I just finished my down blanket. The measurements are roughly like the Nunatak Arc edge. The shell material is Pertex microlight.Fill is 200 gr. of premium down, overall weight is 400 gr including a Spinsack

The I constructed it like some down comforters for indoor use- I quilted it. Formerly I used a sewn through down bag (also homemade) down to below freezing inside a bivy. This time I wanted the ease of construction of a sewn through bag (making baffles is no rocket science but just *BEEP* time consuming and I wanted this project to be quick and dirty) with fewer cold spots- so I quilted the blanket. I handsewed the outer and inner Shell together. As you might see the quilted spots are tighter packed at the edge of the Blanket where gravity would let it slide to hence giving it less room to fill there.
After two nights the down has shifted a bit from the top to the sides, but nothing one or two pats with the flat hand can't correct.

Seems to be a very light construction method with only very few cold spots.
Comments anyone?

Pics (First pic is an oware style Bivy with Quantum top and Silnylon bottom 150 gr.):

Edited by Bastonade on 04/12/2006 09:00:33 MDT.

That's a really clever quilting technique--more towards the edges, fewer towards the center. Just a tad over 14oz, too. What are the dimensions at the top, hips, knees, and overall length? Can you give an estimate of 'average' loft near the center, and for the perimeter? Any guesstimates on the temperature you could take this?

Very nice work. I'm a bit turned-off by the time investment for baffles, but your differential quilting could be a good solution. Thanks for sharing.
-Mark

Seems as if you won't get much response if you stick to the metric system ;). Nay, I'd say it is my quirky english :D.

Nevertheless, Mark got me right.

"That's a really clever quilting technique--more towards the edges, fewer towards the center". In the middle the quilting points are aprox. 10 inches apart, at the edges its more close to 5. Dosn*t really mater really, you start off with evenly distributed 10 inch squares and then you add more and more points as you go.
The loft is about 9 cm in the middle to 7- 5 cm at the sides (these are rough approximations since it depends a lot how the qilt is draped etc.

Dimensions are approx 115 cm (45.3 in) at the shoulder and taper to 80 cm (31.5 in) at the feet. Length is 12 cm (5 in) longer than myself. I talk about the fabric dimensions not the dimensions of the finished quilt.
I have to admit I'd like the quilt to be a bit wider since I'm a rather "big" guy and a side sleeper. But with the bivy to seal out the drafts it is workable.

Bastonade,
Now THAT's a creative idea. Please let us know how it works in practice... after a few cycles of stuffing, etc. I would worry about down shift, but who knows? Well, you will know. So tell us, OK?

Edited by vickrhines on 04/13/2006 18:32:06 MDT.

Thanks for that response. I'll second Vick's request--let us know how it works out over a trip or two. Such a great idea.
-Mark

Christian--what's the word on your quilted blanket? Has it proven durable enough over your trips, packing, unpacking, etc? Any down distribution or shifting issues to speak of?
-Mark

After a couple of field tests I can say that the quilting method has proven itself to be workable. The down shift towards the edges over one night is not noticeable.

All in all I can recommend this method as bing much much easier to construct.
No cutting of baffle fabric, no sewing orgies, no stuffing of individual bafffles, just sew the perimeter, quilt the two fabric layers together, pour in the down and sew the small remaining filling hole shut.

And in the field the down shift is not noticeable (provided that you have filled in enough down.

Could you please walk me through the 'quilting' technique?

I need everything explained like I'm a 5-year-old.

Thanks - I wish I could make something similar.

The quilting is pretty simple. Simply sew the perimeter of the two layers together, turn the quilt right side out, position the two fabric layers over each other by spreading them out on the floor and sew them together punktually. This is best done by hand. A couple of stiches per "quilting spot" are usually enough.

With just a few stitches on each quilting spot, how does the down stay in place? I'm just trying to visulaize this.
Thanks for replying, Christian, I'll get it at some point!

The down just stays in place because of these little quilting spots. There is a slight down shift down to the sides but in practice this is not noticeable. The quilting spots are more dense at the sides of the quilt so there is less space for the down to get into. This might help somewhat with the down shift, but again, in practice there is allmost as much down over you in the morning as there was in the evening.

Are the two layers of material sewed tightly together at each quilting spot? It seems like you could have lots of quilting spots throughout and have the same effect as a baffle if you allow a few inches of thread to connect the inner and outer materials. You could totally control the fill at each point by the number and the separation at each quilted spot. As long as you have enough down to fill it up you would be set. You could add a few more ounces of down, eliminate the baffles, and for the same weight, have a warmer bag. Many baffled bags don't have any way to keep the down from going down to the side other than just having enough down to fill the whole tube right?