Down vs Synthetic Sleeping Bags: Which Insulation Is Better for You?

Should you’re new to the good debate between down vs artificial sleeping luggage, enable me to clue you in. In a single nook, now we have sleeping luggage stuffed with fluffy down feathers. Their defenders say they’re light-weight, space-efficient, and shockingly heat. Their detractors level out that water is down’s kryptonite. As soon as down will get moist, it’s primarily nugatory. Within the different nook is artificial fill, which is championed for its affordability and reliability in all situations. However artificial fill is heavier and bulkier than down. 

After which there’s the environmental query. Down comes from animals (geese sometimes, typically duck). This may typically, although not at all times, end in animal abuse. However synthetics are principally plastic. And given the rising prevalence of microplastics and forever chemicals in our surroundings, that doesn’t seem to be an important alternative, both. 

So which must you select? To raised perceive the good debate, I spoke with supplies consultants Heidi Allen at Nikwax and Tara Maurer at Primaloft. What I realized modified my understanding of the state of sleeping bag insulation and the place it’s going sooner or later.

Desk of Contents

Learn by way of the entire article, or faucet on a subject beneath to leap straight to it.

Down vs Artificial Sleeping Luggage: The Case for Down

Let’s begin with what down is. Regardless of the frequent false impression, down just isn’t the feathers that you simply see whenever you have a look at a goose or duck. Down is the layer of feathers that develop are beneath that waterproof outer layer and sits closest to the animal’s physique. Should you have a look at a down feather (maintain a watch out for one poking its manner by way of your favourite puffer jacket), you’ll see that it’s fabricated from innumerable wisps related to a brief shaft. 

The dearth of construction in these feathers creates a large number of tiny air pockets, which lure warmth out of your physique and insulate it from the chilly outdoors air. Down-feather high quality is measured by fill energy (fp), or how a lot down it takes to fill one cubic inch of area. For example, one ounce of 550fp down will fill about 9 liters, whereas one ounce of 900fp will fill nearly 15 liters. In sleeping luggage, utilizing down with excessive fill energy can lead to important weight financial savings — an essential consideration for backpackers and backpack hunters.  

Down and Moisture

The Achilles heel of down feathers is moisture. When down will get moist, the pockets of air disappear, eliminating just about all its insulating properties. That is such a difficulty that Tyler Freel, Out of doors Life’s Alaska-based employees author, gained’t contact it.

“I don’t take down sleeping luggage sheep looking,” Freel mentioned on a current Out of doors Life podcast. “I’ve needed to crawl in my sleeping bag with all my garments on moist too many occasions. And my artificial bag will dry them out in a single day.” Freel’s use-case (weeks spent tenting and looking within the unforgiving situations of backcountry Alaska) could be excessive. Nonetheless, there are many individuals who gained’t contact down for precisely these causes.

Hydrophobic Remedies

In more moderen years, sleeping-bag producers have began making use of hydrophobic therapies to down feathers to deal with this problem. I spoke to Heidi Allen at Nikwax to be taught extra about how this works.

“All hydrophobic down therapies are a water repellent therapy that’s been utilized to the precise down feathers,” she tells me. These stop the down puffs from absorbing water. Nikwax sends its proprietary hydrophobic down therapy (what Allen known as “goo”) straight to the corporate that sources and grades the down. This provides a reasonably negligible price to the ultimate product. Particularly when in comparison with the various price of excessive vs low fill energy down. 

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Nikwax even put its hydrophobic down therapy to the last word take a look at. The corporate floated an individual in a sleeping bag on a frigid glacial lake. (The take a look at topic stayed utterly dry.) However Allen nonetheless isn’t certain she’d advocate Freel take a second have a look at down sleeping luggage given his use-case. “Should you’re climbing into your sleeping bag soaking moist, and also you’re mendacity straight on the down, then the burden of your physique might trigger issues by smashing water into the fill.” 

Down Upkeep

One level that Allen stresses is the significance of sustaining your gear to maximise its efficiency over time. “In case your sleeping bag will get tremendous soiled, even when it’s a hydrophobic down, it’s not going to work in addition to it ought to.” She recommends utilizing a sleeping bag liner. Liners assist your sleeping bag’s down keep its efficiency. So does common cleansing. “After which you possibly can really add a water repellent therapy at residence as properly,” Allen says. “Nikwax makes a waterproofing treatment for each the outer materials and the feathers.”

No matter you do, simply don’t wash your down with a family detergent (extra on this beneath). It’s additionally essential to retailer down sleeping luggage correctly. No matter you do, don’t retailer your sleeping bag in its stuff sack. Crushing the loft of your down will cut back its insulating properties over time. Sure, it’s often essential to pack your sleeping bag within the stuff sack for tenting and backcountry journey. Once you return out of your journey, nevertheless, it’s best to air out your bag. Then, retailer your down bag in a big, free sack. (Many sleeping luggage are bought with these bigger storage luggage.) Even higher, rigorously cling your sleeping bag from a hook or hanger for lengthy durations of time.

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Down Sustainability

One problem with water-repellent down therapies is that lots of them (though not Nikwax’s) use PFAS. PFAS stands for polyfluoroalkyl substances. There’s been rising analysis that reveals these cancer-causing chemical substances are a detriment to human health and safety. Resulting from elevated consciousness and trade stress (plus new laws in California), PFAS will possible be phased out of hydrophobic down therapies. Nevertheless, there could also be a drop-off in high quality and effectiveness because of this. 

A standard false impression about down is that these light-weight, barely-there plumes have to be exceedingly fragile. For example: What number of occasions are you able to clear them earlier than they disintegrate completely? “Cleansing and re-waterproofing doesn’t really damage [down] except you’re cleansing with a family detergent,” says Allen. “Family detergents are fairly harsh on down feathers and might trigger them to get sort of brittle. You get extra breakage from these little tiny feathers. In order that’s why utilizing a mild down-specific cleaner is de facto essential for caring for down gadgets.”

