Robens Green Cone
I read this thread with interest as I needed a tent for my trip to see Bluebird on Bute this August and had already researched what was available and taken a shine to the GC just on the limited exposure it had on the net, so I was already swayed before Scotboxer and Sanqhar stuck their oars in.
I got it on Fleabay for a best offer price of £225 delivered, from Armysales who were fine to deal with.
It's been up in the garden twice for practise and a couple of points are worth mentioning.
The whole thing is well made.
Its easy. Really. I attached the inner whilst it was on the floor, pegged out the inner, put the pole in, used the door straps to hold it up - not vertical - then guyed the fly out all round, job done.
The 1st inner section pole has a red line down the length through the button to alter the height so its easy to find where the tit/hole should coincide. Handy.
A foursome would have to be a very pally foursome to all sleep in it, three would be just about OK two would be great and one (me) would have a lot of room available. No bad thing but a four it is not.
The lack of a porch proper might be an issue for some but with the back to the wind there looks like there's enough space to cook under the fly especially if the rest of the gear is inside (two up). I have a tarp which I will take and might be pitched to help out here. This is where a BikerPlus scores over it.
It needs a groundsheet to protect the inner floor. The specs say the floor is waterproof to 10000mm head but is very fine material so put something under it. A cheap tarp 3 x 2m would do it with the corners folded under.
I haven't got to grips with the upper wall guys yet... I'm missing a trick here to get the adjustment working properly...
The footprint is large because of the way the fly pitches but on the other hand the higher up you go the less of the tent there is for the wind to get hold of.
At 5'11" I'm not going to stand up whilst putting put my kecks on...
In all, its a keeper. I'll let you know how I get on in Scotland later.
For scale, the Ortleib bag is an old one 28 x 10", (70 x 25cm)