Customer Reviews

Eureka! Tetragon 7 - Tent (sleeps 3)

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(7)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

We bought 12 of these tents. Right of the bat, 1 of the 12 was missing a grommet to hold the back small pole over the window. Basically killing that tent. After the first year of use 7 of the 12 tents were broken. The number one repair problem with the tents are the poles. The tent uses 4 poles, which in itself makes it harder to setup than most 2 or 3 pole designs. Two poles cross to form the main supports for the tent. 5 tents had these poles break, and we were able to easily repair them. The two small poles over the windows are so thin, I've had 8 of these poles just splinter. The metal ends do not come off, making these impossible to repair. They have to be fully replaced. So far Eureka has failed to respond to 3 email requesting assistance, as their is no place to purchase these pieces to fix the tent. The small poles also lead to holes in the rain fly when being installed, if they slip from the grommet that holds them.

In general when we set the tent up, it was very loose and not very tight, making it look extremely flimsy.

For the money, their are tons of tents that are much more stable and will last longer. I personally chose to not buy something this cheap again and we are buying Alps Mountaineering Tents.

I'm not an avid camper so I knew I didn't need an expensive tent, but I also didn't want to skimp out and get a cheapo tent. The Eureka line fit the bill quite nicely. I was deciding between the Tetragon 7 and Apex XT since I'd be using it for 2 people and I wanted it to be lightweight enough for backpacking. After reading many reviews I went with the Tetragon 7 (and I'm very happy with my decision) for a few reasons:
1. Tent 'person' ratings tend to be liberal. A '2 person' tent is reasonably spaced for 2 average sized people, but leaves little room for extra gear and packs. Since I always put my backpack and gear IN the tent, I went a 3-person tent where my gear takes the place of the 3rd person. I'm definitely glad I went with this size.
2. The Tetragons have good rain flies. I read reviews of this tent having leaking problems, which was something that was swaying me toward the Apex XT which seems to have a nicer fly. Admittedly I haven't experienced inclimate weather yet, but I sealed the seams and have an extra tarp just in case the weather gets rough. I think the Tetragon 7 will work well for my uses.
3. Eureka's lifetime warranty is reassuring.
4. As I mentioned, the packaged tent is fairly lightweight and easy for a backpacking trip.
5. Setup was incredibly easy, I must not have camped in a long time because I could have sworn tents were hard to setup. It only took 2 minutes to get the tent up and fly on.
I'm very happy with my decision and especially Amazon's cheap price. As an intermediate camping person (1-3 trips/year) this tent is perfect for my purposes. If I was an avid camper, I might splurge on a more expensive tent, but this one is great for me!

I've been on 2 to 4-week wilderness trips in northern Canada and Alaska reaching up to 300-miles from the nearest settlement. Needless to say, there's been bad weather experienced in tents. Never has there been a tent pole failure (an old Eureka 3 season). A Eureka Tetragon 7 was purchased as an inexpensive tent intended for car camping; not for critical dependency. It was delivered late afternoon with expected overnight rain. Good. It could be tested to determine if seam sealer might be needed as a touchup. It went up before nightfall in the back yard. A check the following morning showed one of the two main poles had snapped in half. Though not in the tent overnight to describe wind conditions, there was an indicator. Two 10-ft-diameter outdoor canvas umbrellas had been mistakenly left open overnight. If strong winds had been present, they would not have remained standing. After allowing the tent to dry in what became a sunny day, a closer examination showed the two short poles in sleeves above both doors looked as if someone had deliberately abused them. They would not last much longer. I sent an email to the manufacturer asking if they knew of manufacturing defects. Two months later, there was still no response. That's when this review was submitted. I've since purchase a Marmot Thor P3 expedition tent (for other purposes obviously) and I'm considering a 3-season from Big Agnes or Marmot (at higher prices than the Tetragon 7). Having owned North Face expedition, Eureka 3 season and car camping tents plus experienced other brands on trips, it was unfortunate to permanently eliminate Eureka (now owned be a larger parent company) from any further purchasing decisions. It's a manufacture's decision what kind of reputation they want to develop; no response to an inquiry is not a good customer experience. I will never trust Eureka again.

The tent poles are cheap and several of them snapped the first time the tent was used. Amazon was great with the refund and even paid for return shipping.

The reviewer below suggesting sealing the seams DOESNT own this tent! I agree that sealing seams is a good idea on cheap tents; however, this tent has a design flaw that causes it to leak!

Expand the photo on Amazon and look at the Rainfly...The bottom of the door (and back window) extend to where the rainfly stops. The Rainfly actually channels water onto the lower sections of the door and rear window.

This creates two problems;
1.) You cannot enter the tent while it is raining without getting quite a bit of water in the tent with you (remember the channeling effect?)
2.) The constant stream of water on the zipper causes a steady leak inside the tent.

If the Rainfly was "A-framed" instead of "Arched" I don't believe it would be a problem.

Drives me nuts that someone who doesn't even own the product would post a 5-star review

This tent is comfortable and easy to assemble. It failed the rainstorm test. I know that every tent needs to be waterproofed and seam-sealed by the owner, and I did that. But a poorly-designed rainfly and multiple points of water-entry ruined it for us. The broken poles are very annoying, but Eureka does have a good warranty policy (not so helpful on a 9-day trip, d'oh).

