Backpacking or hiking with your dog is one of the nicest activities I can imagine, and we are using the Zpacks Duplex tent as a shelter for the night. In this article I'll share my experiences with this tent.
Since a year and a half we are the proud owners of a pretty cool Border Collie male and I want to go hiking with him on multi-day hikes. Normally I would camp out in my
Six Moon Designs Skyscape Trekker. But I figured that the geometry of this tent wouldn't comfortably fit me and the dog.
The absolute number one tent for me was the
Zpacks Duplex tent, but I couldn't really justify the steep price at the time and went with the SMD.
I certainly don't regret the SMD, and donated this tent to my dad.
The tent in a nutshell
The Duplex is a two person tent made from a material called Cuben Fiber which is strong and durable but extremely light weight material. The official name is Dyneema Composite Fabrics (DCF). For more information visit
this page on the Zpacks website.
Because of this DCF the Duplex is extremely light and compact. Mine weighs in at 590gr including the guylines and stuff sack, excluding stakes and poles. The tent is symmetric and has two doorways. There is bugnetting al around the tent, but it is essentially a single walled tent.
DCF doesn't require seamsealing and unlike other lightweight materials the fabric itself doesn't absorp water and/or sags which require some adjustments to guylines after a while in the rain. Also the tent won't gain any weight from the absorped moisture.
Setting up
The Zpacks Duplex tent is not your typical so called 'free standing tent' . You use trekking poles or you have to purchase special poles from Zpacks to set the tent up. I use my trekking poles for hiking anyway so that's my reference here. Setting the tent up is quite easy, just follow the instructions and you'll get a decent pitch first try.
The tent has a lot of guylines (8 in total, you need 6 to pitch the tent so 2 are optional) and adjusting these really allow you to pitch for certain circumstances like maximum ventilation or maximum wind/rain blocking. This will also affect the height of the bathtub floor. From other reviewers I know that some experience is required to get this right. Specifically in the case of (heavy) rain, some people experience water coming in through the vents and I would seriously advise you to set the tent up a few times before your first trip and play around with these 'settings'.
I do think this tent is capable of handling extreme weather, but your pitching skills are essential to the extend the shelter will hold up.
Usage with a dog
This article is actually a product review but I also like to review a specific use case since I wasn't really able to find a review when I was researching this topic.
I just went on a overnight test hike where both the dog and slept in the tent and it was a success. The tent is plenty roomy and the dual door system allows easy access for the both of us.
Of course not every dog is the same weight/size wise, my dog weighs only 17kg and is rather small for a male Border Collie. I think a bigger Border Collie and even a labrador sized dog would fit perfectly also. But much bigger and it get's pretty cramped in the tent.
To protect the tent and to keep the dog warm at night I used a cheap foam pad on the ground and on top of that was a fleece blanket. My dog doesn't try to dig or scratch surfaces and doors etc, but if your dog does that I think this tent isn't very suitable, but then again what material is? (especially in the UL tent world)
Another thing to watch out for is the 'threshold' and the bug screen which are attached to each other at the bottom. Your dog might get caught when running in or out of the tent.
Conclusion
The Zpacks Duplex tent has been a promising tent and it certainly convinced me in more ways imaginable. I like every aspect of the tent so far and it really fulfills my needs on the most important demands on my list.
The tent is extremely light, only a tarp would be even lighter. The tent offers enough space for me and the dog. Pitching is quite easy and allows for finetuning to accommodate your needs for a certain situation.
I recommend the Zpacks Duplex for hiking with a dog, but your dog should not be too large and know how to behave indoors to protect this tent from nails and/or teeth.