Jul. 08, 2024
If you&#;re wondering why roof tents are quickly becoming one of the most popular ways to camp, then hopefully this will give you more of an idea!
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Normal ground tents can take quite a while to set up as they often have inner tents as well as outer tents to put up. Then obviously you've got to pack them away too- not too pleasant when you&#;re doing it on a dark and rainy night! Good roof top tents typically only take around 30 seconds to open up and only slightly longer to close, so you can imagine the time and effort you&#;re saving with them!
2. Cheaper Than Caravans, Campervans And Motorhomes
Roof tents are typically cheaper than caravans, campervans and certainly motorhomes both when you first buy them and from not having the same ongoing costs that you would have with these alternatives. You would often need to pay for a storage facility to keep all of these. Plus you&#;d have to get additional van insurance with campervans and motorhomes, so both of these will cost you money even when you&#;re not using them! Also on top of these expenses you have the extra breakdown, repair and renovation costs you often need with campervans and motorhomes. These can especially add up on the older campers you can buy as they&#;re often not the most reliable of vehicles and need lots of renovating before they&#;re good enough to hit the road with!
3. More Places To Camp
You have the freedom to camp in more places with roof tents as unlike with tents you don&#;t need a large, flat, dry, soft surface to get set up. The need for such a specific type of conditions with a tent often restricts you to fewer of the free/wild camping locations on offer. Caravans/large motorhomes are often caught out by the amount of space needed for them here, so you&#;re usually restricted to just staying at campsites with them.
4. Flood Proof
Because roof tents are up high on top of your vehicle, there&#;s no chance of getting flooded in the night after a heavy downpour like with a normal tent. So if you&#;re planning on going anywhere with unpredictable weather, these might just save you a very wet trip to the dry cleaners!
5. Better Views
The elevated position of roof tents being on top of your vehicle means that the views are much better than if you were down in a tent/campervan. You also get 360 degree views with roof tents that have two doors and two windows too, which makes the scenery look just that much more beautiful!
6. Extra Vehicle Storage Space
With roof top tents you get extra vehicle storage space for your belongings than with tents because you can put your things in the roof tent when it&#;s closed too. This comes in especially handy when you want to quickly pack up and leave your bedding in the tent as it makes it so much faster and easier to do!
7. Stronger And More Durable Than Tents
Good roof tents generally have more durable material on the canvas than tents and the hard shell roof tent designs have a stronger structure to them, meaning it&#;s both leakproof and quieter inside the roof tent when it&#;s windy and raining, which all leads to a better night&#;s sleep for you!
8. Warmer Than Tents
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The thicker canvas material and hard ABS/fibreglass shell that good roof top tents have over regular tents also means that heat doesn&#;t escape as easily, so it should stay nice and toasty for you at night. This should come in especially handy if you plan on going anywhere during the Winter as we all know the nights can get very chilly at this time of the year!
Enjoy this article? Then please check out our others below!:
Hard Shell Or Soft Shell Roof Top Tent? - A Side By Side Comparison
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For me, my biggest concern with tent camping is safety. Whether it be from a human or a bear, I have always felt a bit vulnerable trapped in a raincoat supported by fishing poles. During rainstorms I always imagine a torrent of water coming and flooding the tent or washing us away. And if I&#;m in the woods there&#;s always the fear of critters getting into the tent somehow. I&#;ve even had a snake slither under the tent once. All of these fears almost completely disappear with a rooftop tent. Being on top of your car ensures that nothing can overtake your tent. Critters aren&#;t crawling up the side of your car to get to you and if any floodwaters get to the level of your tent floor then you weren&#;t meant to survive the night anyway.
I am no expert in winter camping, but I have slept (or at least tried to sleep) through a number of frigid nights. On the floor of Death Valley, sleeping in bags rated for 20°F, on a foot thick air mattress, in a tent, wearing multiple layers, I shivered through the night as it dropped to ~35°F. In our rooftop tent, we slept like babies. Granted, we were in our two-person sleeping bag, but it is not rated for the cold at all. We&#;re still weighing the benefits of sleeping individually in cold-rated bags versus the combination bag. Regardless, 37°F was beautifully comfortable atop the Subaru. I was still in a hoodie and pajama pants, but I slept with my torso out of the bag for most of the night.
The mechanics of a tent that folds up like an accordion mean that the canvas tent is not a complete, solid unit. At the hinge of the tent there is a small opening that is covered by a canvas loin cloth held in place by Velcro. It&#;s weatherproof from your ordinary rainstorms, but torrential downpours and blowing wind might be a bit of an issue if you&#;re not careful. This also means there are small crevices for insects to enter through. Although no ground critters are likely to scale the sides of your vehicle to these entry points, mosquitos are notoriously crafty and can get into just about any place they want. It may take some extra sealing up if you plan on staying in a place that has a particularly nasty mosquito infestation. This is not necessarily the case for every tent though, especially pop-up versions, which seem to be completely sealed.
Obviously, adding a small sail that weighs ~100lbs to the roof of your car is going to affect the aerodynamics, but how much? We are still analyzing data from our Subaru Forester, but the results are of the order of a 7-9% fuel efficiency loss. This can be made less severe with a wind deflector (the front of the tent is simply a flat face, with a surface area of approximately 4sq. ft.). Personal driving habits also come in to play, as a primary contributor to wind resistance is proportional to velocity squared, so increased speed exponentially increases drag. This is probably why with our Subaru we see such a large loss, since we are most often driving ~85mph on western highways. This is not always the case with rooftop tents, as some are rather low profile and are more aerodynamic, but those are typically pop-up tents rather than unfolding tents, which are generally more expensive.
It may seem like you need a massive vehicle with reinforced everything to use one of these, but the reality is that they&#;re not as cumbersome as they look. It may look ridiculous perched atop a Mini Cooper, but the stress they place on your vehicle is surprisingly minimal. Our tent weighs ~100lbs. Many standard roof racks are rated for 150lbs of dynamic weight* so make sure you check your car&#;s rating and the weight of the tent, since many tents weigh in right around 150lbs. Any upgraded rack bars (i.e. Yakima, Thule, etc.) should be able to support a few hundred pounds of static weight. Trucks with bed racks may run into issues if they are too tall. Torque is linearly dependent on force and distance, so the less weight you have up high and the lower its center of gravity, the fewer issues you will have on trails when things get rocky.
*Be careful when comparing weight ratings. Static weight is how much weight something can support standing still, while dynamic weight is the force applied to your roof rack while driving (turning, stopping, etc.).
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