He built a backpack that turns into a tent

I really enjoyed this. Thanks for sharing!

Here it is in action as both bag and tent

r ranson wrote:Here it is in action as both bag and tent

He tested it in the cold, but not in the rain.

I'm not convinced it would do as well in the rain:
1. He sort of mentions this, but seriously, groups of things he's carrying in the "bag" iteration, need to be in their own water proof wrappers. Otherwise, when he takes them out of the bag to build the tent, they'll all be getting wet. From my "interior canoe tripping" days, even if you're not using your pack as your tent, having things you use together gathered in bags inside your pack makes life much better!
2. He doesn't really show the front of the tent as being "closable". In windy rain, he can try to set the tent to divert the wind, but wind where I live often shifts during storms. I'm not sure what the best way of fixing the problem would be, but I am sure it could be fixed.

This is a good start though. Too often we think of things as having a special purpose, but developing multi-purpose uses is worth the time and effort.

I suspect he made the project more as a proof of concept.

I would find it a pain to have to take everything out of the bag just to set up the shelter.  Not something for me, but a nifty idea.

In the video he talks about how the front flaps close - although open structures are historically quite common for that cast that can afford enough fabric for a shelter but not enough to have a dedicated tent.

He said there was a video linked to (but I couldn't find it) that goes into more detail about this kind of tent.  

r ranson wrote:I suspect he made the project more as a proof of concept.

Absolutely - and for a first try it's awesome. He's got the concept of multiple uses for both the parts and the whole, and ended up with something that was functional.

Modern humans are pretty spoiled - we've got special thises and thats for every little job imaginable, where as recently as the 1800's I expect many people ate their dinner with their knife, which they also used for dispatching said dinner, and probably used for shaving kindling to start the fire!

and wrote:

I would find it a pain to have to take everything out of the bag just to set up the shelter.

I found that in the wilderness, you often had to take almost everything out of your pack anyway in order to get out whatever you needed at that particular moment. I had a friend who did a lot of multiple day hiking and canoe trips and for Christmas one year, I made him a bunch of stuff sacks of multiple sizes and colours and he was totally thrilled as it kept things together that he needed together, but he could figure out which bag he wanted just by the colour.

We would need far less storage space if we designed things to be multi-purpose in a practical way!

That might be an interesting concept but I think it has a lot of room for improvement before it would be useful for any sort of serious hiking or camping. It looks far too heavy, very uncomfortable, & leaky. Even modern backpacks & tents that claim to be waterproof generally aren't. Wood, canvas, leather, metal, & sisal rope? Maybe in the 1800s.

I'd rather hike with everything rolled up in a wool blanket, a poncho, & a couple of contractor trash bags hanging on a stick. Or better yet a dyneema pack with a nice hammock tent that is a small fraction of the size & weight of that canvas tent. Fully loaded for a week it would weigh less than just his backpack tent & actually be dry. Fun concept for youtube clicks. Not very practical though. Will pass on hiking or camping with it.