Mountain Equipment Helium 400 Sleeping Bag (-5°C/23°F)

This rating is defined as a temperature at which a ‘standard female’ in a relaxed posture will feel comfortable inside a Sleeping Bag. If you are female or a cold-sleeper, this is the temperature rating that is most relevant to you.

This rating is defined as a temperature at which a ‘standard male’ in a curled-up posture can sleep inside the Sleeping Bag without waking for an eight hour period. If you are a male, or are not a ‘cold sleeper’, then this rating is most relevant to you. This is also the rating which is advertised most widely for most sleeping bags.

This rating indicates the minimum temperature at which a ‘standard female’ can remain for a total of six hours before risking the chance of hypothermia and damage to health. Generally this rating should be treated as a guide to how the Sleeping Bag performs under extreme emergency situations, and should not be considered a factor in making a purchase.

Down

The greatest factor determining how warm a down sleeping bag will be is the fill weight: how many grams of down are in the bag. The measure of the quality of that down is the fill power, with a greater number indicating greater quality. Roughly speaking, down above 700 fill power is very good down, down above 800 fill power is exceptional down. We use three different types of down in our sleeping bags:

800 Fill Power Goose Down

Their very best Eastern European goose down. Sourced from Western Russia and DOWN CODEX™ approved. Amongst the best downs available anywhere.

700 Fill Power Duck Down

Sourced from two suppliers, one in Germany and one in China, both of which are DOWN CODEX™ approved. An extremely good all round down insulation.

700 Fill Power Recycled Down

Taken from post-consumer down products, cleaned, sterilised, and sorted to leave an excellent down insulation.

Grey Down and White Down

Depending on the source birds, down may be grey or white in colour. Grey down is more common than white down and is sometimes regarded as less desirable because it may sometimes be seen through translucent or lightly coloured fabrics. However, colour has no bearing on the down’s thermal performance or cleanliness, and in the vast majority of products an end user will not even be aware of it.

Most of the down that Mountain Equipment buy is grey. However, in some products with lightweight and lightly-coloured shell or lining fabrics they pay an additional premium for white down. White down is permitted to contain a small percentage of grey down or ‘black spots’, as obtaining a completely pure white down naturally is not practicable. These black spots do not affect performance and the down functions identically whether it is white or dark. As down moves inside baffles the position or even appearance of these spots is only ever temporary. It is possible to buy pure white down where there are no black spots, but this down has undergone an additional processing stage where it is sorted by hand. As a result, its price is much higher and it is available only in limited quantities.

Their down undergoes testing before it leaves the down supplier, once it reaches the garment or sleeping bag factory, and some final production garments are tested to ensure that the down meets the specification that they require.

DOWN CODEX®

In 2009 Mountain Equipment became one of the first outdoor brands to introduce independent auditing of their down supply chain. Quietly introduced, without fanfare or press-releases, DOWN CODEX® set out to understand an industry and supply-chain that was largely ignored and certainly little understood.

SHOP DOWN SLEEPING BAGS 

Synthetic

Synthetic insulations might all look similar to the untrained eye, but they vary greatly in their warmth, softness, compressibility, durability, water resistance and compression recovery.

The warmer the synthetic sleeping bag, the more weight of synthetic insulation it has inside it, usually in the form of a greater number of layers of insulation and/or thicker layers of insulation.

Mountain Equipment's range of Polarloft® synthetic insulations used in their Sleeping bags are a result of scouring the globe for the best possible materials. They offer a fantastic blend of warmth, comfort, compressibility, and durability which is ideal for all but the most demanding situations.

SHOP SYNTHETIC SLEEPING BAGS 

Exceeding the impressive 1500 mm hydrostatic head of the original DRILITE® LOFT but with a staggering weight of only 28g/m², DRILITE® Loft Xero is a class-leading fabric for the most serious users: it’s amongst the lightest highly water resistant shell fabrics in the world. Ideal for Super Alpine climbing and the most lightweight expeditions where protection, pack size and weight are critical to success.

One of the lightest downproof fabrics on the planet. Perfect for alpinists and backpackers for whom weight is absolutely critical. Despite being just 26g/m², the fabric has exceptional tear resistance, giving you peace of mind on longer or more remote trips.

Considerably lighter than the original DRILITE® Loft Fabric, but still with the same highly water resistant 1500 mm hydrostatic head, DRILITE® Loft 30 weighs 55g/m² and is the ideal fabric for sleeping bags destined for serious mountaineering, climbing, and backpacking in difficult conditions.

One of the lightest versions of DRILITE® Loft available. Our 20 denier version weighs just 36g/m² yet still affords the same highly water resistant properties of the original with an impressive 1500mm hydrostatic head.

Weighing just 38g/m², HELIUM™ 20 uses 20 denier yarns to create a fabric that is compressible, tough, and extremely comfortable. Its densely woven construction ensures the highest levels of downproofing, wind resistance and resistance to heat loss. The new HELIUM™ 20 offers greater handfeel over previous HELIUM™ fabrics as well as reduced seam slippage, resulting in even greater durability than the previous fabric.

A durable and well-proven version of our Helium™ fabrics offers great all round long-term performance without adding undue cost. It’s easily cared for and offers excellent comfort. It is 53g/m².