Here is a guide on how to tape the stitches of your tent’s fly using the famous Seam Grip WP+ by Gear Aid, a permanent multi purpose seam sealant.
Introduction
I own a 2019 MSR Hubba Hubba NX2, a great backpacking tent that MSR restyled after many years. This new edition presents some new features, and the one which interests this article is the introduction of the Xtreme Shield Coating, a brand new fly approach. To make a long story short, a super precision seaming (lap-felled seam) is used in order to keep the tent’s waterproof ability, instead of using the classic factory taping, which tends to degrade faster with time than this new way of seaming.
Some users lamented leaks with this new technology saying that the seamed stitches are better. The aim of this article is not to determinate which method is better, but rather to show you how to tape-seal your tent – whether because your tent doesn’t have taping or because the existing ones are worn by time.
Following the suggestions of MSRs official website, where they encourage to seam seal your tent, I found this product by Gear Aid, a company that specializes in great quality products for the maintenance of any kind of outdoor tools, in this case, the Seam Grip WP+. These two links already show a few videos where they give instructions on how to apply the product and how it works. But how to actually do it on the whole fly of my Hubba Hubba NX2?
I have divided this guide in a few crucial parts in a way that you can jump quickly to the part of your interest and read the related suggestions and warnings while you are doing the work.
1 Before starting
- This work takes time….A LOT OF TIME to be done properly. It took me a few weeks, almost a month.
- You will need a LOT OF SPACE: an indoor space where to fit your fly (and hang it) and an outdoor space where to hang/lay your fly during the day to dry.
- A considerable amount of patience and attention to detail is also pretty much required =)
- As I said before, from the moment you start the taping until when you can fold the full tent back into your backpack for a trip, more or less a month will have passed, so don’t even start this work if you need the tent before this deadline.
- I found the optimal loop to speed up the process : [1. Apply the product in the evening, indoor] -> [2. Remove the tape after 1h or so] -> [3. Let it dry all night long, indoor] -> [4. In the morning, take the tent out to dry all day] -> [5. In the evening, restart from part 1 on another part of the tent] ->…
2 Materials
- 2x Gear Aid – Seam Grip WP+ 2x7grams [with 7g I did ~4 meters]
- 2x Painters blue tape [to do a straight taped seam, the 3M which i didn’t have, is top]
- White Spirit (Silver 603) [to clean the brushes, I found it works better then the Lacquer Thinner]
- Mono use gloves [suggested while using Seam Grip]
- Mask [suggested while using Seam Grip]
- Working area [as I said before, preferably botth an indoor & outdoor space to work and let dry]
3 How to apply the tape
First things first, chose the portion of tent to start with and to work on. You can’t just simply tape all the tent and apply the Seam Grip, you have to proceed slice by slice.
The pictures bellow show what I mean by slice: a portion of tent big enough for you to unload well the glue from the brush and to dry in one day, but at the same time ‘manageable’ because any surface you are going to tape, put the seam grip, remove the tape and let dry must be kept as flat as you can at all times.
To mask the chosen ‘slice’ we use 3 different approaches, the first for the straight seams, the second for the junction points and a third for the zips.
To tape straight seams I suggest to hold the tape, and stick it bit by bit instead of ripping a big slice and stick it all in once. Cover both the left and the right sides of the seam, leaving a 1.5cm gap between them. For the junction points, just rip the tape in little parts and adapt it to the shape you are masking. Try to fill the internal parts so as not to waste too much product.
Check the video and pics below to have a better idea:
To mask the zips, I used two approaches, and choose the best one to show in pics. Since the zip doesn’t stay flat (as with other parts of the rain coat), I used a tiny slice of tape and placed it next to the first one, in order to deal with the wavy shape of the zip. But this was not working well… the tape would eventually unstick, without giving the needed grip on the zip. I found a better and easier way to make this work.
