This is a nice, spacious SUMMER tent. Don't even think about using it if its spring/fall and the temperatures might drop, but its fantastic in hot weather, rain or not. Also this isn't a tent for windy conditions due to its high profile. I can set this tent up alone, although getting the rain fly over the top can be a bit tricky on my own, it does eventually get there. I hadn't thought about how tough it would be for 65" tall me to get a rain fly over the 78" top of a 10x17' tent! I bought this tent for summer camping when rain was a likely complication, when I am NOT packing it more than a few yards from the vehicle. (It is a heavy tent.) It holds a table, chairs, cot, gear, and dog quite comfortably and is ridiculously spacious when I am camping alone. When a group is camping and the weather goes wet, it becomes a great place for people to get together out of the rain and have coffee, play cards, etc. I do think the "cool port" thing is about the dumbest looking thing I have ever seen on a tent though...it looks like either a demented dog door or I'm expecting the little people to join me. The "mud mat" is also rather dorky. Being three room is kind of stretching it, but the curtains are useful for changing clothes when there is a mixed group together.
Minuses on this tent: it has a single d-door with a single zipper pull, which starts on the bottom. It has huge mesh sections in the ceiling over the ends, and there isn't any way to close them off. It lacks extra tie down points on the rain fly for foul weather when the wind kicks up a bit, which means its inclined to really start popping in a gust. There are not very many stake points on the tent itself either, which also help in foul weather.
This is a very decent budget tent for summer use. Coleman Red Canyon 17-Foot by 10-Foot 8-Person Modified Dome Tent
This tent was purchased for a late fall family weekend excursion into the Ozarks. My first bit of caution can also be a plus, so it is not the reason for my rating. THIS THING IS HUGE! It is difficult to find a place to set up. Once set up though there is enough room for 2 adults, 2 kids, 2 dogs and have a "lobby" in the middle.
On a less pleasant note. A middle of the night thunderstorm rolled in. Though the bathtub flooring is effective, the rainfly does not fully protect the seams. And, regardless of what the manual says, the seams are not water proof.
If you do purchase this tent follow a few guidelines and you should be fine. 1) make sure you are staying somewhere that will accomodate such a large tent 2) regardless of what the manual says, seal the seams on your own 3) It's pretty easy to set up but needs 2 people
This is our first large tent purchase and I bought it because after reading tons of ratings on other tents, this is the one that, for the price, seemed to be as waterproof as advertised based on user ratings.
It's easier to set up than you would think. I'm a 5'7", 130-lb woman and set it up by myself. The instructions are attached to the inside of the bag next to the zipper (as they always are on Coleman tents with zipper bags). It took about 30 minutes because attaching the guylines takes a little while, as does finding spots to drive the stakes w/o hitting rocks. Once the guylines are attached, you don't have to do it again. The most frustrating part was raising the center poles by myself. They are very long and really could use 4 hands instead of 2, but after fiddling with them just right I got them up in 10 minutes or so. With 2 hands, they tend to just fall over and make S shapes instead of dome shapes due to their length vs. strength. But like I said, I got them up. The sides poles are easy. The poles are color-coded (per the instructions) with red or grey stickers, but after you set the tent up once, you can tell which poles are which w/o needing the color coding. The side poles are thinner than the center dome poles. Our poles were not red and grey like the poles in the picture on this website. They were all black.
The inside of the tent is very roomy and attractive, with some gold accents on the white areas of the tent. I like the white - it adds a very current look to the tent.
The room dividers come detatched, and attach with loops. The zipper on the only door to the tent is doing fine so far, but on all of our older Coleman D-door dome tents the zippers have eventually broken after a few years, so we'll see with this one. I'm surprised Coleman hasn't changed their door design. I also don't like how the door has a 4-inch lip in front of it that you have to step over when going in and out. I wish they'd lower the door to almost ground level. It would also make it easier to sweep out.
I also don't like the rain fly. In the picture, the fly is away from the tent all the way around, but when you set it up, there are 4 symmetrical spots where the fly touches the body of the tent. I haven't tested this tent in rain yet, but the fly should never touch the tent. We fiddled with the fly off and on for a couple of days and was never able to raise the fly off the tent in any of these 4 spots. I also think that due to the size of the tent, a rain fly should come down closer to the ground instead of stopping midway down the tent. So I hope this tent is really as waterproof as people say.
Also, the tent didn't come with the little yellow hammer advertised on the package. But that's ok, because for less than $2 you can get a rubber mallet at any major retailer in the camping section, and rubber mallets work tons better than little plastic hammers.
Make note of how they pack it, because you'll need to simulate that when packing up. Always use your tent poles to tightly roll the tent towards the door, otherwise you'll never get the bag zipped. The poles will give you a good gauge on how wide your roll should be and also help you roll tight. The instructions give you NO guidance on how to pack it back up.
You won't need a tarp. All modern tents have a bottom already made out of waterproof tarp material, and the tarp habit stems from back when they weren't, so don't bother.
Overall, for the price, if you want a large, roomy tent, this is a good deal. You can get a Coleman for the price of an Ozark Trail (which leak like a seive).
UPDATE: We've been *poured* on 3 weekends this summer, and the only drop of water in the tent was from the bottoms of our shoes. It is indeed as waterproof as people say despite my doubts about the seemingly insufficient rain fly. We haven't needed to use any seam-seal or spray of any kind. If yours leaks, something is dreadfully wrong and you should contact Coleman.'
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