ProsDurable, Great Value, Performing as Expected, fantastic customer servic
I have a family of 5 (and a Golden Retreiver). 3 of which are small children (8, 5 and 2). We needed a large tent that would have some sort of porch to keep stuff and dirt outside but also enough room for everyone in the main area. We have used the tent several times and it was incredibly easy to set up. During one use, we had high winds and rain and we remained 100% dry. In addition, during our last use, the rain fly ripped. LLBean instantly sent us a brand new tent and instructions on sending ours back. That is unreal customer service. You cant go wrong with this product (One more thing, you will be the talk of the campsite as the tent is pretty awesome looking)
I bought this tent after signing my son up for Boy Scouts. We just used it this weekend. It was very easy to set up but don't forget to velcro the rainfly to the poles. The screen room is great to store all your gear and keep them dry. It rained and we had lots of wind but the tent stayed dry and we didn't feel any of the cold winds on us. I love the pockets along the side of the tent! You can store a flashlight, phone, book etc. without worrying about losing them in your bed or on the tent floor. It took less than ten minutes to take the tent down and was a cinch fold up and put back into the bag. The only thing that I would change about this tent is coloring the door zippers a different color than the ones that open the panels to reveal the screen. Everything else is color coded and doing the zippers the same way would be very helpful. It's a great tent!! I would highly recommend this tent to anyone!! We had a great time!
ProsDurable, Great Value, Performing as Expected, very well engineered, very user friendly
I was supposed to use this tent for my travels through state parks next month. I'm already sleeping in it in the yard with my two kitties. It's so comfortable and spacious with screen roof for stargazing. The raincover goes on easily and quickly, and it only takes me 15 minutes to set up the entire tent myself. I'm a 57 yr old female. I don't want to stay in my bedroom anymore. The tent is much more fun!
We spend a lot more time in tents than most of you, and currently own 4. Although this tent is just for my wife and me, we wanted a big one with a screen room since we spend so much time in them. After reading a zillion reviews, we decided on this 6-person King Pine Dome.
First the positives. This tent is well designed. Reasonable assembly, good price, LLBean customer service. Hard to go wrong even if something goes wrong. We purchased the ground cover too. Some people are complaining that they wanted the screen room to have an attached floor, but we did NOT want that. There are other tents you can get if you want that. We wanted something where we could leave muddy boots, waders, etc. And also if you left the window panels open and it rained in there, you wouldn't have the floor fill up like a bath tub (we usually fold the ground cloth up to about 6 inches away from the interior door, which makes a nice dry-ground area to leave things on, like an axe). All in all, it is the kind of tent we wanted. The zippers and seams have all worked well through 6 rain events. Don't underestimate the luxury of being able to put on your clothes, rain coat, and muddy boots in that screen room when you have to go to the bathroom on a rainy night! Also, the screen room will hold 2 chairs and a small table comfortably. If you were stuck playing cards in a rain storm, you could probably cram 4 people in chairs in there and 3 people sitting on the ground in the main chamber with the interior door open. The screen room will keep out most any bug that flies, since it has a 4-inch curtain around the bottom that acts kind of like a gasket. Oh, and be sure to watch the video, which gives you the best idea of what the tent is like.
Now the negatives. We always put the fly on, and it goes on rather awkwardly. The fly takes more time to put on than to set up the tent. The reason is that funny looking hat bill design. Not a big deal, though. The bigger issue is that we live and camp in Montana, and 40 mile per hour winds are common here, all year long, and even when the weather is nice. We always stake everything out, and rope off the fly. The poles have bent some. It is not yet a problem, and I do not know if it will become one. The metal ferrules where the fiberglass poles connect to each other seem to be too short, and that is where the bends occur. Should one fail, I think we'll be able to improvise with duct tape or something, and Bean will probably send us another one for free, because they are just that good. But it looks like it could become an issue.
Now for the weird stuff. The diagram you see when you click on the images of the tent is horrible and not scaled well. The interior of the main room is 10x8.5, and the wall slopes are not as vertical as some. I'd really call this a 4, maybe 5 person tent, but most tents are rated by squeezing as many people as will fit. The diagram shows the main room as being longer than wide, which is obviously not the case. And the screen room is about 10x5.3, much bigger than the diagram scale shows. The back vestibule is much closer to a rectangle than that shallow-sloped trapezoid in the diagram, and offers more space than at first appears in that diagram. Very poor diagram.
