Heating in a tent in winter
Guess all of us have been in the off-season and winter hikes when at night, lying in a tent, only two questions are of concern: “Why is it so cold?” and “When will the morning come?” This situation is also possible in summer trips at high-altitude overnight stays. But a tourist is an inventive person and does not like to freeze, and therefore obvious and not very ways to keep warm in a tent began to appear. First, let's figure out when it's warm for us: 1 . In the sun or around a campfire. In this case, we are warmed by a third-party heat source. 2 . When we are wrapped up in warm clothes, a down jacket, a sleeping bag. In this case, thanks to good thermal insulation, we keep our own heat. It is on these two concepts (saving own heat and receiving heat from an external source) and on their combination that the methods of warming in a tent are built: Feet in backpack. After a cold snap, the limbs begin to freeze first. There's an easy way to prevent your feet from freezing - stuff them in an empty backpack. This will add an extra layer of thermal insulation and keep you much warmer. Fleece liner. During preparation, analyze the future region of the trip, if cold overnight stays are possible, and you are not sure about your sleeping bag, buy a fleece liner. The thing is not expensive, light and at the same time very warm. thermal underwear. A lot has already been written about thermal underwear, I will simply say - it should be. The only thing is that for sleep it is better to buy thermal underwear made from natural fibers, and not synthetics. Heating pad in the sleeping bag. The simplest heating pad on a hike is a bottle of hot water. If you are very cold, maybe two. They will keep you warm and the sleeping bag will keep you warm. Should be enough for the night. If the bottle cools down earlier, just pull it out of the sleeping bag. Sometimes a stone heated in a fire and wrapped in a cloth is used as a heating pad. The main thing is that it should not be too hot. Stitching, quilting, twine. This is a favorite way for young people. Two sleeping bags are fastened into one, where both tourists climb and warm one of them with their warmth! A very efficient way. In addition, it is also pleasant if you sleep with an individual of the opposite sex)) Sparka raises the comfort temperature by 7-10%. Tent heating. If you have a stove, candles or dry alcohol, you can heat the tent with their help. At the same time, be as careful as possible, because the tent burns down in a matter of seconds. In general, the presence of open flames in the tent is prohibited. But what can't you do when it's cold.. You can still warm the tent with a hot stone. We take a stone heated in a fire, put it in an iron bowl and carry it to the tent. A place should already be prepared in the tent - things have been removed, flooring from boards has been laid out at the bottom, because when the bowl gets very hot, it may well melt the carimate and the bottom of the tent. Toilet paper. A friend of mine took three rolls on a hike. toilet paper and every night he wrapped himself in it from head to toe. Says - helps, he did not try. The main disadvantage is that by morning the paper turns into crumbs and it takes a long time to clean things from it. We have warm nights!
Good day friends! This review will focus on heating in a tent in winter time. I posted a blog post - I'm looking for an answer, since the review will be educational in particular for me. At the end of the post, I will formulate questions that interest me.
The frosty season is coming, which cannot please nature lovers, fishermen, tourists, athletes and just active people. Whatever category you belong to, I need your experience, if any, not by hearsay, experience in heating a tent in winter. More precisely, the temperature range is 15-20 Celsius overboard.
Specific conditions for the use of heating devices are a dome tent, without a bottom (such are used for fishing). Outside, the skirt is covered with snow. There is spruce branches on the floor, a layer of 20 centimeters. On top of the spruce branches there is an awning tarpaulin, sometimes foam (depending on whether there will be spruce branches at the place of spending the night or not and according to the weather ....) and a good sleeping bag cocoon - comfort -15 Celsius.
The problem is that during my nights in the forest I used several ways to heat the tent. And not one suits me absolutely. You still freeze, then you watch so as not to burn, then you ventilate ... You end up not getting enough sleep. And I would like a serene sleep for 360 minutes like that ... To be cheerful and rested in the morning.
I had to sleep near Nodia a couple of times, but it's not convenient to have to spin like a carcass on a spit. He heated one side, cooled four ... This is not rest, this is so as not to freeze!
And so the ways:
- gas hob
Pros.
It is convenient because you can cook on it in a tent and kicking it in a dream is difficult to turn it over. And that's it!
Minuses.
There is a very high consumption of cans, if you use it for heating, you need to have cans only of high quality for low temperatures, and they are expensive. As a result, using expensive raw materials, we still freeze, we have to wake up to control combustion or change the cylinder.
-Candles.
Pros.
Cheap. It's not hard to carry.
Minuses.
Cold.
(You always have to watch as if you didn’t turn over when you tossed and turned, slept so once.)
- Kerosene lamp.
Pros.
