Coleman 8-Person Tent for Camping

I received this tent about a week ago knowing full well it would be used right away. Though it was an eight person tent, I was the only one sleeping in it but I needed the extra room for my cot and all of my gear. The time of year is mid summer so I thought this tent would be perfect. When the tent came, I opened the item right away to take inventory and to do a test assembly in the field across from my home. Please understand I do not do have a lot of current camping experience but I have had experience over the years and thought it should be pretty straight forward. The tent includes the tent, rainfly, stakes and poles all enclosed with instructions in a zippered bag. The tent instructions say that it would be better if a second person was available to help erect the tent. There was no second person included so I did it solo. It takes some patience but it can be done. Don't get ahead of yourself, follow the steps and complete them one at a time and you'll have success even if you are solo. The hardest part is the initial raising and placing of the main support poles. If you first secure the main poles (one at a time) on the side opposite the door, you'll find it a bit easier as you can stand inside the door (if it is zipped open,) allowing you to be closer to the center of the roof as it is raised. After that, everything is a bit easier. Side poles come next and then clip and secure everything. You may find that the zippers on the front door are under a bit of tension. I found that if I used the top zipper to close half the door and the lower zipper to close the lower half, it opened and closed much easier than if you used one zipper to do the whole door. Also, you'll find if you leave the internal door window unzipped (open), the door zippers work easier. One of the back window zippers kept loosing it's lanyard as the metal tang on the zipper wedge seemed a bit too open to keep the cord in place so I simple took my uni-tool pliers and gave it a gentle squeeze closing the loop and thus holding the lanyard more securely. No failure on the zippers thus far. The floor is a Tyvec type material and a “tub” type design. It seemed fairly rugged but I stilled used a tarp ground cloth as a good foundation. My cot has 6 legs and in four days never left as much as even an impression on the floor. I did have a thorn or two pierce the floor while camping, my fault for not making sure the ground was completely clear. But it did serve as a reminder that even though it may look rugged, you can still easily put a hole in it. On my camping trip, I used what I had learned to erect the tent and repeated the process with out too much difficulty even on my own. It is important to note at this point that I did not have success putting on the rainfly during my practice run as the wind was too great. So, if you can, save the rain fly for when there is little or no wind, especially if you are by yourself. I slept in the tent for three days without the rain fly and it was great. The huge screen panels allow great views of the night sky and give more than ample ventilation. The forecast for the fourth night was for rain so I installed the rainfly. This is where someone may have dropped the ball in writing the instructions. First, the instructions call for placing the “Arbor” rods through the specified points prior to draping the fly over the tent. If you have two people, perhaps its possible. But, it was much easier to drape the fly over the tent and THEN install the arbor rods. Second, the instructions show four bungee securing loops, one at each corner of the fly when in fact there are 8 bungee loops with hooks. The hooks are then stretched and secured to the stake loops at the four main corners of the tent. This design could use a little refining as the steel tent stake anchor loops are pressed firmly to the ground under pressure from both the tent stakes themselves and the four tent support rods. Trying to get the bungee hook attached to the tent stake loop as directed may require you to do a little excavation with your fingernails in order to access enough surface area of the loop to secure the hook. Also, these bungees are under pressure so when you are stretching them, be careful one doesn’t slip and hit you right in the face...like it did me. Once the fly was up, I was ready for the rain. Or was I? In total, we had about an inch and a half of rain that fell over a 24 hour period. In that time, you could see a slow deterioration of the rain proof capability in both the rain fly and the tent. At first it looked like it was coming in around the tent stake anchor points (it felt wet in these areas), then I noticed that the fly itself started to seep through the fabric in several areas. Later still, I noticed that the tent fabric areas that were not protected/covered by the rain fly became saturated and accumulating moisture seeped through. I used several t shirts and socks to soak up the water. In total, I estimate there was at least a quart or more that leaked through. Fortunately, the ground cloth raised the floor of the tent slightly and accumulating water stayed to the outer perimeter of the floor. Considering it was a new tent, I am pretty disappointed at the lack of water proofing that was done to both the tent and the rain fly. I expected some moisture, but not to the degree that I experienced. As far as rain is concerned, there is a another design feature that could be improved and that is the rain fly arbor over the front door. With out any wind, rain can still wet the door. And, since the door is at an angle, when you unzip the door, the door swings inside and all of the rain on the outside of the door is now on your floor. You can minimize this by tapping on the door before you open it and most of the rain water will fall to the outside, but not all of it. An over hang of another 12-18 inches would take care of this. One final note. The tent take down was pretty simple all but drying it out before I could roll everything up which takes time. Try as I may, I could not roll up everything tight enough to be able to fit everything back into the bag that it came in. A bigger bag might be nice. I have since purchased a can of water proofing spray and will treat everything and give it another go. If I hadn't received such a huge discount when I purchased it, I would probably return the tent because of the leaking.