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What is the Lunar II?
The Lunar II is a synthetically insulated sleeping bag from Mountain Equipment. It is lightweight, packable and has been specifically designed for three season use. It's the ideal bag for hut to hut adventures in the mountains, wild camping on hilltops in the summer and will still keep you warm and protected on those chilly autumn nights.
What is the Lunar made of?
Insulation:The insulation in the Lunar is Polarloft which strikes the perfect balance between warmth, comfort and durability. If you were to look at Polarloft under a microscope, you'd see that all the fibres differ in size; the thicker provide durability and loft whilst the finer fibres provide much of the insulation and help trap warm air. The beauty of synthetic insulation is that if you were to get it wet it would still retain most (around 90%) of its insulating properties.
Fabrics:The lunar is constructed using Lunar 40D - a 40 Denier Nylon that weighs in at only 43 g/m². It is soft to the touch, packable and durable. It is also breathable and allows sweat to escape through it on those warmer nights.
What is the construction used in the Lunar?
The Lunar series uses single layer construction in the underside of the bag that not only offers surprising warmth and protection for its weightbut also adds to its great packability. The Lunar II also uses Offest layer construction in the top of the bag for added warmth on those chilly nights - making it the ideal bag for all your three season backpacking adventures.
What are the features?
The Lunar features a full-length zip baffle, which helps seal out cold spots usually caused byzips and is supplied with a lightweight compression sack.
How does the Lunar fit?
The Lunarfits into Mountain Equipments 'Alpine Fit' block which is tapered in the upper body and the legs to maximise thermal performance and minimise weight.The hood and foot-box are both anatomically shaped for comfort and thermal efficiency.
Summary
The Lunar II is the ideal three season bag that offers the reliabilityand ease of synthetic insulation without compromising on weight and packability.
- Maximum User height 6'5" (200cm)
- Polarloft insulation
- Lunar 40D Outer Fabric
- Offset layer construction top
- Single Layer construction underside
- Alpine Fit
- Anatomically shaped hood and foot-box
- Full-length zip baffle
- Supplied with a lightweight compression sack
How warm a sleeping bag do you really need? We’ve tried to help you by grouping our sleeping bags by their recognised comfort ratings. These are the ratings supplied by the brands that indicate the temperature at which you will remain comfortable whilst sleeping on an insulated sleep mat. After all, comfort is what you want when it’s cold and wet outside, and you’re all tucked up in your nice warm sleeping bag.
We always recommend that you choose your bag according to the coldest conditions you will experience; you can always unzip a bag if it is too warm, but trying to sleep when you’re too cold is just miserable. Bear in mind that we are all individuals, so we all feel the cold differently and that our own resistance will fluctuate depending on a whole load of factors, including how much we have eaten, whether we have consumed alcohol, whether we need a wee or what kind of mood we are in!
Sleeping bags do not generate heat; they only trap the heat we produce, so it is vital that you get into your bag when you are giving off warmth, don’t go to bed when you are cold, have a hot meal or a hot drink or do some brisk exercise to get you nicely warmed up.
Traditionally sleeping bag manufacturers provided their own temperature ratings based on their experience, the product's intended end-use and the perceived environment. However, each brand tested their bags in different ways, and it was hard to find a fair comparison between models. So, in 2005 a European standard for sleeping bag temperature ratings, EN 13537, was introduced to give consumers a comparable guide to sleeping bag performance across a range of brands and models. The ratings have four different temperature ratings to give you an indication of the bag's performance.
Comfort Rating: This is the temperature at which an average female should experience a comfortable night’s sleep. On average, women sleep colder than men, so this rating is some degrees above the "comfort lower limit" for a man.
Comfort Limit Rating: This is the lowest temperature at which an average male should experience a comfortable night’s sleep whilst laid down in a curled up position.
Extreme: This is a survival rating where the user is likely to suffer health damage such as Hypothermia. It should be treated with the utmost caution and not be relied on for general use.
However, the EN 13537 European Standard does not apply to down-filled sleeping bags with a fill weight of more than 800g; for those bags, you will have to rely on the manufacturer's experience and technical expertise, which is often more accurate!
Most reputable brands still use their own rating system alongside EN 13537, for instance, Mountain Equipment's “Good Night’s Sleep” and Rab’s “Sleep Limit”. These ratings are often the most accurate guide to the overall performance of a sleeping bag being used by an average outdoor enthusiast because they are based on years of expedition heritage, field trials, technological experience, and constant feedback.
But please bear in mind that all ratings are only a guide and, as mentioned earlier, there are a huge range of factors that can affect your comfort; if you are just not sure, it is always wise to go for a warmer model.
The biggest difference you can make to your overall comfort is to use an efficiently insulated sleeping mat. Once you get inside your sleeping bag, you instantly compress all the filling beneath you, greatly reducing its efficiency. Therefore using a quality sleep mat will ensure you are properly insulated from the cold ground, and you will be a lot more comfortable... Basically, there is no point in buying a top-quality sleeping bag if you are just going to lie down on the floor.