Bushwalk Australia

Unfortunately my last order from RSBTR was damaged in transit and my membrane silpoly had a small hole in it about 15cm in from the edge.

As it is for a tarp and I'd have to trim both sides to centre the ridgeline I would lose about 30cm width which doesn't work. RSBTR have been kind enough to replace the damages piece which means I now have 4 yards of 15cm narrower silpoly to play with.

I was thinking of making a silpoly bathtub floor and Tyvek topped s/bag cover to offer some protection when tarp camping but before I go chopping up a great piece of fabric I thought I'd ask for ideas.

I did think about a waterproof outer synthetic quilt but am worried that would just trap sweat and body moisture in reality.

Or, maybe an all silpoly bivy bag for trips where I plan to make a hut (NZ) but for whatever reason have an unplanned night out.

Or, a mini tarp ~1.8 X 1.2 made to use as a vestibule extension for my Lanshan 1 or 2.

What ideas do you folks have?

Just repair the hole and use it full size. Patch with almost anything and use neutral silicon as the glue.

I would patch it but it is a brand new piece of fabric that I bought and it wasn't packaged well enough to survive the trip.

It's also the membrane silpoly that isn't ripstop and has lower tear strength than most of the other fabrics so I don't really want to start with a hole if I can avoid it.

So given that they will replace the half of my order that was damaged I now have a good length of fabric to make something else out of.

With the damages bit I could leave the extra 15cm width on and patch it and use it for something else but I figured I'll trim it down and use the waste to test some glued reinforcements and send some to Timthetinker for testing.

Well in that case a small tarp to use as a porch may be the best way to use it.
I've almost always found that my patches are stronger than the base fabric as I use a layer on each side if in doubt

Smellypaddler wrote:Unfortunately my last order from RSBTR was damaged in transit and my membrane silpoly had a small hole in it about 15cm in from the edge.

As it is for a tarp and I'd have to trim both sides to centre the ridgeline I would lose about 30cm width which doesn't work. RSBTR have been kind enough to replace the damages piece which means I now have 4 yards of 15cm narrower silpoly to play with.

I was thinking of making a silpoly bathtub floor and Tyvek topped s/bag cover to offer some protection when tarp camping but before I go chopping up a great piece of fabric I thought I'd ask for ideas.

I did think about a waterproof outer synthetic quilt but am worried that would just trap sweat and body moisture in reality.

Or, maybe an all silpoly bivy bag for trips where I plan to make a hut (NZ) but for whatever reason have an unplanned night out.

Or, a mini tarp ~1.8 X 1.2 made to use as a vestibule extension for my Lanshan 1 or 2.

What ideas do you folks have?

Hi Smellypaddler, When you described your fabric as silpoly, I immediately thought that you were dealing with simple woven polyester fabric with 'pure' silicone rubber coated on both sides (That's what it looks like to me). BarryK has pointed out to me that ripstopbytheroll have a products that they call silpoly:
https://ripstopbytheroll.com/collections/waterproof-polyester-fabric/products/1-6-oz-silpoly?avad=189374_e2360bdb5&variant=30371342157
Their description is :
"1.6 oz silicone coated polyester ripstop (aka silpoly). This fabric is coated with a silicone/PU layer on each side......."
What do you think your silpoly is? Is it polyester fabric coated with pure silicone rubber or polyester coated with a mix of silicone rubber and PU?
Tim