DIY Portaledge Summary - Start to Finish

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randy88fj62

Trad climber

LA, CA

Topic Author's Original Post - Sep 26, 2016 - 10:07am PT

I wanted to make my own portaledge and so I started with what I thought would be the hardest part. I got some input and made the corners. This will accept OD 7/8, .035" wall, 4130 tubing.

1 inch OD Titanium -6Al -4V (aka T64) was in my garage so why not use it?

Drawing:

The titanium was machined to make half the corners so 8 total pieces were machined:

Then the material was tacked together to form the corners:

The experienced welder did his thing (not me):

Now you can't weld Titanium and be done. T64 needs to be stress relieved and then preferably aged to bring the hardness and ultimate tensile strength up. For this you need a Kiln capable of accurately going up to 1,000 degrees F for 4 hours.

T64 (and titanium in general) cannot be aged in an oxygen environment. It causes an alpha white layer that will crack badly at your welds. To do this you apply 'stopoff' on the part to prevent oxygen from touching it then you put it in an argon environment during the aging process.

Argon purging out oxygen prior to bake:

4 hours later and slow cool to ambient we have mostly finished 6.2oz each corners:

Once the corners were done I found a cheap eBay supplier for seamless 4130 chromolly steel tubing which arrived quickly.

I then had some thick walled 4130 tubing machined on a lathe to fit inside the tubing so the long sides of the portaledge would be flush.

Here you can see the joint:

Once the frame was done I moved onto the sewing end. I bought an old $75 sewing machine online after borrowing a friends (Kingston Deluxe made by Brother).

Here is the sewn bed without suspension or tension end straps:

Corner suspension made from rated flat webbing (similar to Fish's)

Sewed on tension end straps, 4 per side. I used thicker polyester webbing and if I did it again I'd use thinner flat webbing as I feel it doesn't cinch as good as it could.

Once the bed was done and tensioned I went to work on two fins with nalgene cinch pocket on one side and a mesh zippered pocket on the other side. The zipper is on the not load bearing curved inner seam:

Once the fins were complete I went to work on the Suspension using flat webbing and a petzl Paw S.

Final thoughts after using it this past weekend:
Don't sew daisy chain loops too high on your suspension straps as you limit your adjustment options.

The Ø1/4" bungeee I installed through the frame stretched and needs to be trimmed. make sure to pre test and stretch your bungee so it's not a mess to assemble on the wall.

Portaledge Final Dimensions: 90" long x 50" wide (perfect for us 6'5" guys).

Total Cost: ~$450 including rain fly material (need to finish that)
Hours to construct: Too many! Took me about 6 hours to made the fins for example.

Materials used on ledge:
Corners: Titanium 6Al 4V (aluminum would be fine too)
Frame: 4130 seamless chromolly tubing with a .035" wall thickness.
Bed Material: 410D packcloth (blue) and 200D packcloth (orange).
Bed side wall protector material: 16 oz hypalon (brown)
Tension Straps: Polyester flat webbing (use thinner nylon webbing)
Suspension straps: Nylon flat webbing (1")
Suspension adjusters: 1" cam buckles (Ancra are good but expensive)
Suspension main point: Petzl Paw Small.
2" flat seatbelt webbing to reinforce bed at end tensioners and fins (light blue).

Things I didn't finish when rushing to get this done:

-Rivet titanium corners to 1 of the tubes so they don't float just in the bungee.

-I bought 2 bumpers to put on wall side to reduce wear on bed material.

-Fix daisy chain loops on suspension.

-Add additional storage daisy chain loops to bottom of portaledge on all sides.

-Add handles to suspension to raise oneself up when laying down.

-terminate suspension correctly. Currently if you let the cam buckle open the strap would fly out completely. Nothing is sewn to keep it from escaping.

-Throw away crappy tyvek rain fly and finish proper rainfly.

Rain Fly waterproof master point:

Mungeclimber

Trad climber

Nothing creative to say

Sep 26, 2016 - 10:18am PT

Excellent fun!

For your Nalgene water bottle is it high enough, that when sleeping on it with the water bottle in place, that you don't whack your elbow against it?