Originally Posted by
Duragrouch
I used to use a thermarest self-inflating sleeping pad. In recent decades I went to a big agnes one, thicker and with synthetic down insulation inside, I just need to blow it up, not hard. Now, most sleeping bags with the best lightweight insulation, that compresses underneath you so doesn't do much good. One of the companies, may be big agnes, can't remember, they have a system; The sleeping bag has insulation on top, none on the bottom, just a light fabric sleeve that the pad slips into, which works well, especially if your pad is insulated. However, a fully insulated bag does provide insurance in case your pad springs a leak. By the way, big agnes was good on that, mine spring a tiny leak where it was folded to roll small (BA pads are short folded and rolled, like a coffee can), and typical pad patches didn't hold against their fabric exterior. They said send it in, I did, they sent me a new pad.
a little warning against this concept:
I used a light sleeping bag for decades with this concept, much lighter insulation on bottom of bag, with the goal to reduce bag weight. It was however rather narrow (to maximize warming by having less dead air) but even as a slight fellow, I found in colder temps I would feel cold on my back when I turned in the night, because the whole bag would turn with me, exposing my back with hardly any insulation to the cold air when I was on my side.
It probably would have been alright if the bag had more real estate, more volume, allowing more turning to side to side easier without rotating the whole bag with you.
The quilit system with those two strap thingees does a pretty good job of keeping the quilt over you and fairly easy to keep it tucked up against you enough on both sides.