How To Choose The Right Sleeping Bag
by: Sam Bradford on Thu, 19 Mar 2009 at: 3:50 AM Go to: Previous Article Next Article
The technology behind sleeping bags today has sure improved upon the old cowboy bedroll idea. These you can stay warm in the coldest of circumstances using some high tech designs and materials. Here are some ideas to help you buy the right sleeping bag:
At one time or another you will be on an outdoor adventure and the weather turn cold particularly at night. Keeping this in mind you will need to look for a sleeping bag that will be rated for the coldest of temperatures that you may be exposed to backpacking and camping. For your warm weather trips a sleeping bag rated with a +35 degree or even above will be good enough.
But if you do your camping in either the mountains during the summer months, or the fall or spring, you probably will need to get a sleeping bag that is rated in the range of +10 - +35. Of course you hearty winter campers should buy bags that are rated between -10 to +10 degree range, and then the alpine mountain climbers and cold weather explorers should get the bags with a rating of below -10.
You need to know that these ratings are just estimates for the lowest temperatures the bag will work to warm you at. So just use these numbers to steer you in the right direction, everyone feels the cold at different levels. You may get so warm that you don't like a lot of blankets on you if you sleep, if this be the case then go 10 degrees less warm on your sleeping bag (or the +35 rated). But if you get cold real easy then go 10 degrees warmer.
The most critical section on your sleeping bag is by all means the insulation. The sleeping bags today either have down or synthetic insulation in them. They each have there pros and cons. Down is the one that does best in the warmth given equated to what it weighs.
Down is nice, light and very easy to compress to roll the bag up, but gives you fantastic insulation. How do you think geese can be so warm and fly too during the cold weather? Reports show that down is durable over the long haul and even can insulate after you using the bag for years.
With mentioning all that about down, the sleeping bags also come in some good quality synthetic materials today, and this kind of material is being improved upon as time goes by. It is true though that a synthetic sleeping bag has more weight in it than the down sleeping bag, the synthetic bags are the more desired ones in wet conditions, they do better than down under these conditions. Down actually has very little ability to insulate if it gets wet.
Definitely buy a synthetic for camping in damp conditions, you won't be sorry. Also the synthetic is totally hypoallergenic, whereas many people can be allergic to the down. If you have little money to spend the synthetic is cheaper than the down is. Let your adventure begin!
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To get more information on Down Sleeping Bags we suggest you visit www.downsleepingbagsonline.com.
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