Make an Ultralight Solo Micro Tarp (120g / £10+)

Background

If you try and use a flat tarp above the treeline you may find yourself in for a cold and uncomfortable night. Likewise if you try and use a bivy bag in the mountains on a rainy night you may find it a little bit unpleasant.

For mountain terrains it is great to have the sleep-anywhere flexibility of the bivi bag (home-made in this picture) but it's also nice to have the shelter that a tarp can offer.

This Micro tarp is 'designed' for use in windy conditions and in exposed conditions - IF you use strong fabrics. Spinnaker fabric will not be up to the task.

For many terrains I just love the flexibility of the micro-tarp and the bivi bag. It offers me some shelter from the wind and rain for cooking and packing up, and a dryish place to put my kit.

Sometimes I will pitch it using a hiking pole (if I have one) at other times I will take a home-made tent pole. It can be pitched with just a single guy-rope.

The bomb-proof bivi bag shown weighs in at 490g (c/w case), the tarp shown weighs in at 208g incl. guy ropes, and bag. Add in 8-10 assorted pegs for another 60g. This gives you a total weight of 750g. But that 750g gives you a stable shelter that can be setup anywhere with you being able to use the fully enclosed bivi bag if conditions are extreme or the ground made of rock. During the day the shelter could be quick-pitched to give a weather-shelter.

As a solo traveller I quite like the feeling of safety that camo and blending in with the scenery that this small-footprint shelter offers.

This particular tarp CAN be used by two people at a push but they must be good friends ;-)

Materials

2oz PU-Coated Nylon is ideal and cheap. SilNylone (Silicone coated Nylon) is even better and stronger. The Camo stuff I am using weighs in at about 2.5oz / 80gsm. Spinnaker fabric will weigh in around 45-50gsm but is not as strong.

Note: This design is kept simple by wasting fabric! When fabric is £4 / metre it's just not worth the extra grief of machining panels.

• 2.5m of 2oz PU-Coated Nylon or similar in a 1.5m width
• 1m of 10-15mm Nylon webbing
• 2-10m of 3-4mm nylon cord (2m = 1 guy rope)

Pattern

Click Image to enlarge.

The pattern may look a little odd to you when you see it flat like this. If you look at the picture it may make more sense! The pattern is designed to get a good amount of usable space and height out of not much fabric. It is also designed to be pitched with just a single pole - poles are heavy...

The rear of the tarp has a straight section - this adds a bit of extra volume at the rear for minimal extra fabric.

In the picture the LHS of the tarp is close to vertical. This gives maximum height for minimum fabric. The RHS (in the picture) is much wider and tails off gradually. This gives plenty of coverage for gear.

This Tarp is JUST big enough for me at 6ft to sit under and not get wet hair (if the wind and rain are from behind).

Cutting

1. Mark out the fabric as above. The simplest way to do this is to put chalk/pen-mark using the measurements given, join the dots and then cut.

Construction

1. Hem each edge using a rolled-hem. If you do not have a rolled-hem foot then just fold over 1cm and stitch.

Click Image to enlarge

2. Cut 6 scraps of fabric for the green peg loop reinforcing patches. Each patch should be 3cm deep.

3. Sew the reinforcing patches onto the WRONG side of the fabric as shown above.

4. Cut a larger triangular patch fro the front guy-rope loop (shown in red). This should be 4-5cm deep. This patch is the most stressed in the whole design.

5. Cut SQUARE patches of 3cmx3cm for the optional guy-rope loops (shown in purple). [Guy-ropes attached here will provide extra stability in wind]

6. Cut and seal up to 11 strips of 8cm nylon webbing.

7. Stitch peg loops and guy loops like this:

8. Cut and seal 2m lengths of nylon cord - one for each guy-rope that you plan to use. Attach the guy-ropes to the tarp using a single-loop noose and finish each guy-rope with a taut-line hitch. (See Knots).

9. If you wish use any left-over fabric to make a bag.

Pitching

1. Fix the rear two pegs

2. Fix the side peg for the shorter side. The panel should be roughly in front of the rear peg and slightly offset.

3. Tie a single inline-loop into the front guy-rope approximately 15-45cm from the fabric.

4. Fit the tent pole or walking pole into the single loop and place the base of the pole slightly off-vertical as shown in the picture above.

5. Tension up the guy rope so that the fabric is taut in the front-rear direction.

6. Peg out the remaining corner.

7. Re-peg if necessary to produce good tension in the fabric.

8. Peg out additional peg loops if required.

9. Peg out additional guy-ropes if required.

Peg Advice

The minimum pitch for this tarp is 5 pegs - 4 corners + guy rope. In firm ground titanium skewers will be sufficient for 4 of the pegs. For the main guyrope it is strongly advised that you use a Y or V stake (Alu or Ti). The main guy rope is under a lot of tension and in a wind it WILL twist a wire peg.

For very soft ground or windy conditions it is worth pitching the 5 main pegs using Y or V stakes. If you use wire pegs the pegs may shift in soft ground resulting in a loss of fabric tension and less wind-shedding.

See Also: Ultralight Tent Pegs, DIY Long Tarp Pole