Pros:
-Easy to set up or take down
-Adore the included gear loft and gear pockets
-comfortably fits 2 people and some gear
-the floor is not too thin (I wasn't worried about anything gouging it)
-Fantastic ventilation. The best is that the side vents are lower down, so if you are trying to sleep, you can feel a breeze on *you* not just above you. Even works well with the rain fly up.

Cons:
-The rain fly does NOT cover the front and back. I waterproofed and seam-sealed the heck out of this, but still we had leaks. The worst was where the rain fly didn't cover. If you look straight down at the tent & fly, you'll see that the bottom halves of the front and back of the tent are not covered by the rain fly. This might work out if you never entered or exited in the rain and had absolutely NOTHING touching the front or back (as in, a single tenter with little stuff). It gave us significant drippage.
-BOTH of the rain fly poles, needed to arch up the fly above the door & window to prevent contact between tent/fly, broke in the first 4 days of use. And they broke at a spot that makes duct tape unhelpful.
-The zipper constantly gets stuck at the bottom. The rain cover for the zipper is a good idea until you are trying to get in and out.
-Locations for water leaks are abundant. The velcro attachments from the rain fly to the tent? Yep. The zipper cover for the door? Bingo. Don't be fooled by the appearance of a sealed bathtub seam on the bottom--not at all. Double seal this one (I didn't).

Very please. My two boys and I went backpacking the end of December. It was the first time for my 12 year old. This tent worked very well. Good construction. Not too heavy for this type of trip. I would recommend the next size down, if you only have one other person, but it's great for 3.

This tent was a fairly cheap buy, so I don't really regret it not living up to my expectations.

I was leaving for a field geology course. It was a six week tour of the Southwestern United States. It was a Mojave Block Party.

The tent only had to make it six weeks. It's utter failure (while possibly somewhat attributed at certain times to my drunkenness) has made me question whether or not I will buy another product from Eureka. List of failures follows:

1. The stakes. While this may not be a major complaint, it would be nice if the tent came with some decent stakes that don't bend when you look at them for too long, or leave them in a hot car. After six weeks my original un-damaged Eureka tent stake count is... 3/8.

2. The zippers. Whomsoever's idea it was to make the main zipper on the tent out of plastic was probably on methamphetamines. It wouldn't be that bad if the zipper was large and made of plastic, but it was very tiny, and made of plastic. Every part of it. Plastic. So that means that halfway through the trip the zipper would unzip behind where I've already zipped past, making it extremely difficult to a.) get the zipper back to the beginning of the track and b.) close the tent without having holes in the zipper. Eventually this became so bad, (on the last day of the trip) that the zipper just straight came off the door. And then it was done.

3. The rainfly. Okay, take note tent-designers of Eureka. When designing a tent which is advertised to have a rainfly, make sure that the rainfly covers the ENTIRE tent, not just sections of the tent. We were exposed to heavy driving rains, and high wind, and everyone else's full rainflys kept their tents dry. Mine was not so dry.

4. The poles. They're made of fiberglass, need I say more? Be careful when you set them up, one of mine snapped just on setup one day. Which reminds me, thanks Eureka for being the only tent company in existence to not include an emergency pole repair kit with their tents. It's okay though, a buddy of mine had my back.


On the upside, this tent did hold up to the wind better than some of the REI tents on the trip, but I'm fairly certain that's because I tied my tent to a billion giant blocks of heavily metamorphosed Kaibab marble and they just set their tent up broadside into the wind.

If you like camping in your backyard, or going out to car camp every once in a while, this tent will probably work for you. If you need to call it a home for weeks at a time, then I would click the back button or hit the delete key as fast you can.

We also had a problem with one of the brim poles breaking after the first use, and the other one has chips at the "fiberglass" tip. I called customer service the next day and had to leave a message after merely getting someone's voicemail. That same day, I also sent an email to customer service as follow up. It is now 6 days later and, after still not having received a reply by either phone or email, I called again. I was informed today that they do not have the poles in stock, and (this is the best part) they do not expect them for at least 8 weeks! Let's see, that means, with any luck, I SHOULD have them by the middle of October. I also asked about the possibility of obtaining them from a store that used to stock Eureka parts, only to be told that the stores do not have them either. Needless to say, I am rather disappointed with the quality of the poles, not to mention Eureka's lack of customer service. Actually, the tent itself is quite nice, although we only used it the one time in dry weather, so I can't comment on how it is in rain. However, a tent can only be as good as it's weakest link which, in this case, is definitely the poles.

I've had this tent for over 5 years in all kinds of weather
Rain,Snow,Hot,Cold & Windy it keeps me and my gear dry
I use it for motorcycle trips across the united ststes
for kayaking trips & hunting trips never had a problem
I use a tarp under the tent. Sets up in couple of minutes
in the morning dry off with towel put back in bag & ready to go
but I noticed the rain fly on mine is a little differant
then the one shown in the picture I recomended this to
all my family & frends