Just wanted to relate a bad experience with a Ray-way quilt. My husband and I made our own down quilt using Jardine’s design. It took a lot of effort, and it came out functioning well and weighing a bit less than 4 lbs. We set off on our PCT thru-hike with it, looking forward to romantic nights spooning under the stars.
However, the design failed us. In the first hour or two of the night, it was wonderful. Then, as the temperature dropped later in the night and our bodies warmed the bag, we got too hot in the lower part of the bag (waists down) and too cold in the neck and shoulder area. Cold air would come down through the gap between our shoulders/necks. We tried stuffing extra clothes in the gap, but the clothes would shift eventually and proved to be irritatingly bulky. We bought a small fleece blanket to stick in the gap, but it also shifted and let cold air in.
So, we abandoned the quilt after two weeks of miserable sleeping. We bought two Mountain Hardware down bags that zipped together and called that a good compromise.
BTW, we made the quilt out of 30-degree rated down on top and 200-weight fleece on bottom. We used a full zipper.
I have since racked my brain and penciled down some ideas on this gap issue. It needs a good seamstress and a some quality materials. I think a light elastic neck separator is the answer, but have never experimented. I know from the experience, that even if we solved the upper warmth problem, we would still have the lower body overheating issue to deal with…it’s too hard to regulate our two very different sleeping styles (he sleeps very hot; me very cold).
I just wanted to point out why the quilt system failed us so that you have some idea of what could go wrong. Obviously, there are many out there who have used the quilt system effectively. If you tend to sleep without tossing a lot and with similar body temps, you may find you really like a quilt. But if not, it’s not enough of a weight savings to sacrifice a good night’s sleep. Buying two high quality light down bags is about the same weight as a quilt. In fact, the two bags we own now, together weigh less than the quilt did and are rated to 10-degrees. (The highest quality lightest bags are made by Feathered Friends, Western Mountaineering and Marmot.)
As for down, I have carried it over 8,000 miles of AT, PCT and across the US. I’ve been in torrential rains, fallen into creeks and endured El Nino on the AT in '98. I’ve only gotten my bag damp a few times, both due to leaky tents. Neither was life-threatening. The down has to be soaked to be useless and that just doesn’t happen unless you try or are dumped out of a canoe. In fact, even when our canoe turned over, the two trash bags around my down bag kept it dry, even after a 10-minute plunge through rapids.
Bottom line is to do what is most comfortable to you. Just know that down is a fine choice for backcountry travel, but you will want to protect it well.
Nocona
and i think we’ll probably end up with a single wall tent, or maybe a tarptent with really good mesh walls as the gf has an uneasy relationship with skeeters.