Big Sky Evolution 2P

While cottage manufacturers have given us plenty of lightweight tents, those looking for a more traditional free standing, double wall tents usually have to look to more mainstream companies. For example Big Agnes produces several lightweight 1 and 2 person tents under 3 pounds. However, as someone 6'6" in general I have found that these are lacking, either in length (Big Copper spur) or height or aren't really free standing (think the fly creek/slater series from Big Agnes). I have been looking for a lightweight (under 3 pounds) free standing tent. I have a couple tarptents (the moment DW and stratospire 2) which are great, but sometimes you want a free standing double wall tent. like when you are staking on snow. I also like having enough room in my tent to bring my pack in a have a little space to spread out so that eliminates most 1 person tents and I generally use a 2 person tent solo (the moment DW is the exception). I had been eyeing the tents from Big Sky for a long time. I have seen several great reviews of their evolution and revolution series and from these it looks as though they have an unmatched weight vs space for a traditional tent. Like many other cottage manufacturers their tents are made from sil-nylong, no polyurethane coating here. A quick internet search however can give on one pause in buying a tent from them. Apparently many years ago people would pay for tents and not see them for a year. Their website doesn't really help the situation quite frankly as it is a mess. The pictures they have a of many of their tent models are not the current revision of what they are selling. For example, the evolution 2p tent pictures on the website is not what you will get. The pictures of the evolution are an older revision that is quite different than what they currently sell. I only knew what to expect because of other reviews. 

The space and weight of the tents just seemed too good to pass up. Big Sky now keeps an up to date list of what is available and from internet posts it sounded like they had fixed up their act in terms of delivering tents. Moreover they do not charge your credit card until it is ready to ship. I decided to take the plunge and order one. 

Mesh Inner Tent

Big Sky Evolution 2P with the fly on

I settled on the Evolution 2P, which is a traditional free standing double wall tent It is a simple dome with two crossing poles, two doors/vestibules, and requires pitching the inner part of the tent first. As I wanted to use the tent in winter, I ordered both the mesh inner  and the inner tent that has a breathable fabric instead of mess. Big sky offers a couple of options such as a slightly lighter fly and carbon fiber poles, but I chose the base model with the standard sil-nylon. Those options would have saved another 5 or 6 ounces off the weight. After placing the order, I was surprised to get an email from Bob Molen, the owner of Big Sky. Apparently the website had not captured the poles I wanted. He wanted to know which I wanted and offered me a free compression sack for the trouble. In any case, about a week later I got the email that my tent had shipped. They were out of the fabric inner so he said that would ship when they made another one, in about 2 or 3 weeks. Several days later I received the tent. Of course the first thing I did was weight it. On my scale with the compression sack, it got 47 ounces. This is the compression sack, fly, inner tent, and poles. It does not include stakes, of which you need 4 at the minimum and 8 for the strongest pitch.

After setting the inner tent in my living room I was blown away with how much space it had. Big sky claims 42 inches of headroom and that was accurate. I can sit upright without touching the ceiling. They also claim a 91 inch length of the inner tent. That seems about right as I can fully stretch out without touching the ends. The width is fairly standard, 53 inches tapering down to 47.

Notice how the ends of the inner tent are near vertical.

There is nothing fancy or revolutionary about the tent. It is a simple dome using lightweight silnylon to save weight. Quite frankly having used quite a few freestanding double wall tents over the years, the Evolution 2P just blows them away in terms of the space for the amount of weight.

Up close view of the high end.

The fly has the usual features one would expect on a high end tent. It has two generous roof vents that can be propped open, velcro tabs to attach the fly to the poles, and guy out points on the four corners. Big Sky uses an interesting mechanism to attach the corners of the fly to the body of the tent. Instead of clips, the corners attach to heavy duty shock cord, allowing the fly to self-tension itself. With the mesh inner ventilation looks great. One nice feature is that you do not have to seam seal the fly.

Plenty of ventilation

The vestibules are reasonably sized. You can order a porch fly for more vestibule space but I didn't go with that feature.

Reasonably sized vestibules

A view of the vestibule

I'm quite pleased with the purchase. After about a month I did receive the breathable fabric fly. I will try to post some pictures of that soon. If you are looking for a tent Big Sky is worth a look. Although they really need to fix up their website the tent itself is beautiful and they were prompt and communicative in the buying process.