In truth, it’s so strong that a few of Nikwax’s hydrophobic down is definitely made with recycled down from gadgets like mattress comforters and pillows.

That’s one problem with down. One other is with how the birds themselves are handled. Nikwax, like many different producers of hydrophobic down, makes use of solely RDS-certified down. RDS stands for “Responsible Down Standard” and it’s centered on animal welfare. The usual ensures that down-producing birds are handled humanely all through their lifecycle. There is no such thing as a dwell plucking of geese in RDS-certified down. (At present, most down is produced as a byproduct of the meals trade.) When searching for down sleeping luggage, search for the RDS certification.

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Our High Picks for Down Sleeping Luggage

Should you’re seeking to make the change to down, listed below are our prime suggestions to get you began:

Down vs Artificial Sleeping Luggage: The Case for Artificial

Down is such an important insulator for sleeping luggage that the unique artificial fills have been really designed to imitate it. Primaloft is a kind of corporations. They have been first tasked by the U.S. Military to create an artificial fill that mimicked the properties of down however didn’t collapse when moist. (Primaloft nonetheless provides the U.S. army with artificial fill to this present day.) Tara Maurer, senior vp of product technique, defined that Primaloft’s artificial insulation excelled at that. Primaloft is fabricated from polyester, which is hydrophobic. The dimensions of the fibers are very small, which suggests they create floor rigidity when meshed collectively. That retains water at bay.

So, in contrast to handled down, you by no means have to fret in regards to the water resistance sporting off. That may be a significant assist if one thing goes mistaken along with your sleep system. “Think about a situation the place you could have an artificial sleeping bag, and it’s downpouring and it will get moist,” Maurer says. “Should you shake it out or wring it out, it is going to regain its loft and thermal properties quicker than down sleeping luggage. Significantly untreated down.” And when it does, it is going to are inclined to retain that homogenous protection, slightly than clumping collectively. 

Artificial Thermal Efficiency

Talking with Maurer, it’s clear that that genesis (and intuition for comparability) nonetheless looms giant over the artificial market right this moment. For example, Maurer defined that Primaloft dislikes utilizing fill energy as a measurement of artificial fill, as a result of it’s extra of a measurement of quantity than it’s of thermal efficiency. The corporate prefers as a substitute to make use of a take a look at known as the Gustin-Bacon. On this take a look at, a weighted plate is positioned on prime of 30 grams of fill to see how properly the fill resists compression.

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Fluff Doesn’t Essentially Imply Heat

Nevertheless it’s not simply the fill energy measurement that customers have come to anticipate from each down and their artificial counterparts: it’s additionally the look. Individuals see a marshmallowy puffer jacket, full with sewn-in baffling, they suppose heat. So some artificial fill is designed explicitly to imitate that look. And that’s true for sleeping luggage as properly. “We’re consistently attempting to attain a steadiness,” says Maurer. “We need to make our merchandise as thermally environment friendly as attainable, to make use of the least quantity of fabric to get the very best web profit.” 

What which means for shoppers is which you could’t eyeball the loft of an artificial sleeping bag and assume the identical guidelines apply as for a down sleeping bag. As a substitute, search for established ISO ratings. These rankings are achieved utilizing a dummy and thermometers in a temperature-controlled room. Over time, synthetics could even do a greater job at sticking to their ISO temperature rankings than down, since they gained’t be as affected by errant moisture. With sleeping luggage that use batting (think about a sheet of artificial insulation) slightly than free fill, you might be additional protected against points with chilly spots. You would possibly anticipate to have chilly spots when free fill settles to at least one spot or one other within the baffling. 

Artificial Sustainability

One attention-grabbing factor I realized from Maurer is how synthetic-insulation corporations can reduce their environmental footprint. Nearly all of Primalofts merchandise are made with 80 % or extra recycled fibers. “The wonder about utilizing polyester is that it may be repurposed and reused time and again,” says Maurer. “We’re taking plastic from recycled bottles. And there’s the potential to take our garment utilizing our insulation and repurpose it into one thing else when it reaches its finish of life.”

Nemo’s new Forte sleeping bag, the primary in its new Infinite Promise collection, is one current instance of this. This sleeping bag could be totally recycled at finish of life by following hooked up instructions. 

And when that polyester is lastly headed to the landfill, that doesn’t imply it is going to keep there endlessly and ever, like we anticipate to occur with artificial or plastic-based merchandise.

“A few of our merchandise even have an additive to them that assist them biodegrade at an accelerated price,” Maurer says. In checks, within the period of time it took for untreated polyester to degrade by 1 %, the polyester handled with the biodegradable additive had degraded by 94 %.

Our High Picks for Artificial Sleeping Luggage

Bought on the reliability and affordability of artificial sleeping luggage? Listed below are two of our favorites:

FAQs

Ultimate Ideas

If, like me, it’s been a minute because you thought-about the state of down versus artificial sleeping luggage, there’s excellent news and unhealthy information. The primary is that lots of the seemingly intractable points with each are being tackled head-on by the trade. Down can be water-proof. Artificial fill can be much less environmentally dangerous (and it doesn’t have to be so dang thick). However there are additionally some items of the equation that stay the identical. Excessive fill energy down remains to be unmatched by artificial fill for its heat to weight ratio. Artificial fill requires much less care to get the identical stage of efficiency. It additionally tends to be fairly a bit cheaper. Which of those components is crucial to you’ll have an effect on your determination. However each are glorious choices that may see you thru many nights within the backcountry.