The air version of this tent weighs in at 21.1kg/46.5lb and the packsize is 73 x 42 x 42cm/29 x 16.5 x 16.5in. The Aether 450 weighs 20kg/44lb and when packed away the carry bag’s dimensions are 72 x 30 x 32cm/28 x 12 x 12.5in, which is a relatively compact but dense and heavy package to carry around. Family tents are always voluminous, taking up serious real estate in whatever vehicle you use to access the great outdoors. It’s one thing talking about ease of set up and take down, but long before any of that you have to get the tent in the car and across the campsite. In every other respect – in terms of robustness of fly and ground sheet, zips, mesh etc – there is no real difference between air and pole tents. The one thing you don’t want to break (or forget) is the pump… Just as with a broken pole, duct tape (the unsung hero of every camping trip) can sometimes be used to do temporary tent repairs, and tubes can be replaced. This does not mean the entire tent is rendered forever useless, though. While this is very rare, due to the heavy duty materials used on the tubes, it’s not unheard of. That said, you can of course suffer a puncture to an airbeam. Tension straps mean an air tent can withstand rough weather (Image credit: Pat Kinsella) Durability, repair and maintenanceĪs noted above, while an air tent may well move around a bit more in high winds, at least the beams won’t snap – which can be a problem with pole tents, either in very extreme conditions or as a result of an accident (reversing your car over them), or incorrect usage. Even so, we felt that the air tent was marginally harder to wrestle into the carry bag than the pole tent. The Osiris Air 500 comes with a pump with a deflate setting, and it’s imperative you use this in order to stand a chance of getting the tent back in its bag – otherwise you’ll be left with pockets of air that make the task utterly impossible. Family sized tents are notoriously laborious to roll up and squeeze back into the carry bag provided, which always seems too small to swallow so much tent. Take downĪlways the least fun part of any camping trip, not least because it means the experience is nearly over, is dropping the tent and packing it away. All things considered, we’re going to call this one a draw. However, while they may bend, inflated tubes will not snap, so that’s one thing less to worry about. This kind of performance will of course vary between tent brands and individual designs and models, and not all air tents will be equipped with these straps, leaving them more prone to bending in the wind. These do impede on the internal space somewhat, but they are optional, and don’t need to stay in place when conditions are more benign, giving you more room for things like your camping chairs once more. However, we spent a wild windy weekend testing out both styles of tent, and found that the Osiris Air 500 performed just as well as the Aether 450 pole tent, not least because it has internal bracing straps that help it maintain its shape even in gusty conditions. Where some people might expect a greater degree of divergence in performance level is in stormy weather, with many people perhaps predicting that air tents might not be so robust.
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For more on this, check out How to choose a tent and What size tent do I need?īecause they all tend to stand pretty tall, and are more often tunnel- rather than a geodesic- (half dome) shaped, family sized pole tents and air tents both rely heavily on tensioning at either end to stay up, and guy ropes all around to stay stable during high winds. Family sized air tents can stand just as high and wide as pole tents designed for the same purpose, offering the same level of head height and floor space, so there’s no real difference there. In terms of features and comfort, this all comes down to the quality of the individual tents in question. Inflating the Vango Osiris Air 500 with the provided pump (Image credit: Pat Kinsella) Design, stability and adverse weather
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