How to insulate a tent for a winter overnight stay: materials for heated floors and awnings

You can insulate a tent in different ways. A plastic film is first placed on the floor, then covered with felt. The walls from the inside can be reinforced with isolon or penofol with a foil layer, and the outside can be covered with tarpaulin. The material for the tent should allow air to pass through and at the same time provide good protection from the cold. The main types of insulation and methods of forced heating are described in this article.

10 best insulation materials

To ensure reliable insulation, all parts are insulated: the floor for the tent with your own hands, the walls and the ceiling. This can be done using different types of insulation, for example:

1. Izolon or its analogues with a thickness of 2 mm or more does not rot, is convenient to install, has a layer of foil that reflects heat inside the tent.
2. Penofol is an analogue of isolon with better reflectivity, but is more expensive.
3. The awning for the tent is insulated with your own hands and padding polyester on foil. It protects well from the cold and is quite affordable. At the same time, during installation it is necessary to leave holes for ventilation, because otherwise it will be very humid inside.
4. Batting is a proven insulation material at an affordable price. Needs reinforcement with foil, which is attached on top of it using a stapler.
5. Felt is a material that is laid in several rows and, if necessary, also covered with foil.
6. Polyethylene film is used mainly for external insulation.It protects well from wind and humidity, wet snow, but does not allow air to pass through at all. Therefore, a DIY film tent needs constant ventilation.
7. A similar effect is achieved by polyethylene foam, which better protects against the cold and at the same time has sound insulation properties.
8. Another way to insulate a tent for a winter overnight stay is to use a camping mat. This is a temporary option when there are no other means. Not suitable for harsh winters.
9. Oxford fabric protects the walls well from the wind, while allowing moisture to pass through, thereby providing a good microclimate. Usually in winter this fabric is used together with tarpaulin.
10. An insulated winter tent with a floor can withstand frosts even with the help of improvised means. This could be an old blanket, clothes, mats. Spruce branches, moss, and thin branches without knots are placed on the bottom. A layer of snow and soil up to half a meter high is laid around the perimeter to prevent it from blowing.

How to insulate a tent: step-by-step instructions

The tent is insulated in several stages - outside and inside, floor and walls. They are also considering methods of forced heating, which is especially important in winter. An approximate sequence of actions is as follows:

1. Place plastic film on the outside and secure it with office clips, and cover it with snow or ice from below. Instead of film, you can use Oxford cloth with a tarpaulin or fabric from an old tent. Thanks to this, thermal insulation will increase by 5-6 times.
2. Next, they insulate from the inside using improvised means, for example, excess clothing or an old blanket. Instead, you can take batting or padding polyester, fold it in several layers and secure it with a stapler, and attach foil on top. The easiest way is to use ready-made materials with a foil layer, for example, isolon or penofol.
3. Now you need to think about a warm floor for a winter tent. For these purposes, the same materials are used, for example, thick felt, isolon with a layer of foil, or ordinary travel rugs. In this case, polyethylene is placed under the layer, which will provide waterproofing (melted ice and snow will provide water).
4. Consider methods of forced heating and the installation location of a gas lamp, burner or other heaters described below.

Forced heating

There are several ways to keep your tent warm at night. But even if you use the best materials, in winter this is not enough - forced heating is required. You can implement it using the following tools:

1. An alcohol burner is small and produces a limited amount of heat.
2. A paraffin candle is only suitable for a one-person tent in not very frosty weather. Moreover, you will have to constantly monitor it to prevent a fire.
3. Dry fuel does not smoke or give off a smell, but it only lasts for 15 minutes, so you have to constantly set fire to a new batch.
4. A gas lamp is comfortable to use, but does not provide much heat and is only suitable for slight frost.
5. A gas heater is an effective means of heating, suitable even for large tents.
6. An infrared burner is another reliable way to heat tents of any size.
7. A solid fuel mini-stove heats better than anyone else, but at the same time requires the chimney to be vented outside.
8. A petrol tourist primus is used for cooking, but in extreme cases it can also be used for heating.

It is important to think about what to make the floor of a winter tent from and what to cover the walls with. It is best to use different materials. For example, you can choose isolon as the main insulation, and dense for waterproofing polyethylene film, and for protection from wind - Oxford fabric.