Woodlife

I received two DD hammocks earlier on in the summer courtesy of Nick at DDhammocks. This was for putting up a hammock setup tutorial on YouTube. The video happened to feature a DD hammock. Unlike the DD hammock in the original video, the ones I received were two newer versions; the DD Camping hammock and the DD Travel hammock. Throughout the summer, I’ve used these pretty extensively and can now give some sort of informed opinion on what they are like.

The DD Camping hammock is the basic hammock. As with all DD’s they are double skinned and are of a nylon material. Each comes in their own stuff sack. The camping hammock is 2.70m x 1.45m and long enough for people up to 6’ 5” and 150kg. The hammock itself weighs 700g. The two layers are separated by a zip, which means you can slip in some insulating material between the layers. The zip is a great improvement over the older DD’s as I found that lack of fastening between the layers gave rise to a problem when using a self-inflating mat; in that the mat would slide away into the open gap.

The DD Camping hammock comes with 8 meters of rope already affixed to the ends of the hammock. The ends of the hammock obviously receive most stress bearing the weight of the body but these are sewn in very well. I can foresee no problems with these pressure points holding over a length of time. Indeed, I’ve had the older DD for two years, and have had no problems at all.

The ropes are a green nylon based tubular (hollow) type of rope. They do stretch a bit on first use, but quickly settle down especially if they receive a good soaking. What I do like about the rope is that they adhere well to the tree with no noticeable bark damage, unlike some paracord. The disadvantage of the tape is that they do tend to fray a bit after some use, but this is easily fixed with a bit of heat treatment. You can get replacement rope on DD’s website.

My modification to the rope tying system is to add a karabiner at each end of the hammock. (Make sure you use proper climbing karabiners if you’re going to do this). These serve as drip rings and allow the hammock to be adjusted or taken down during the day without the need to re-tie the rope to the tree. This can be seen in the updated set-up video (see end of post for links).

Some people don’t like the DD’s preferring more of a deeper cocoon-shape or an all-enclosed type of hammock. This is personal preference and I prefer to see what’s around me when lying in a hammock. The DD is great in this respect. If you tie the DD straight and taught as it should be, there is a minimum of “banana-ring” (what a great word!) and you don’t sag too much unlike other systems. I can easily sleep on my side and don’t feel the need to lie at an angle.

To me DD Camping hammock is a no frills, cheap but effective type of hammock. I’ve tried a few others (BCUK Magikelly and Hennesey) and I still maintain that the DD is the better all round hammock.

The DD Travel hammock comes with a mosquito net. The hammock is the same size as the Camping hammock but weighs slightly more at 950g. It’s the same material but the zip now separates the mossy net from the hammock allowing you to enclose the mossy net around you. The hammock itself still has the two layers, but these are not zipped together like the camping version. This is a bit of a drawback because you’re back to square one with the Thermarest slippage problem. With any luck, DD might add another zip or another method (perhaps Velcro) of securing the two layers together.

The Travel hammock comes with an extra length of 5mm paracord in case you don’t have a ridgeline. The idea is to rig the mossy net loops on either end to this line or the ridgeline of your tarp. I use prussic knots for this but have realised that you shouldn’t tie these too tight as the weight when entering the hammock might cause the mossy net to pull away from the hammock itself. I’ve experimented with two small bungees, and they seem to work, allowing the net enough give without putting the hammock and mossy net under any pressure. I would like to see an ability to thread the ridgeline through the mossy net without reducing the effectiveness of the mossy net. Whether this is possible I don’t know. I like the idea of having extra loops on the top of the mossy net. This allows for different configurations of hanging the net thus making the net wider although most people will use the top centre loops.

There have been complaints that some versions of the Travel hammock netting are not fine enough to keep out midges. For those who need that extra protection you should wait until the 2007 version comes back into stock as that version is finer than the 2006 version.

The whole hammock looks pretty good when setup and would certainly do the job for a normal low level summer environment i.e. anti-mosquito. Personally I prefer to rig an additional mossy net with the DD Camping hammock version. Two reasons for this. Firstly, the sides of the hammock tend to be pulled up by the mossy net rigging so I can’t see out of the hammock and secondly, the environments which I set up seldom need mosquito protection. For more privacy and protection, I would say the Travel hammock is a very good choice and again, at the price, you can’t go far wrong.

In short, I would recommend DD’s as a hammock of choice for both the novice tree-dweller and indeed to those who tend to take hammocks out on a regular basis. It’s just a matter of which one suits you best.

To new videos showing the Camping and Travel hammock set-up are now on YouTube.

Thanks for the visit.

Pablo.