Light + Heating is not bad (C grade).
Minuses.
Always ventilate! Constant control so as not to overturn in a dream.
- Gas heater.
Pros.
You can cook on it, you can dry clothes on it. I had one (and swam away), we constantly burned it while fishing, but since we went either on snowmobiles or in a car, we carried a propane tank with us. 
The cylinder was enough for a very long time (for 2-3 fishing trips for sure). The only source of heating that moderately dries the air and prevents it from falling out (in literally of this word) condensation in the form of snow inside the tent (whoever slept knows such small snow dandruff in the morning inside the tent everywhere). Warm, comfortable, does not stink, the sleeping bag even sometimes had to be unfastened.
Minuses.
Gas consumption like a tile. I described this disadvantage. Carrying propane up the hill is not an option.
- Potbelly stove.
IN old times I had to sleep in a combined-arms soldier's tent for a platoon. One potbelly stove on moderate burning heated the tent with a bang. (Firewood is prepared, the orderly monitors the stoves).
Pros.
Like indoors.
Minuses.
As in the case of a propane tank (weight, volume ...)
- Just wrap up.
Pros.
With good thermal underwear and a quality sleeping bag (sleeping system), there are no worries to get enough sleep.
Minuses.
Getting up in the morning, getting out is disgusting! Crawling out to the toilet is disgusting. Everything cold in the tent is dandruff everywhere, to drink tea you need to kindle a fire or a tile inside the tent, everything is damp and frozen ... brrr ... I had such a morning several times when, spitting on everything, I extinguished candles, stoves, tiles to sleep peacefully.
I am skeptical about salt heaters, catalytic heaters in a sleeping bag (it will warm only a separate part of the body, not for long), bottles of boiling water, I have not tried heated stones in a tent, but I need a cobblestone the size of a head, there are none in our forest. And open sources of fire (candles, Lebedev's lights ...., this is not safe). There is a sound idea for candles, but where to find such a chandelier?
Today I don't have the best option. Not in my backpack, not in my head. Before asking a question, I say right away that I understand that there is no ideal means of heating. But there is hope.
I would like to purchase reasonable price so that you don’t have to worry about a fire in the tent, so as not to suffocate, so that the weight is not large, so that a combustible consumable is available, not expensive and available in stores (and not by online order). And the main thing is that it should really be warm (not like in a bathhouse, but so that steam from the mouth does not pour out in clubs inside the tent.) Someone may know something like that, in extreme cases I am ready to sacrifice some of the benefits I have listed.
???
And may the force be with you!
In the cold season, you need to take care of its heating, especially if the trip is planned with children.
Of course, an important role for a comfortable sleep is played by right choice and, but you must admit, even if the whole body is warm, and the nose and ears are cold - this is not very pleasant. Children are known to toss and turn in their sleep and open up, so it is better to heat the entire tent to be calm and not worry that the little ones will catch a cold. So I will not consider individual heaters, such as a catalytic heating pad, a hot water bottle in a sleeping bag, or other chemical heaters.
So, what are the safe options for heating a tent. One of the most common ways is to heat the “home” with cobblestone well heated on a fire.
There is a trick here - if you simply heat the stone on a fire and bring it into the tent, then at first it will be stuffy there, but after an hour the stone will gradually cool down and it will become cold again in the tent. You can put a stone in a bowl with a lid - this will increase the time to 3 hours, but this is not enough for a good sleep. It is necessary to increase the thermal inertia of the stone so that it keeps heat for 8-10 hours, cooling down gradually. To do this, use a non-combustible, lightweight and small-sized heat insulator - ordinary aluminum foil. A stone wrapped in several layers of foil will cool down much more slowly and will not create stuffiness in the tent in the first hours. When the stone starts to cool down, it will be enough just to unscrew the foil layer by layer - and it will become warm in the tent again. Heat is retained by the air between the foil layers.
In order not to burn the bottom of the tent with a red-hot stone, it is placed in a pan (it is better that the stone is approximately the size of a human head and fits snugly in the socket of the pan, and does not rest on its bottom). Under the pan, you can additionally put an inverted frying pan or a wooden plank.
Important note: you need to heat the stone gradually in order to prevent its destruction due to a sharp temperature drop on its surface and inside.
If possible, you can heat a 10-20 liter can of water and put in a tent. The effect of the battery for 3-4 hours is provided.
Another equally common option is set up a tent at the place where the fire burned. Ideally, the turf is removed according to the size of the tent, a deepening of 20 centimeters is dug, and a fire is burned at this place for several hours. When large coals burn out, the fire is covered with a layer of earth 7-10 centimeters, spruce branches or dry grass are placed on top and a tent is set up. But many do not bother with digging, but simply remove the coals from the fire and put spruce branches on the hot ground. You can sleep peacefully until morning.
