​Hubba Hubba 1st vs 2nd generation

[yellowcanoe]

Received tent. Not at all happy.. Of course the Gear Shed installation was not intuitive.. But the big beef is the tent fly is too narrow to span across from mid line grommet and pull tab above one door to the other

It took pushing down on the tent on its side to get enough play to release the grommet via a pull tab. I see you had similar issues with that lateral pole. We studied and we don't think the issue is the third piece of material with grommet from the Gear Shed.. BTW that is quite a load to trust one little pole end with. I envision a real catastrophe if that blows out or breaks.

Perhaps there is a trick I am missing. I sure hope so. Otherwise the tent along with its assorted cardboard and plastic warnings is going back.

 

[Guest]

It took pushing down on the tent on its side to get enough play to release the grommet via a pull tab. I see you had similar issues with that lateral pole. We studied and we don't think the issue is the third piece of material with grommet from the Gear Shed.. BTW that is quite a load to trust one little pole end with. I envision a real catastrophe if that blows out or breaks.

I think MSR’s span between those grommets is lacking in exactitude during production. It was sometimes a real bear to get that center pole free of the1sty grommet seat on my 1[SUP]st[/SUP] gen HH, especially if it was dry out.

The second generation HH seems to be less of a problem in that regard. If there is a trick to it other than bending the pole I never learned it.

 

[yellowcanoe]

Tomorrow we will try the b*st*rdized version. The dimensions of the fly on 2 gen HH seem tight. The fly on my first gen HH is in good shape. I may give birth to a dat and a cog. The tent on 1 has holes in mesh..sewn up.

My new child may have tent 2 footprint 1, Gear Shed and fly 1. It annoys me that those stakes have no loop cords and force me to rummage in the gear shed. ( the wooden one in my front yard) Also the tent lacks guy lines for the ends..

I thought I had plenty of groundhogs.. but the maxi ones went .. what? They ran away? I can't find them

 

[Odyssey]

You're making me nervous. It's been two whole years since we last tripped. That means two whole years since we last used our (then new) HH. I was happy with it, but now wonder if I set it up wrong, and never knew enough to find fault. You know what I mean? Like when you button up your shirt wrong, one extra button above a lop sided dishevelled mess, completely unnoticed, except by everyone else...but they won't tell you. Or when you put your t-shirt on inside out, and no-one tells you about the shirt tag hanging off the back of your neck...all day long. Okay, I'm starting to sound like I can't dress myself. I was just trying to make an analogy. Anyway, we'll practise setting up our HH before our long awaited and overdue trip next month, and see how it goes.

 

[yellowcanoe]

The ground hog stakes have run away with the 3 mm cord. I knew I had some somewhere!! I just finished UNPACKING everything for the upcoming trip and REPACKING it. . I suppose I will be going to Ragged Mountain again for more stakes and cord and then THAT will run away too or breed with the cheap Coleman stakes that will make the offspring.. shakes ( sh... and stakes)..

As to the dang tent I am tempted to pitch it for a month and let it stretch in the yard while we go on a trip.We didn't plan on using it and the nearest REI is 150 miles the wrong way. Then if the tent stays recalcitrant it can go back when we do go to CT and actually pass an REI on the way

AHA! Found em in bed with the sand stakes. I forgot to take them out of that stake bag at the end of the Green River trip. They have been unable to breed thankfully. The reflective 3 mm cord is still off somewhere.

 

[oldie moldy]

Hi Yellow Canoe, This may be no help at all, but when I was learning how to get the most from my Eureka Timberline (4 person) in the yard I had a dickens of a time with a little spreader bar it uses.

The bar is positioned in the center of the long "spine" of the tent pole, crossways. The ends fit into little pockets on both the inner tent and the rain shell. Kinda like having two socks on one foot (on each end of the spreader bar) Anyways...what the spreader bar does is to hold the tent fabric farther apart than it would normally fall and thus gives you more interior room.

The spreader bar really does work well but it is a booger to get into the proper place. Once I was convinced that I did understand how it was supposed to go together and had everything correct up to getting that last end of the spreader bar to slip into place I used a cheap spoon to lever that last bit in. Now, I know that you have a Hubba Hubba tent and it's not like mine, and I don't know what part is giving you problems but is there some way to use something to give you just a bit of advantage?

For me, that cheap stamped spoon on it's handle, has on the underside a grove that works just like a shoe horn that allows me to ease the end of the spreader bar into the fabric pockets. But gently, ever so gently.
Not knowing what the particular problem is I can't make any specific suggestion but maybe there's some way to get a mechanical advantage?

Best Wishes and Good Luck!! Rob

 

[Guest]

Hubba Hubba center pole

The spreader bar really does work well but it is a booger to get into the proper place.

I have never had a problem getting the center “spreader” pole on the HH seated with the pole ends through the grommets on the tent when setting up. Getting it back off, at least on my older HH, was sometimes quite a challenge.

The problem is that the ends of the pole fit into a half inch grommet seated in a webbing loop and there is nothing with which to pull the grommet straight back free of the pole end except fingers clenched behind a teensy grommet.

That attachment point needs a ladder lock adjustment on the webbing.

Or at least something more finger kindly to help pull the grommet straight back and free of the pole end. Even a bigger flange around the tiny grommet would help.

The dimension tolerance beween those grommets and pole ends is by necessity very close. Too tight and it won’t fit at all, too loose and the top of the tent body will be loose and droopy. An eighth of an inch off in either direction would make a huge difference

I expect that those tolerances are somewhat inexact in the sewing of the tent. My older HH was very tight, especially when it was arid and the tent fabric taut dry. So far so good on the new one, but I haven’t taken it down in the desert yet.