First, open the zip, rip a slice of masking tape (10-15cm long) and stick it on the edge of the zip, using your nail to push it below the zip for a perfect grip. This works, although it gives a second problem on how to keep the zip straight, but we’ll get to this one. Below, 4 pics will show you better than a thousand words.
This finishes part 2 on how to detect the working area on the fabric and masking the seams. Remember the more pressure you apply all along the side of the tape where the Seam Grip will be applied, the more adherent it will be and also, less product will pass between the tape and the fabric.
4 How to apply the product
This process is pretty straightforward, Seam Grip WP+ comes with two brushes, one to screw on the tube, and one single use brush. It works either ways. We also face the problem of cleaning those brushes after each usage.
You have to apply a little film of product, brushing it in all the directions so it penetrates well in the seams (trying always to brush from the tape towards the seams in order to prevent any Seam Grip to slip under the tape). So, don’t hesitate to pass it more than one time on the same spot. Below I show you some parts of the fly with the product freshly applied.
I want to spend two words on how to clean the brush after the usage. Gear Aid says that they are single use brushes, but I tried to clean them anyway, using two different products. The White Spirit and the more aggressive Lacquer Thinner. The latter is not suggested: it doesn’t actually clean the bristles, making things almost worst. So, when I had finished to apply the product, I simply soaked the brush in a glass jar filled with White Spirit, leaving it all night long to rest. The next day, the Seam Grip has transformed into a kinda rubberish plastic that you can remove easily, as you can see in the pictures and video below.
This concludes part 3. All in all, brushing this product is not so different than brushing some glue or a particularly thick coat of paint.
And don’t forget that now you must store the tube in a zip lock bag in the freezer! (as written on the Seam Grip WP+)
Now if you have any loops along the seam that you are working on, be careful to keep them away from the product and not to make them stick with the seam. Here is how I did it:
5 How to remove the tape
When you finish to put the Seam Grip on the chosen slice, you will have to wait some time before removing it. They suggest to wait half an hour before removing the tape, so as not to allow it to stick to the tent. I made a few tests, and letting it dry indoor for 30 minutes is way too short. The Seam Grip was still ‘liquid’ at that point and kept sliding left and right – rendering the prep work I did with the tape totally useless. Thus, I suggest you to wait at least 1 hour, even 2h, before removing the tape, if you can. Here are some pictures and videos about this step.
6 Drying
As mentioned before in the “Before Starting” part, I usually did the work in the evening (apply the tape, put the Seam Grip, wait & remove the tape). So after removing the tape, I would just leave the tent on the working table as it was, for the whole night – making sure to leave the tent flat on the working area so as to avoid wrinkles that can be difficult to unstick and risk damaging the fabric. The next morning, I would leave the tent outside all day long to dry. Later, the same day, in the evening, I would start the work again on another part. If the weather happened to be rainy or bad, I would still hang the tent to dry but indoors.
Here are some pictures of the drying areas (dry#1 on the working area, dry#2 outdoor, dry#3 if bad weather).
Bellow, a short video of a stick test I did one night after I applied the product and had left the tent in the indoor working area to dry.
Another issue that may happen is to leave a wrinkle somewhere and don’t realize it before a while. As I said, you must always double check the slice where the product has been freshly applied. But nobody is perfect and a wrinkle could pass by unnoticed anyways. If that happens, try to unstick the two parts delicately and start the procedure over again. Note that there is the risk of damaging your fabric this way, especially if the Seam Grip has already dried – in this case, best to just leave it like that. Keep in mind that the glue takes days to dry properly, so if you check the taping regularly enough, you should be on time to save the situation. I show some pictures of this case since it happened once to me as well.
On the first following picture you see that those two parts got stuck together. I managed to unstick them but, as you can see, the final result isn’t as satisfactory as the rest of the taping. On picture #2, I applied the tape. On picture #3, I applied the product and left it to dry with a weight on one side, so as to avoid the two parts sticking back to each other again. Picture #4 shows you the final result.
7 Final product
Here are some pictures of the finished product!
uruz2@roofless 