Looking for ultralight tentpoles

[Kerne]

I've just bought some waterproof ripstop nylon and I want to have a go at making a small, tunnel type tarp, something like this:

http://www.tarptent.com/products.html

But all the replacement poles I can find seem to be pretty heavy, pretty expensive, or both. Anyone know of any sources of ultralight ally poles that will not break the bank?

 

[sandbender]

Field and Trek sell a pair of walking poles for a tenner.

Link here.

They don't mention the weight for these Karrimor ones though, I have a couple of sets of Leki poles which are very lightweight and work well as tarp poles.

 

[Huon]

The Alpkit carbonlite poles are pretty good and cheap for carbon poles. They have the added advantage of being about 7cms longer than most of the alternatives - good for pitching tarps.

At about £40 per pair they are half the price of other cheap carbon fibre walking poles.

The Alpkit site shows them as temporarily out of stock (new supplier) but I would recommend calling them to see if they have any old stock left. That is how I got mine.

Good luck!

Huon

 

[Kerne]

Cheers, folks. I use Alpkit carbon fibre poles to hold up my present tarp when I can't find convenient trees, but I want to make the front of this one a hoop shape so I'm after traditional (though light!) tent poles.

 

[sandbender]

Cheers, folks. I use Alpkit carbon fibre poles to hold up my present tarp when I can't find convenient trees, but I want to make the front of this one a hoop shape so I'm after traditional (though light!) tent poles.

Ah! I can see hoop poles being used further down the page that you linked to in the OP. Why not try getting in touch with existing ultralight tent manufacturers and asking for replacement poles for one of their tents? obviously don't tell them that your going to use them with a tent of your own design rather than one of theirs or they'll probably charge you more