Camp Bed Thermarest Copy
 

Just bought a copy of a Thermarest bed off of Ebay. It was shipped direct from China and cost just over £50. Saving me around £140 on the price of the real deal.

The quality is very good and I have really give it some stick testing it.
It is easy to put together, light, strong and most of all comfortable.

Same applies to the copy of the Helinox chairs and table. Bought them both and very pleased.

If these companies did not rip you off with crazy prices, the Chinese would not bother to copy. Being greedy does not pay off.:thumbup1:

The companies that develop the kit have to make money somehow. Testing and development costs big time. The firms that copy stuff just have to buy one and reverse engineer it, saving a chunk of R+D, but at what price?
I've had a Thermorest sleeping mat for over 15 years, many of which were in my military days. It's never let me down, and I'll buy another if it ever dies.
I'm not knocking anyone who wants to save a few quid, but spare a thought for the people who did all the hard work ;-)

I've owned a good eight or ten Thermarests plus another four or five off-branded pads. The Thermarests were all good quality; the off-brands ranged from pretty good to atrocious. Ya pays yer money and ya takes yer chances.

I'm aware that there are a few other highly-regarded name brands, notably Big Agnes and Exped.

Hope that's helpful.

Mark

you do pay your money, but if you havnt got that kind of money in the first place then your choice can be limited until someone brings out a copied budget version.

Yeah the quality might not be as good but when you consider the difference in price you could kit out four of you for the price of one originalbier plus as long as you can bodge fix until you get home then no worries and at worst if it has cost much less in the first place you can just chuck it away, no need to carry a broken product around just so you can claim on the warranty when you get home!

Been looking at these as I fancy some lightweight comfort but I could never justify the high original prices. Cheers for posting, ditto the copy chairs.

I have an original thermarest sure its still going but its heavy and my copy version is much smaller and cost about £15 and has been serving me well for many trips.

Do you have a link or name? Ok, found one..

I like the idea of being off the ground a bit but am concerned that the little "feet" on these cots/beds would bugger the groundsheet of my tent. Is this a problem or not ?

I have just sent my trail lite three/quarter back to Thermarest for repair where the covering was starting to get unstuck from the foam giving it a kind of pillow effect. I suspect it to be not salvageable and it cost be $35 US to ship!

I have had this mat under infrequent use for 25 years, the last decathlon mat I had lasted 5 nights before leaking round the valve.

On the last trip to replace the failed decathlon we picked up an Exped on sale very light but seems very thin ... time will tell.