Bivvy bag with integral mattress

Now this may be a morning brain fart, but please hear me out.

I was thinking that a hooped bivvy bag with integral sleep pad (with pillow shape at the head end) would be ideal for bike packing, You could also have a midgie screen at the head end. But after a quick google, they don’t seem to exist.

Pros

• Lighter overall weight, as the mattress would replace the part of the bivvy bag that would be at the bottom.
• The mattress wouldn’t move around in the bivvy bag, meaning more comfort.
• Less components to carry and store, and would be quicker to setup and take down.

Cons

• If the mattress fails then the bivvy might need binning as well.
• Would be harder to make and would be more expensive. Maybe?

What’s the singletrack collective’s thoughts?

i assume you’d have the hoop inflatable as well in your design

Solution in search of a problem.

Plus it would make the air mattress unusable if you didn’t need the bivi bag

You lost me at hooped bivvy, by that point i am bringing a tent.

As above, sometime a bivvy bag isn’t necessary, then you are either getting a second mattress or lugging round a hopped bivvy with you.

I can see where you’re coming from. It would be a bit niche (see above comments) so potentially low production volume/expensive.

Also – what R value would the mat portion be and would it have to be available in a couple of options?

Some new ideas are best slept on first.

I stitched some elastic across the width of an old snugpack bivi I had to hold an inflatable mat in place when I was still in uniform.

I binned the whole thing off as getting out and getting dressed in the rain was bollocks and the lack of space for kit was an issue.

Go for a tent or a tarp/basha that you can sit under and admin yourself instead. May not be as warm as an enclosed space but you can mitigate for that with a decent bag and liner.

Are you talking about a swag?

Bivvy bag with hoops and integral mattress? Bloody heaps of them here mate. Some go flat on the ground, some have a cot / bed built in too.

Wouldn’t work for me as I move around a lot when sleeping.  I’d just end up with the mattress on top of me unless it was pegged down and the you have a tent assuming a hooped bivvy.

The reason I thought of this, is I’ve been on a few bivvy trips recently and find it a real faff keeping the mattress where it should be. If I use it with the bivvy bag on top then I just slide off in the night. If I put it inside, I still find myself needing to adjust the mat in the night.

So ignore the hoop bit, as this seems contentious. And focus more on a bivvy bag with integral mat.

I’m also in the market for a new winter matt, and thought I’d maybe get a winter bivvy bag whilst I was at it, and just thought it would be easier if I could just buy an integral bivvy and mat one.

You’re compromising the material on either the base of the bivvy bag, mattress or both though as they need to do different jobs. You’ve also committed to using this specific set ups at all times.

I don’t think it gets rid of the risk of slipping just means that the whole lot potentially moves. If you’re that fussed so stick on rubber dots on the base of your mattress is a damn sight easier and more convenient than fully integrated nonsense. On a longer ride I might want a bivvy/camp and a night in a bothy or a doss on someone’s floor, this doesn’t allow for that flexibility. Also means you can’t just easily dry out one part or the other.

What might be a nice option would be something like the system Sea to Summit uses to attach an inflatable pillow to its mats. Basically a low-profile, hook and loop-type fastener, or glorified Velcro but without the scratchiness etc.

It works really well to attach wandering inflatable pillows to mats – the stick-on patches come with their mats. I don’t see why it wouldn’t do a similar job as a bivi to mat system. For TJ the mat could have guying points at the corners to hold it down…

The whole integral bivi/mat thing would be quite niche, complicated to manufacture and wouldn’t give you any flexibility in mat insulation levels. I suspect someone makes a bag with mat retention straps of some kind, but I’ve never come across it, though there are a fair few sleeping bags that have reduced insulation in the base coupled to straps to hold a mat there. I don’t like them, I always end up with odd voids which feel cold.

I put silicone sealant on by groundsheet and mat to help stop the slippage.

