The Novice Survivalist
A novice outdoorsmen learning camping, fishing, bushcraft and survival. "KNOWLEDGE IS A SURVIVAL SKILL"
French Army F1 2 man pup tent.
Hi Campers,
I recently purchased a new camp tent. Why you ask. My old tent was a Ozark trails 2 man tent I purchased at Walmart. Great little tent, however I recently managed to put a hole in it. Repairing it would just need to use some Duct tape. (Cut a piece for both, inside and out.) Not sure if this would keep the wet out, or for how long.
Fortunately I recently watched a review on YouTube from one of my favorite channels. The Prepared Wanderer. Excellent channel that I have used as a reference for equipment and tips regularly. He reviewed a tent that really could my attention. It had some great extras associated with it, and so I looked a bit more into it and found one that met my budget. (Amazon). $55.00 I felt was a worth while investment for what I believed to be a great addition to my camping equipment. So dusted of my bank card and splurged. I purchased the French Army, F1 2 man Pup tent. (Military Surplus).
A week later it arrived and I dived into check it out. Well Money very well spent. Here’s the why and why not’s of the tent.
Why not’s first.
- When I got it out of the packaging the bag it came in was bigger than I hoped.
- It weighed a ton.
- On opening the bag The extras bag ( pegs tie downs etc.) was extremely heavy. Probably half the total weight. The pegs were a very large, very strong steel. And there was a lot of them. 16 in total I believe. Extremely heavy.
- The tie ropes are made of a thin Strong rope. (Like mini 550 cord). There are 6 in total I believe. These will work fine however but the color (Army green) made them hard to see. I have bad eye sight and I know Ill trip over them.
After this initial impression I sat down and looked to see if I could fix these 4 issues.
- The Size of the bag turned out to be a quick fix. When it is packed from the manufacturer. The tent is rolled up. In such a way that it was long. I found that stuffing the tent instead of rolling it up, reduced the length about 4 to 5 inches. Taking care of the size problem. It was just too long to attach to the bottom of my Medium Alice Pack. Now it is only slightly wider than Pack.
- The weight issue as I said was mainly the very sturdy pegs that were supplied with it.
I replaced these ( most of them 12 to be exact) with the aluminum style tent pegs I used on my old tent. I got these from Walmart and they cost about a $1 each. The weight saving is magnificent. however they are not perfect for the pegging down of the floor of the tent so I kept 4 of the original steel pegs. to peg the 4 corners of the floor. - See 2…LOL
- To minimize the issue of tripping over the well camouflaged tie ropes supplied, I bought some high visibility 550 cordage. It has a reflective strand woven into it and is a safety orange color. Inexpensive and the rating was 150 lbs. . More than enough to tie down the tent.
Viola… it now is perfect for me . Well as perfect as I can get it right now.
Here are some more plus features I found when I rushed out back and put it up for the first time.
- Quick and easy to put up. Took about 7 minutes
- Made of very sturdy water proof material
- Built in fly
- Built in floor
- Excellent ventilation.
- Roomy. Later than I supposed.
So campers am I happy with my new purchase. Very so far although I have not put it to the actual camp test….YET. Winter has arrived in Minnesota. Its getting chilly, but I still would like to test it out. Just have to plan the trip carefully. Don’t want to find myself in a bad situation in the middle of a snow blizzard.
Stay tuned for a follow up post on the French 2 man pup tent. Or if your inkling takes you click on the link to see my YouTube video of the first set up and review I did.
Until next time. Remember Knowledge is a survival skill. Of course modifying things to suit your needs is a must.
Stay warm out there
The Novice Survivalist
The Novice Survivalist 
Pingback: Prepping for my first Minnesota winter | The Novice Survivalist