. Don't dick around with the 1oz tubes you can buy at your local camping/sporting goods store; you'll maybe get three seams done.

We have one of these for family/base camping, Kelty Palisade 6, that is sadly discontinued. 10x10, with enough room to stand up in, plus the vestibule is like having a screened in porch that seats 2 comfortably and has cup holders. We call it the BAT (big-ass tent). We've been in really strong wind and thunderstorms without issues. Looks like the Kelty Arcadia line replaced it (sub $300 range). My dad found the Palisade on a closeout site, so there may be some more out there. Good luck.

I buy a tent about every 8 years. Always Kelty. The few times I have strayed into the Ozark Trail or Coleman territory I was buying them every two or three years.

Other ones I've liked were Gander Mountain (probably made by Kelty from what I've seen) and Hillary, but I don't think they're still in business (or they sub everything out to China)

Kelty seems to be on the leading edge of all the bells and whistles like easy-up clips instead of pole pockets, clips inside for accessories, and I have always appreciated their super heavy-duty zippers.

If it were my money, Kelty all the way.