How I set up a Bedouin Tent
Since I found little to no usable information on Bedouin tents, I have decided to make a post on how I set up my tent.
The inital bundle is pretty small compared to my mini yurt.
With the rectangle of fabric spread out on the ground, grab one edge pole and place it under one of the tension strap corners. stretch out the ropes and hammer them down. (Its easier to have some one hold the pole stead, but can be done with one person).
repeat with the other edge.
Once I have all the edge poles in place, repeat with the other side.
I allow for a fair bit of bag at this point. You will need it.
I was going for a North African Bedouin style tent. They have arched ridge lines, and I can not see how to get that look with out aid of a ridge slat. The more common variety just have poles to keep the top of the roof up.
I place one of the poles hooked into the ridge slat, shrug my way into the tent, and raise the pole up til the two parts are steady, but not tight.
I then place the other pole into the roof slat corner and raise that pole up
Keep moving out the pole until they are vertical. You might have to adjust the tension on the sides to get them to stand straight upright. Once I have them up, I peg down the roof center tension straps.
I built my tent so that the end walls are permanently attached. The side walls are attached to the roof by means of pins (I used curtain hanger prongs, cut and sharpened).
To splay out the walls I pinned the canvas around the guide ropes. This allowed a lot of shade, and air still moved freely through the tent.
Shot of one of the pins.
At night I un-pin the bottom of the walls and the pin the corner canvas edges together.
I have a separate piece of fabric that spans the inside middle of the tent that gets pined to the outside walls. This gives a nice sleeping area with out people walking by watching you sleep.
The pins used to attach the wall segments make great points to attach the tassels.
That’s it. How I set up my Bedouin tent.
AWESOME!!!
I love the how to! The pics are wonderful and I love that your centre beam has a place to hand lanterns! I would never have thought of that!
Yet another of Tir Righ’s brilliant Populace!
Hi
I am making a bedouin style tent and I would like to know what are the straps that you used (and have down the center line) and did you sew this on a regular sewing machine or by hand? Thanks!
Zoe
The straps are just strips of the same canvas the tent was made out of. Since the canvas was a light weight canvas, I made the straps extra long and doubled them over where not attached to the tent rectangle of fabric. This was to add a little bit of extra strength at a stress point. If you are using 10oz canvas or heavier its most likely over kill.
It was all sewn on a normal 60′s era machine. Use canvas/jean needles, change the needle every time you change the bottom bobbin of thread, and just take it easy. There is this fabulous little jig I have found called a “jean-a-ma-jig. http://sewfordough.wordpress.com/2009/05/07/jean-a-ma-jigwhat-is-that/ (just a random site that explains it better than I could). This thing is great at getting the hard parts of the seams done. Best couple bucks I spent for tent making.
Good Luck, and I hope I have been of help. =D
Hello,
I have been looking to make a tent like this to calm my regret of not buying one in Cairo a few months ago. I love your design and how simple it is. I would like to try something like this but I had a few questions. In the picture where the tent is half set up it appears that there is quite a bit of sag in the midde of the rectangle, did you sew that in or is that the result of streaching? Also did you need to cut the side walls at an angle to get then to compleatly enclose the tent? Thanks for all the info on your sight so far. There really is nothing online about Bedouin tents.
-Trail
The tent is a rectangle. No fancy cutting and such. If at all possible, the first time you fully put up the roof, tension it down hard… and keep it up for a few days. Morning and night try to cinch down the ropes a bit more. The roof especially around the front and back will look a little wavy, but it will go away as it stratchs into its normal position. Once the roof looks right, I took the wall fabric and pinned the good edge to the roof and layed the excess material on the ground flat. I then took a 2×4 and layed it down on the ground over top of the canvas, made sure the wall was nice and flat and then marked the canvas at the ground were I wanted the canvas to be cut and seamed too. good luck
Mary.. your amazing. thank you so much for putting your building adventures on the web. I have a few questions..
1. what was the overall dimensions of the tent when set up?
2. what was the length of your roof beam and sidewall poles?
3. the end sidewalls are part of the original pieces of 9×12 sewn together?
looking to get this done for Pennsic war 2011
thanks
Ratnavati Bai SCA participant
I have to admit, I never took measurements of the tent when it was errect. I camp solo, so it seemed pretty damn cavernous to me =D. I am sure with a little trig, and time I could figure it out, but I am at work so it will have to wait.
Side wall polls were 36″, but you can make taller, or shorter walls if you want. Just adjust were you place the tension band along the side. I originally used 36″ as I have a decorative rope bed that the up rights are 36″. The bed looked weird in the tent, so I made a new shorter bed. My own preference would to make the walls shorter. more 28-30″ just to get a cooler looking slope to the roof. Thats just me though. Roof beam…. Can’t remember specifically…. I think it was arounf 36″ too. But could be wrong. It was definatley no more than 40″ as it came from a skid runner.
3. The side walls were part of the of the roof section. You can easily put the tension bands on the edge of the roof, and pin on side wall sections (probably easier to sew). I have seen both examples on existing bedouin tents. All kinds of depends on regions, tribes, preference. The original tarp 9×21 was more 9×15 with 6 feet of walls on the ends. The longer the unsupported roof would benefit from more frequent seams. The painters tarp I used was 9ft wide (no seams). In high wind areas, this would be cause for concern. My other bedouin tent, I have seams every ~30″ or so. It has way more strength along the length.
Good Luck.
I love your design, I would love to use something like this as a Dayshade. Thanks for this information
Master Achbar Ibn Ali
Greeting Mary,
I am not sure how often you visit this page, but I have just found you! I really like this design and appreciate the extent of information you’ve given. Where did you purchase the fabric? What was the over-all room the tent allowed (12 x 12)?
thank you for making your adventures in tent making so public!
Judur
Oh, one more question, How tall are the center poles?
Thanks again!
Judur
Very nice! Much as I despise him, I liked Gadafi’s super size Bedouin tent. It’s a shame they burnt it; I would have made them an offer!
Hello the fabric I used in this project was painters drop cloth. The tent was a prototype so I wasn’t all that worried about longevity of the fabric. I wouldn’t remcommend Painters tarp for much of anything that has alot of tensile strenght needed in the design. Yurts were the fabric sits on a structure is fine, but the pulling force on a bedouin tent can be a problem. I recommend just searching for a 100% canvas in an 8-9 oz range. That should be more than strong enough with the tensioning strap bands to help with the force.
The poles If I remember right were approx. 7′ tall but they could have been slightly shorter. I thing the inner dimensions were 8-9′x16-17′ thats due to the side walls being integrated into my design. If the straps where attached to the very edge of the roof it would have been more 8-9′x 20′