Frequent Mistakes People Make When They Waterproof a Tent

 Most backpackers have to get a waterproof tent at one time or another. They are camping time after time, the weather is nice, everything is going fine, until one time it starts raining and even though the backpacker runs into the tent, he or she gets soaked with water, and the whole trip is ruined. Then the backpacker goes out and buys a backpacking tent. Then he or she uses it happily and successfully for years, before it all goes wrong because the waterproof coating, the seam sealer, wears off and the waterproof fly starts to wear out. Then the backpacker needs to face a serious decision. Either buy a new tent, or try to make my existing tent waterproof again.

In this article I am going to focus on the second possibility. What do you need exactly to make a tent waterproof, and what are the tips that you have to know to have maximum results.

First of all, if your rainfly has holes in them, you can saw the holes together. However if you saw a lot of holes together the fly might become too little, and might not cover the whole tent. This would make the tent not water resistant, as one layer is not enough to stand in the way of rainwater in my opinion. If you need a new rainfly, you can buy one from most tents from the manufacturer, but if you can't, you can put a tarp on the tent to make it waterproof again.

If the wall or the floor of the tent lets water in you should apply a waterproof spray to the tent. You have to spray the liquid onto the tent and wait a bit in order for it to achieve its maximum effect. You only need to wait for 45 minutes up to a maximum of an hour, and then you should grab a piece of cloth and distribute the liquid all over the wall of the tent. You can apply the waterproofing spray on the outer wall as well, it will help if the only problem that the outer wall has is that the waterproof coating wore off the tent.

A seam sealer is also a vital device in waterproofing a tent. It serves as a material that you can apply to the area where the rainfly and the floor meet, where they are sewn together. Some seams are factory sealed, which means that the manufacturer of the tent put a small piece of material between the wall of the tent and the floor, and applied double stitching to it. This little piece won't make the seam completely waterproof, unfortunately a little water might pour into the tent through the seams. If you apply a seam sealer, you won't have such problems though.

How can you find out if your attempts to waterproof the tent were successful? For example you set up the tent, hose it down, and then look inside to find out if any water got in or not. But the easiest way to find out if the tent is waterproof is to try it out in the wild. If the hosing test worked, then you should be alright when the real rain comes.