Durston X-Mid 2

“Thanks for sharing your experience and sorry you had a poor experience. I appreciate the feedback and I'll try to provide some analysis on what may have gone wrong here. **1) Leakage/Saturation** It sounds like the main issue seemed to be water soaking through/saturating the fly fabric (i.e. leaking). Both nylon and poly fabrics rely on the coatings (e.g. Sil, PE) for waterproofness, so leakage isn't a nylon vs poly issue but rather a coating issue. With the X-Mid we use a silicone coating on the outside and a PE coating on the inside (so we can seam tape it) and this fabric is normally very waterproof. We've been using it for 5 years with very few reports of leakage. In your case, the problem would have to be either (a) some defective fabric that doesn't meet our normal waterproofness, or (2) condensation. It's hard to rule out condensation in the field because they can feel very similar. Either way the inside of the tent would be wet potentially all over. What I suggest is to do a quick home test. You can place the fabric over a bowl or bucket and put a puddle of water on top to see if it leaks. If it leaks, my sincere apologies. This is quite uncommon and we will be happy to warranty it. If it is a case of heavy condensation, that is partly within the control of the tent but also mostly driven by the environment (e.g. temperature and humidity). In conditions where it is cold and wet heavy condensation can be simply unavoidable since ventilation is not doing anything if it's just exchanging humid air in the tent for other humid air. Normally this isn't a substantial problem in a doublewall tent because you are separated from any condensation, but if it is also windy (as it was for you) then the wind can knock the condensation off the fly. That is a real problem with all singlewall and mesh inner tents. This is why we also offer inner tents with solid fabric. A 'solid' inner protects you from any droplets knocked off the fly (whether from condensation or leakage) and is much more popular in Europe, but is less popular in North America because it is also warmer and can be too warm sometimes. If you regularly camp in quite cold/wet conditions a solid inner is a better way to go - hence it's popularity in the UK. With regard to nylon versus poly, as I mention this doesn't have much to do with leakage or condensation. The main effect here is that polyester doesn't absorb water INTO the fibers nearly as much as nylon so there is less water weight gain, less sag, and faster drying. Either fabric can still get condensation and still leak (if the coatings aren't working properly) but poly does have advantages in these other areas. **2) Doorway** For the doorway, the X-Mid has a "protected" doorway where the fly overhangs the inner slightly so falling rain won't land right inside the tent (as it does for many tents). This fly over hangs the inner, but the over hang is not a lot so if you open the door quickly it can swing inwards and hit the ”