More confusing heating option with the help of a fire and a duralumin collapsible pipe. For such a heater, you will need six meter lengths of a duralumin tube with a diameter of 5 cm (the weight of the kit is a little more than a kilogram) and a small sheet of asbestos. About 5 meters from the tent, a fire is kindled and a pipe is pulled through it into the tent. The place where the pipe comes into contact with the fire is wrapped with asbestos. One end of the pipe is directed into the tent, the other - outside the fire, protrudes so that the smoke does not get inside. The clean air entering the pipe is heated, passing through the fire, and goes into the tent. The difference between the lower - inlet end of the pipe and the upper - outlet should be at least 1.5-2 meters. The steeper the slope, the stronger the air circulation. The temperature of the incoming air depends on the heating of the pipe in the fire. If it gets too hot, you can close the outlet in the tent or reduce the fire.
All these methods are time-consuming and not very convenient when you are traveling with children or moving from place to place and you arrive late and already tired to the next parking lot.
Help is here special travel heaters . They are gasoline, kerosene or gas.
Burners are very popular in Lately among tourists, as everyone can choose what he likes from a wide range of specimens on the market. Such a stove can combine not only a heater, but also a tile for cooking, and sometimes also illuminate the space. Such burners are usually compact, reliable and silent. Using such heaters in a tent, you need to take care of access fresh air inside. It will not be superfluous to have an oxygen sensor in the stove, which will turn off the gas supply when the oxygen level is low. A prerequisite is that such a heater must be certified for use in residential premises.
For some winter night fishing - real romance. For others, it is a form of perversion. However, this article is not for them.
If you want to catch trophy specimens in winter and surprise everyone, you definitely need to go night fishing. With the right approach, you will return with large bream, burbot, pike, crucian carp, etc.
However, remember that winter fishing with an overnight stay in a pond can be life-threatening, and therefore requires utmost vigilance and caution. Recall that last year in Altai there was a tragic incident when two experienced fishermen died in a tent. The men set up a tent on the ice. And to keep warm, they lit a gas burner inside, and soon fell asleep. The next day they were found dead - the fishermen were poisoned by carbon monoxide.
To prevent this from happening, you need to choose the right tent and burner. About how to make winter fishing safe and as comfortable as possible, Komsomolskaya Pravda told chief angler Altai Territory Sergey Kazantsev.
How not to freeze and burn in the winter in a tent: advice from fishermen
Rule #1: You need the right winter tent
Winter tents differ from summer tents in that they do not have a bottom - this is necessary in order to drill a hole inside the tent. The main task of such a tent is to keep warm and protect from the wind.
Please note that the tent is equipped with a ventilation system - at least a valve at the top. Ideally, there should be forced ventilation - this is a special valve at the bottom. If there is none, then make such ventilation yourself, using an ordinary plastic pipe - put it between the wall of the tent and ice (snow). According to the laws of physics, cold air will be dragged into the tent, circulate with warm and go upstairs with combustion products, - advises Sergey Kazantsev.
There are insulated winter tents that have several layers of insulated awning and a floor.
To be honest, I'm not exactly in favor of insulated tents. For me, it’s better that there is additional ventilation - this is a guarantee of safety. In addition, it is very important that the inner layer of the tent is not exposed to evaporation. I saw tents that were covered with frost from the inside ... You yourself understand that it will be problematic to warm up in it, - says the fisherman.
Rule number 2: Use a convector for heating
Almost all winter tents provide a place for a stove, which is accompanied by a hole for an exit for a pipe.
I tested a lot of different stoves, but I can say that they haven’t come up with a better one than a convector for heating a tent. As such, there is no open fire there - the burner is inside, and the combustion products go out through the pipe. This is very safe option. The convector itself works as a heater - the tent is heated with warm air, says Kazantsev.
The cost of such a convector is not great. Approximately 4-6 thousand rubles.
If you still decide to heat the tent with devices with an open fire - a gas burner, candles - do not place them close to the walls of the tent.
Rule #3: Carry a CO2 Gas Sensor
During heating, carbon monoxide accumulates in the tent. It has no smell or color, but it can kill a person. First, one feels unwell, attention is scattered, the head starts to hurt, then the person falls asleep and ... no longer wakes up. To monitor the gas level in the tent, take a CO2 sensor with you when you go fishing. If the gas level is exceeded, the sensor will emit loud signals, which will save lives. The cost of the sensor is about a thousand rubles.
