My brother insisted that $20 Walmart tent would survive a thunderstorm

After it collapsed on me at 2 AM during a trip in the Smokies, I had to sleep in the car the rest of the weekend, so what budget tent actually holds up in bad weather?

2 comments

2 Comments

gonzalez.reese1mo ago

You had to sleep in the car, that's rough. But I gotta ask - was it the poles that snapped, the rain fly that ripped, or did it just flood from the bottom? Because each of those problems points to a totally different weak spot in a tent. Knowing how yours failed would help people figure out what to look for in a better one.

felix1471mo ago

Poles snapping is the worst, I think that's the one that really screws you because now there's nothing holding the tent up... you're just sitting there in a collapsed nylon bag. Our poles snapped right at the connection joint, cheap aluminum that just gave out in a moderate wind. A ripped rain fly is bad but at least you can sometimes drape a tarp over it. Flooding from the bottom is just pure bad luck with site selection or a terrible floor seam. But snapped poles? That's a design failure, plain and simple. You end up with a pile of useless fabric and a broken frame...