MYOG Ultralight 2 person backpacking quilt

We wanted to try out a backpacking quilt, but didn't want to buy one and find out we didn't like it, so I made one. Here is a basic video about the process. This quilt has 5 removable sleeping pad straps, a shock cord drawstring head and a mini-cord drawstring foot. The supplies came from RipStopByTheRoll. Approx dimensions: Head 86' wide, Foot 71" wide, 74" long

Materials:25’ 1/8” Shock cord: https://ripstopbytheroll.com/products/reflective-shock-cord

• 25’ 1.5mm mini-cord: https://ripstopbytheroll.com/products/1-5-mm-mini-cord
• 4yrds .66oz membrane 10 taffeta nylon orange: https://ripstopbytheroll.com/products/0-66-oz-membrane-10-taffeta-nylon-1
• 4yrds .66oz MEMBRANE 10 taffeta nylon blue: https://ripstopbytheroll.com/products/0-66-oz-membrane-10-taffeta-nylon-1 so glad I made the inside and outside diff colors: didn’t matter what was top and bottom, but it made it much easier to sew, because I could see when the fabrics lined up
• 8 low profile center push buckles: https://ripstopbytheroll.com/products/low-profile-center-push-buckle
• 2 pieces of 5yard continual cut (so 10 yards total) 3/4” wide grosgrain ribbon (maybe could have done with just one 5’ section, but not sorry- didn’t have to worry about having enough): https://ripstopbytheroll.com/products/mil-spec-nylon-grosgrain-ribbon
• 4 cord locks (kind of wish I’d just gotten the captive ones): https://ripstopbytheroll.com/products/two-hole-bean-cordlock
• 4 yards climashield 7.5oz: https://ripstopbytheroll.com/products/climashield-apex-7-5-oz-sq

I did piece together the top, bottom and insulation, to avoid buying a lot of excess material. For each of the materials, I stitched (2) 75” long pieces together side by side, and then cut off the excess on one side to give me enough to lengthen it at the foot. The insulation I stitched by hand using a running stitch.

The seams were all serged. I would worry about those edges just fraying. An alternative would be to use a flame or a hot knife.

A narrow sleeve/tube the width of the top plus about an inch serves as a channel for the shock-cord drawstring head. The short raw edges need to be finished somehow, so they don’t fray. They can have a rolled sewn edge or just serged. I then folded this, with wrong sides together and just stitched the long edge, because it will be sewn into the head edge of the quilt.

On the floor, I laid out the top and bottom fabric, right sides together and put the climashield insulation on top of that. The whole thing will be sewn along the outside edge, and then turned inside out, so before it gets sewn, the following also needs to be done: 

• the narrow channel/tube I made for the drawstring is set between the top and bottom layer at the head edge, with the sewn edge matching the seam allowance and the folded edge toward the middle of the quilt. I made sure the ends of the tube didn’t get sewn into the side seams.
• I separated the buckles and put grosgrain loops through the same 1/2 of each of them. Those needed to be held in place along the side edges, between the top and bottom of the quilt with the buckles toward the center of the quilt, which I did using binder clips.
• The other halves will be put on long strips of grosgrain ribbon and after the quilt is finished, clipped into the side buckles, to secure the sides of the quilt underneath your sleeping pad. I did this so they can be completely detached and stowed, if you’re just using it as a blanket.
• Put about 12 folded 2 1/2 inch strips along the foot, for the corded drawstring. 

I sewed the whole thing around the edge, except for a 1 foot gap. I reinforced that last stitching, by going back-and-forth a little bit. The process of turning it inside out does put a little pressure on the stitching to either side of the gap.

The gap was sewn closed after turning it. The shock cord was fed through the tube at the head, then through one hole of a cord lock, the other hole of the cord lock had a short piece of cord to sew to the head-most buckle on each side- should have bought anchorable cord locks…. Also, I sewed the head shock cord at the center of the tube, so each person could adjust it independently.
At the foot, I did basically the same thing, but threaded basic mini-cord through the loops and secured it at each end in the same way (again, wish I had bought anchorable cord locks).

*** revisions: we used this on a few trips. One was a bike trip through Florida in November, where at 3am it finally got cool enough to want a blanket. Originally, the straps were sewn to one side of the quilt, with the buckles on just one side, but it became increasingly obvious that we really didn’t need the straps for Florida. Another trip was up to about 10,000 foot elevation in the Rockies in August. The temperature probably dropped to about 35°. Especially in this case, it became obvious what the advantage of the quilt was. We could bring the dog underneath it with us, which we hadn’t anticipated. Even with a neoprene pad and an inflatable pad and a jacket, she was still cold. In neither case did I use a stuff sack for the quilt, I just stuffed it into a pannier or a compartment of my backpack. Having the climate shield sewn into the sea allowance will just not continue to be a good way to keep it in place. As a result, I opened up the side seam and sewed the top, bottom and insulation together, leaving a one and a half inch slack in the thread loops, so as to not compress the insulation, or cause air gaps. I made a little gizmo out of PVC to put between the layers to maintain that slack. I also used an embroidery hoop, to keep the fabric layers taught while I tacked them together.