I think I’m in a minority of wanting minimal of faff when bikepacking, I forgot that the faff is part of the fun for some, from: selecting your camping spot, unpacking your kit, setting up your camp for the night, setting a fire and setting out a tarp. I tend to setup camp late and leave early, I just want to pull out a bivvy bag and get in, this is why I often have my sleeping bag, liner and mat already inside my bivvy bag already for a wild night under the stars. I have a lightweight 1 man tent that is great but needs a much larger area to setup compared to the bivvy bag.

I’ll try out putting some silicon sealant on my mat to help it stay put. I just need to buy a winter mat and bivvy bag now. This would be easy if it wasn’t for the huge amount of choice, even more choice if you have deeper pockets than me.

I think I’m in a minority of wanting minimal of faff when bikepacking, I forgot that the faff is part of the fun for some,

Don’t go getting all butt hurt because a bunch of people point out it’s not the great idea you thought. All what you are proposing appears to do in terms of reducing faff is remove the time it takes to put a mattress in a Bivvy bag at the expense of a whole bunch of other compromises (as pointed out by people).For me it’s a pretty unappealing compromise but Bike packing is the prime example of there being more than one way to skin a cat. Some want light weight at the expense of everything else, some want comfort and will sacrifice weight and bulk for that.

If you think it’s a good idea then it wouldn’t be that hard to seal the top of a bivvy bag to a mattress to test proof of concept and if you like it make one. Most bike packing gear is cottage industry level anyway. Bearbones MYoG forum may have some pointers.

“butt hurt” I’d do a laughing emoji if I could.

I’m currently looking at SWAGS, thanks aphex_2k, never heard of them before.

Simples. Get some sticky sided velcro tape. Stick some on the sleeping pad and on the bivvy bag (and inflatable pillow if you have one). Everything stays in place but can be separated for packing or when bot needed.

https://www.screwfix.com/p/velcro-brand-black-heavy-duty-stick-on-tape-1m-x-50mm/21670?tc=JL2&gad_source=1&gclid=CjwKCAjw3P-2BhAEEiwA3yPhwKTr-jfHw6zzKa0XEU1K9BWs-zpps7v1Olo05LJs7_2DO1DlXUGXIBoCsEEQAvD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds

Simples. Get some sticky sided velcro tape. Stick some on the sleeping pad and on the bivvy bag (and inflatable pillow if you have one). Everything stays in place but can be separated for packing or when bot needed.

No, it won’t. Rolling and unrolling will very quickly cause the Velcro to unstick itself from the fabrics, as I’ve found using the stuff on all sorts of things. Sticking it in place then stitching it along the edges would work, but it’s not ideal. Running strips of outdoor silicon caulk would probably work better, although it might be a good idea to clean the surfaces with isopropyl alcohol to get rid of dirt or grease before applying the silicon.

The effect is roughly like the grippy dots or stripes on gloves or house socks; actually, thinking about it, squirting lots of silicon blobs on both contact surfaces would probably be easier, although take a bit longer – cut the applicator nozzle off to allow dots about a centimetre across and splodge them at equal distances apart, I reckon would work really well, with minimum faff apart from the initial application.

No, it won’t. Rolling and unrolling will very quickly cause the Velcro to unstick itself from the fabrics, as I’ve found using the stuff on all sorts of things. Sticking it in place then stitching it along the edges would work, but it’s not ideal. Running strips of outdoor silicon caulk would probably work better, although it might be a good idea to clean the surfaces with isopropyl alcohol to get rid of dirt or grease before applying the silicon.

The effect is roughly like the grippy dots or stripes on gloves or house socks; actually, thinking about it, squirting lots of silicon blobs on both contact surfaces would probably be easier, although take a bit longer – cut the applicator nozzle off to allow dots about a centimetre across and splodge them at equal distances apart, I reckon would work really well, with minimum faff apart from the initial application

It’s worked so far for me to be fair, but I do like the idea of the silicone “blobs”. I’ll give that a go when the velcro fails.