Rule number 4: take a mobile bed with you
On winter fishing, in any case, you will want to sleep - fresh frosty air will do its job. In order not to catch a cold and catch pneumonia, take a mobile folding bed with you. Now there are a great many of them - they are very compact and can withstand heavy loads. The cost is from 2 thousand rubles.
Some take air mattresses with them. This is a big mistake! Believe me, you will freeze very hard on it. Warm up your body air cushion which inside the mattress will fail! Therefore, it is better not to experiment. If there is no folding bed, then take tourist sleeping mats made of isolon, inflatable mats and sleeping bags designed for winter conditions, an experienced fisherman advises.
Fishermen are more often worried low temperatures overboard, which are very difficult to deal with when fishing. A winter suit with a fleece, mittens with fur, felt boots and even special thermal underwear as for astronauts it is unlikely that they will significantly help even in a 20-degree frost. Therefore, in order not to die on ice, in a piercing wind, additional means of heating are simply necessary.
The thought immediately comes to mind mobile home or tent, it is very difficult to do without it on an open reservoir in the winter and you can freeze in a matter of minutes. Stiff legs and arms do not at all add sympathy to winter fishing. Plus, freezing long time very harmful to health. Therefore, choosing a good tent for winter fishing will guarantee that you will not survive in the forest in winter, but turn winter fishing into a comfortable and exciting experience.
Setting up a tent for winter fishing
First thing to do before setting up a tent for ice fishing- this is to determine which side the wind is blowing from and position the tent so that the entrance and ventilation holes go to opposite side. Thanks to this, the tent will be protected from direct penetration of cold air and will be more stable.
Being inside the tent, the angler must leave open at least one air vent no matter how hard the frost is. Otherwise, condensation will quickly form inside the tent, which will lead to more cooling. When setting up a tent for winter fishing, be sure to make sure that it the lower part was covered with snow. In this case, you will not only insulate it, but also give it greater stability. You can freeze the lower part to the ice, but just be careful when removing the tent later.
Heating tent for winter fishing
One winter tent winter fishing will be small and very inefficient in terms of keeping warm. There are different ways to get out of this situation. Usually anglers use:
- candles for heating tents for winter fishing
Candles for heating a tent for ice fishing are the most economical and compact way, they are cheap and take up little space. Wax or paraffin candles give off enough heat when burned to keep the temperature inside the tent, but only up to a certain temperature outside. But from experience it is known that even at minus 15 on the street, this wax option does not save much. Plus, it is possible for a fishing line to get on fire from a candle.
- gas stoves for ice fishing
For lovers of winter fishing, special heaters are produced. They differ in fuel, due to which the tent is heated, as well as in the working volume. Some copies work without refueling for two to three hours, others a little longer. Most often, these heaters run on gas fuel. The most popular means of gas equipment is a cylinder with a tile. The tile gives off much more heat, quickly warms up the tent space, but it should be remembered that the tile with a balloon is rather bulky equipment.
- dry fuel for heating the tent on winter fishing
Other anglers use dry fuel heaters to heat their tents while ice fishing. You can easily make such a heating pad yourself. To do this, in an ordinary tin, we make holes for air to enter and the oven is ready. It is suitable for both heating the tent and for heating food. But dry fuel emits a lot of unpleasant odors, and if you burn it, for example, all night, you can get poisoned and even lose consciousness. Therefore, it is not recommended to use this method of heating.
How to heat a tent for winter fishing
In addition to the aforementioned methods, many fishermen use a primus stove to heat their scarves during winter fishing. Some fishermen, going on a trip by car, take cast-iron stoves for the tent. They run on either gas or wood. And in order not to burn out, a pipe is attached to the furnace, which goes out into the street. Such a stove is heated all night long, the temperature in the tent will be very comfortable.
It is extremely important to remember safety when ice fishing!
Heated dry tents ignite easily from the slightest spark or overheating of heaters, be very careful!
How to insulate a tent for winter fishing
However, warming up the tent is half the battle, you still need to keep it warm in it. To keep warm, some manufacturers make double-walled tents. In such designs it is noticeably warmer. But if you have the most common scarf, then you can try to upgrade it. You can use any non-toxic building material intended for hydrothermal and noise insulation. This material can be used to cover the floor in a tent, keeping a place for holes, then the cold from the ice will enter the house much less. Also from this material you can make capes on the tent in the form of caps. And then a wonderful winter fishing for pike, burbot, bream, carp, perch, carp will be provided to you!
For those who are really interested in the topic, we suggest watching a video about heating tents for winter fishing.
Video - winter fishing tent heating
Happy winter fishing and remember to be safe on the ice and in a heated tent!
