Hi Backers,

Wanted to touch base with everyone to mainly say that the production of the AERAIL A1 tents are moving along well. Many components have already shown up with the main body of the tent scheduled to be completed and ready to ship late October through November. 

We have had the opportunity to do some more field testing, also known as Camping, and have been pushing the product as hard as we can. 

The AERIAL A1 is preforming well without showing any signs fatigue in the stitch work, water resistance or materials degradation. There has been one area of concern that we have not been 100% satisfied with and that is where the spreader bar connects into the webbing. Even with reinforced stitching and a burned hole there has been slight stretching and we presume that repetitive use overtime may increase the hole size to a point that could affect the connection. After lots of proposed ideas and testing we have come up with a solution that solves the issue. The new design adds a small aluminum bar (we are calling a plug) between two stitched bar tacks in the webbing. The spreader bar inserts into the plug through a burned hole in the webbing. "How does this help?" The spreader bar wants to pull inwards as weight is applied to the sleeping surface, the plug transfers the weight onto the stitched bar tack over a 25mm distance rather than the previous design which applied pressure to a 5mm hole. We have made prototypes which work very well, we sent drawings to a facility for production and the production sample was not to the quality we require, new samples are being obtained and we have faith things will be resolved. Custom components like this, last minute, are risky but it is unfortunately something that we feel is crucial to the longevity of the product and our reputation. Since the Spreader Bars are removable and made independently from the tent body this should not hold up the progress of any other area of the product. 

We have also made a modification regarding the fly connection to the tent body. Instead of connecting to a small loop sewn onto the webbing we have opted to put the fly connection directly through the suspension buckles and then back to a small aluminum ring. This allows the fly to extend a bit further away from the tent body and also increase adjustment length to prevent bottoming out. 

Thank you to everyone who filled in their survey. We still have 54 outstanding surveys, you know who you are ;) Please look for "AERIAL A1 - KICKSTARTER Backer Survey" in your email and follow the link, if you can't find the email let us know and we will help you out. 

Hope everyone is staying safe, we are working hard to get your A1 isolation chambers out to you as soon as possible.

Andrew and Jacob