 

[yellowcanoe]

Finger kindly... an accessory.. Will try today. Now having coffee.

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/31Ye2+gLEQL._SY300_.jpg

 

[oldie moldy]

All right then: grommet on the end of the pole, no way to grip it to remove it. Can you loop a nylon cord around the pole, snug it up to where it's displacing the grommet from the end of the pole? I'm thinking that there has to be some kind "shoulder" on the pole's end, can you wrap the cord into that and continue to wrap until the grommet is pushed off the end?

Sorry to be a pest but I do love a puzzle! Rob

 

[Odyssey]

I do remember the unfriendly wrestling match I had with the pole end and grommet. I was too afraid to use any kind of tool, piercing the fabric being a horrid fear. I can be a klutz sometimes. (Ask M about the washing machine. And the car fender. Unrelated incidents of course.) I chose to just wrestle with it, bending the pole beyond what seemed natural. It's surprising how much flex there is in those poles! I always assume the "tent engineers" know way more than I do. Endless predawn Christmas mornings wrestling with foreign language toy instructions and missing parts should've boosted my confidence by now. No.
It's almost like the pole end must fit the grommet at a perfect 90 degree angle to just fit. The pole tension troubles this. I often bend the poles over my leg to achieve an acute bend, waiting for the "snap" to break both the setup and my fragile confidence.

 

[yellowcanoe]

Well I came home to find that nearly a month of "time out" and being pitched in the living room had not reduced the tents stubbornness to give up its pole end backing out of the grommet.

There was some blue air around..

Finally I thought I ought to be smarter than the tent. Or try to outwit it. I'm stubborn too.

I found that by releasing a corner ( better all four) I could move the offending lateral pole toward the end of the tent enough to make it give up its grip.

However that was only one try. Maybe I got lucky. I promptly rolled the whole tent up and put it in its stuff bag.

Lows Lake.. if anyone sees a canoe going by with a tent still up on it...thats me.. Or dragging ala sea anchor.

 

[Guest]

Lows Lake.. if anyone sees a canoe going by with a tent still up on it...thats me.. Or dragging ala sea anchor.

Hmmm... house boat. Backcountry style.

 

[yellowcanoe]

Hmmm... house boat. Backcountry style.

We really need to change your screen name to Raven. The trickster Ya know, not any bird will do.

 

[Guest]

I found that by releasing a corner ( better all four) I could move the offending lateral pole toward the end of the tent enough to make it give up its grip.

I like that technique and will try it myself. I have always released all of the clips, but it never occurred to me to release the pole corners. It stands to reason that doing so would provide more slack in the tent body. Well, duh.

My curiosity (frustration) with releasing the grommets on the spreader pole was enough that I read every written instruction and watched video on the Hubba Hubba set up.

http://www.cascadedesigns.com/msr/tents/experience-series/hubba-hubba-nx/product

http://media.cascadedesigns.com/pdf/Instructions_HubbaHubba_Web_EN_2014.pdf

Nowhere is there any mention of freeing the spreader pole from those recalcitrant grommets, which seems to be a common problem/complaint.

If releasing the pole corners is the solution perhaps you should write MSR and suggest that they include that vital tidbit in the take-down instructions.

 

[Mihun09]

So, like, when you get a MSR tent do you right away add to the waterproofness of the floor and fly? I mean, like, the Hubba Hubba is 3000mm on the floor and 1200mm on the fly, but our MEC Wanderer is 10,000 on the floor and 2000 on the fly.

When considering future tent and vestibule options this past week sitting out endless rain, this tent and shed combo came to mind, but it is rather tiny inside, a smallish two person, more like a roomy one person tent. The gear shed would rock, but still, I keep a lot of stuff inside regardless of vestibules.

 

[yellowcanoe]

Not tiny for a solo which I am using it for. As to floor water resistance it's a given you will use a footprint in this case. Never has a floor stoppage problem in gen 1

 

[Mihun09]

We don't buy footprints. We will cut up an old poly tarp and put that inside though, as we did this trip, but still will re-seal the tent floor and fly before next season.

 

[yellowcanoe]

Fun with threading mini groundhog stakes. First there was a good deal of shopping for 2 mm cord. Most stores carry 3 for the smallest size. Finally I got smart and went to my go to parts store( though I didn't go to there fast enough this time) and bought cord.. 84 cents total at Ragged Mountain in Intervale NH.


We are threading 9 stakes. MSR has an evil sense of customer satisfaction. There are a lot of new variations on the f word here in the dining room. Why the hole could not be elongated one direction baffles me.

 

[Jsaults]

Good evaluation of the HubbaHubba Mike.

I have been generally pleased with my 1st gen HH, enough so that I bought a Hubba for bikepacking, also 1st gen. Your observation about the higher walls caught my attention, as I was on a multi-day ride on the GAP trail this past summer during "Thunderstorm and Torrential Downpour Week". When the heavy rain fell at 90deg to the ground, the water ran off the fly in such volume that it splashed in all directions - including through the netting, wetting my down bag. I am tempted to add fabric to the vulnerable areas (well, not myself - I will have one of the customizing services do that).

Other than that, my H and HH have performed superbly. I also bought a Gear Shed for my planned ride on the Great Ohio Bicycle Adventure. I want to use it as a trike shelter.

Jim