The evolution of the tent has been a wild experience. Easy lean-to tents have been found courting again to 40,000 BCE. They’ve been utilized by nomadic tribes, armies, and touring circuses within the millennia since. Then, within the mid-Twentieth century, the traditional “survival tent,” most frequently used for leisure tenting and backpacking at the moment, got here into being.
Tent tech has been on a bell-curve trajectory since then. And I’ve received to be trustworthy, issues are getting bizarre. We have now multiperson tent hammocks like Tentsile that permit you and your loved ones to sleep suspended off the bottom. There are inflatable four-season basecamp tents, tents that float, and now, there’s the EXØD Air Station Pod-01.
This factor might have been drawn up by the set designer of the Dune films. It’s futuristic and glossy, and it appears to be like greater than a studio residence in New York Metropolis. When it turns into accessible for common buy on August 18, it would price about as a lot as a month’s lease, too.
However at 18.7 kilos and with a passive 5-minute setup, the Pod-01 might provide a novel shelter choice for overlanders and automotive campers who wish to have house.
EXØD Air Station Pod-01: Deployable Housing
The EXØD webpage for the Pod-01 claims that the shelter can accommodate as much as 4 folks. The product’s tagline is “Mild as air, sturdy as metal.”
Which may be hyperbole. The Air Station Pod-01 is gentle. It’s lower than half the burden of the REI Wonderland four-person tent (35 kilos), and equal in weight to Mountain Hardwear’s Bridger four-person tent (18 kilos) — each of which had been featured in GearJunkie’s roundup of the Greatest Tenting Tents.
Nonetheless, when contemplating its space of 45 sq. ft, the Air Station Pod-01 can be one of many smallest tents on that listing. With a set-up peak of simply 5 ft, you can not arise inside it. And it doesn’t provide any vestibule space like a lot of these different tents do. So while you weigh in how a lot inside house this tent provides, it’s truly type of heavy.
Is It Waterproof?
Whereas the model does label this tent quite a few occasions as “4 Saisons,” [sic] it by no means outright says it’s waterproof on the webpage.
Nonetheless, EXØD signifies that the partitions are 70D Polyester Ripstop PU membrane 1,200mm, and the flooring are produced from nylon 420D PU membrane 3,000mm. Each of these textiles are rated as waterproof.
Setup & Structure
Based on EXØD, this tent might be arrange in 5 minutes. It features a hand pump with the acquisition, nevertheless it’s questionable whether or not you’ll attain full inflation in that point with out an electrical pump. The tent requires no poles or rainflies. The entire construction is created by air pumped into HT Dacron tubes and guylines that stress the partitions.
Two partitions roll down utterly, and the opposite two characteristic spherical home windows. “That creates an actual reference to the surface world,” in line with EXØD. In tandem with roof vents, that characteristic additionally aids with air flow.
EXØD claims that a lot of the design of the Air Station Pod-01 was adopted from windsurfing know-how. It purports to supply stability in intense winds and sturdiness towards saltwater publicity and sand abrasion.
And while you’re finished with it, it may be damaged down in the identical period of time as setup, and it packs right into a duffel carry-case.
A Automobile Tenting Resolution?
If you happen to really dislike utilizing poles to set tents up, an inflatable choice just like the EXØD Air Station Pod-01 might be for you. With an electrical pump, you merely plug in, refill, and cool down.
It advertises that it may be arrange in minutes and provides a spacious residing space with home windows. Its weight and talent to pack right into a backpack-sized duffel make it an attention-grabbing automotive tenting and overlanding shelter.
Nonetheless, it is usually a particularly costly piece of drugs. If you happen to preorder it now, it’s $1,820.
On the following tier of preorders, the value jumps to $1,940. And should you wait till the “Final Probability” preorder stage, the EXØD Air Station Pod-01 will price you $2,040. EXØD is a European model, however the web site says it provides worldwide transport.
This tent might be geared toward a really small demographic. It isn’t the minimalists or ultralight backpackers, and it actually isn’t the funds car-campers. However the model, design, and aesthetics of the Air Station Pod-01 might attraction to a sure style. If you wish to seem like the slickest, most futuristic camper wherever you go and might afford the funding, you may be it.
Be taught extra about this space-aged tenting shelter (and place your preorder) on EXØD’s web site.
