Lightwave is dedicated to the design and development of high-quality lightweight tents and rucksacks.
You can find Lightwave products in specialist outdoor shops in Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Ireland,
the Netherlands, Norway, South Africa, Switzerland and the UK.
wilderness trekking
lightweight backpacking
Lightwave ultra tents are designed specifically for any use where keeping weight to a minimum is paramount. Examples are extended trekking in wilderness areas where you need to carry everything for self-sufficiency, lightweight fastpacking trips where least load equals greatest speed/distance covered, and any global travelling when you might have to run for the last bus (for a week) back to civilisation.
Our ultra tents are amongst the lightest in the world – something achieved with absolutely no compromise to strength or durability. Tent weight can be cut in two ways: by sourcing the right fabrics and components, and by reducing the number of added features. Look at the design of any Lightwave tent, and you’ll find that zips, webbing loops, adjustment buckles and pockets have been pared down to a minimum. The result is full performance for an exceptionally low weight.
The fabrics used for the ultra tents are the lightest practicable: any thinner yarn or lower fabric weight, and strength is seriously compromised. Poles are already highly refined in the art of weight reduction, and the difference between the best and the standard is not great. We still use the best, anyway. The f2 ultra is alone in the range to come with titanium pegs that are half the weight of standard aluminium ones. For guylines, ultra tents use a thin Dyneema/polyester cord that is 80% lighter than standard nylon lines.
The ultra flysheet is made from nylon 6.6 with a yarn thickness of 30 denier. Considering that most lightweight tents use 50-denier yarns and many standard tents 70-denier, 30-denier yarn might appear to be very thin: with just 36% of the mass of a 50-denier yarn, it has only 36% of the strength. We compensate for this by using high-tenacity nylon 6.6, which has a much higher tear strenght than normal nylon. The flysheet is coated on both sides in silicone (the most durable and water-repellent material known to tentmakers) to a generous hydrostatic head of 5000 mm (3000 mm is more than sufficient).
The ultra groundsheet is made from a 50-denier nylon ripstop with an outstanding polyurethane coating. We have been using this fabric for five years and have been extremely impressed with its durability – for its weight, it is undoubtedly the best available. It is also the most expensive material we use.
Ultra tents use 8.84 mm DAC Featherlite poles. These are acknowledged as offering the best strength-to-weight ratio available.
Pegs are very important – without them, no tent could withstand anything more than the slightest breeze. Lightwave’s specially developed Lightning peg is similar in weight to most standard pegs but substantially stronger, and is supplied as standard with all but one of our ultra tents. (The exception is the f2 ultra, which comes with even lighter titanium pegs.)
Finally, ultra tents come with our Lightning guylines, a 1.50 mm blend of Dyneema and polyester with a breaking strain of 110kg. Phenomenally light, they also absorb no water so won’t freeze up in winter.
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