{"id":1250,"date":"2014-08-02T23:20:38","date_gmt":"2014-08-03T04:20:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/amymakesstuff.com\/?p=1250"},"modified":"2014-08-02T23:20:38","modified_gmt":"2014-08-03T04:20:38","slug":"sleeping-bag-and-compression-sack","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/amymakesstuff.com\/?p=1250","title":{"rendered":"sleeping bag and compression sack"},"content":{"rendered":"

I am going on a backpacking trip. I want to carry as little as possible if I can, so I tried to make a lighter and smaller sleeping bag.<\/p>\n

First, I cheated by starting with a sleeping bag. It is one I have had as long as I can remember. Its okay for warm car camping nights, but too heavy and non-insulating for anything else. I decided to take it apart, replace the insulation, and put it back together as a mummy bag, instead of a simple rectangle. The image below shows the bag with the insulation removed. I am in the process of shaping it to have a similar taper shape to an actual mummy shaped sleeping bag.<\/p>\n

\"mummifying<\/a>
mummifying the bag<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I purchased 2 yards of Primaloft insulation (60″ wide) from Quest Outfitters. Basically, you can buy almost any sort of material from making outdoor gear from them. I went with synthetic, instead of down, since its easier to work with, cheaper, and will stay warmer when wet. I am going to see how it works out without sewing any baffles at all (because I am lazy and trying to make this bag with the least effort). Hopefully the friction between the layers and careful handling will keep things in place. Otherwise, I may stitch a few points through all the layers to keep things from shifting. We’ll see.<\/p>\n

\"Primaloft<\/a>
Primaloft synthetic insulation<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"remaking<\/a>
remaining insulation scraps are loosely hand sewn together for the hood<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"hood<\/a>
hood pieces. The two middle pieces are also from the original bag, but I ran out of original material and bought some blue uncoated ripstop for the rest.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"hood<\/a>
hood is crudely stitched to the top of the tapered bag<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I know its not great to sew through the insulation along a line since it compresses the loft along an entire line. However, for this bag, I am ignoring this fact.<\/p>\n

For adding the zipper (and sewing on the hood for that matter), the proper time to do so would have been much earlier. Instead, I just sewed the zipper directly to the outside of the bag. I made sure to sew one side of the zipper to the edge of the bottom of the bag (the side I end up laying on) and to sew the other side of the zipper 2 inches in from the edge. That way there is a strip of insulation directly behind the zipper.<\/p>\n

\"oops,<\/a>
oops, time to add a zipper now<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"I<\/a>
I used ripstop to add some tubes around the head opening so that I can since it down around my face<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Clearly quite thrown together, but it resembles a sleeping bag! Next I needed a compression sack to keep it packed down. To estimate the volume needed, I put the sleeping bag into an existing cylindrical stuff sack that was a little too short and large in diameter for what I needed. But I could measure its height and length to calculate volume needed for my bag, and I used that volume to decide the dimensions of my new stuff sack. I settled on 20″ long at 6″ diameter.<\/p>\n

\"pieces\"<\/a>
pieces: top, bottom, body, and two skirts that the webbing will attach to<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"folded<\/a>
folded and sewed one edge of each skirt.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"also<\/a>
also folded and sewed what will eventually be the opening of the pull cord tube<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"adding<\/a>
adding webbing to one of the skirts, I am using 3\/8″ wide<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Below image shows the pull cord tube sewn, and the addition of triangle piece of material,\u00a0which will\u00a0offer some strain relief on the opening, as well as create a larger opening to help make stuffing easier.<\/p>\n

\"adding<\/a>
adding triangle piece of strain relief of the bag opening<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"skirt<\/a>
skirt with webbing tentacles attached to the bag body<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"finally,<\/a>
finally, the body becomes a tube. Starting at the strain relief triangle, the edges are sewn together.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"circular<\/a>
circular end cap is sewn on. The edge is folded and sewn again (maybe not necessary)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"The<\/a>
The cap is made with one skirt sewn to one end cap<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"The<\/a>
The first stuffing! measures in at roughly 17″ uncompressed<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"squish!\"<\/a>
squish! down to a little over 12″<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

As it turns out, the skirt on the cap ended up being too short and the cap would slide side to side depending on which side was being tightened. I added an extra strip of ripstop to make the cap just a bit deeper. This seems to do the trick.<\/p>\n

\"the<\/a>
colors!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"don't<\/a>
don’t forget to add a pull handle! I used 1″ grosgrain ribbon.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I am going on a backpacking trip. I want to carry as little as possible if I can, so I tried to make a lighter and smaller sleeping bag. First, I cheated by starting with a sleeping bag. It is one I have had as long as I can remember. Its okay for warm car […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1263,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[8,14],"tags":[61,71,118,145,182,194],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/amymakesstuff.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/08\/img_3948.jpg?fit=800%2C600&ssl=1","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/amymakesstuff.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1250"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/amymakesstuff.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/amymakesstuff.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amymakesstuff.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amymakesstuff.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1250"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/amymakesstuff.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1250\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amymakesstuff.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1263"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/amymakesstuff.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1250"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amymakesstuff.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1250"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amymakesstuff.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1250"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}