MSR Access 2 Tent  | Performance

We first saw the Access 2 at the Friedrichshafen OutDoor trade show and were immediately smitten. Why? It’s a four-season tent that weighs less than a lot of relatively flimsy backpacking tents, or perhaps more realistically, a four-season valley tent. It’s not intended as a fours-season mountaineering shelter, though MSR makes those as well.

Our test tent weighs bang on 1900g in its bag complete with the original pegs and two extra guying ones we added plus tent and pole bag. Leave the bags at home and you lose another 120 grammes or so taking the realistic, usable weight down to 1780g.

So what makes it tougher than a standard MSR lightweight backpacking tent? First the fabric has been beefed up compared to the real lightweights with a 20D flysheet fabric – though that’s the same as a Hubba Hubba. Then the inner has only two small mesh panels, one on each door, to keep the interior warm and draught free.

But the biggest innovation is with the tent’s poles. They’re a new Easton composite design called Syclone and not only are they decently light, they can deform much further than alloy poles, then spring back rather than failing catastrophically.

The other advance over Easton’s standard backpacking tents is that while they use a familiar hub-based longitudinal pole, there’s an additional full length transverse pole compared to the truncated one on a Hubba Hubba NX.

The extra pole adds bracing, wind resistance and has the happy side effect of reducing flapping in the wind. In a stiff breeze, the tent barely moves.

Pitching the Access 2

It’s early days, but so far we’re impressed, with some reservations. The tent is easy to pitch: peg out the inner, snap the longitudinal, hub-pole together then clip into the ground-sheet corners before clipping the inner tent into place.

Next you simply add the full-length transverse pole and clip the inner tent to that – top image – finally you add the fly-sheet. In calm weather that’s all dead easy, in wind it’s a little more fiddly, in rain you’ll need to be quick to keep the inner tent as dry as possible.

Ideally we’d prefer an all-in-one pitching tent for fast, foul-weather pitching, but that’s not the case here. Once up, you have the option of using the standard guys to add stability or adding extras to the optional, multiple guying points for increased strength.

Even in standard spec, the tent feels very stable, taut and confidence inspiring. No flapping or flabbiness evident so far.

Living with the Access 2

There’s lots we like about the tent. Inside it’s decently roomy with loads of head-room, so even with two of you in residence, it never feels overly cramped. There are gear pockets running the full width of the tent at either end for stashing kit and some handy lantern hanging loops along the ceiling.

The bright orange outer – green is also available – and white inner tent make it feel light and cheerful. The twin doors are brilliant. Not only do you get extra storage area, but there’s less climbing over each other and, if the wind shifts, you may simply be able to cook on the other side of the tent.

Speaking of wind, unlike many US backpacking lightweights, most of the inner is solid fabric to keep draughts out and warmth in. There are small mesh panels at the top of each door, but that’s about the sum of it.

That has the potential to mean more condensation, but so far we’ve not had an issue with it and judicious use of the outer door zips mean you can vent the Access reasonably well. One omission though is the lack of insect mesh door panels, they may not be overly useful in full winter conditions, but not so clever in, say, Scotland in the summer time. Your call.

Other quibbles: the porch doesn’t offer as much versatility and cooking shelter as, say, a Hilleberg tunnel tent, tough there’s plenty of storage. And finally, there’s the price. We’re not saying £540 is unreasonable for what you’re getting, but you need to be sure that it’s what you need.