.665 Spreader Bar Pole

My wife and I frequently hang double under 1 tarp and I would just search for trees or at least 1 tree big enough to keep our shoulders apart. I was upgrading her to beetle buckles and thought since we are already splitting the weight of the tarp this was a small price to pay for the convenience of having more suitable hang locations and also for a good nights rest. We got the 32″ per Dutch’s recommendation and it works great once you figure out how to dial in you hang for two. It even creates enough space to use the shelf on my Blackbird without crowding my wife. I still pay attention to rig us on opposite sides of the tree to keep the stress down on the pole, but it works absolutely perfectly. There are a couple things to note. If you are using different length hammocks (I’m in a WBBB XL and my wife is in a 10′ netted hammock) you have to take a little extra time in your setup to get the head ends where the bar goes across evenly (both horizontally and vertically). You should also note that the spreader creates some see-saw action between the two hammocks because of the hard link between the straps. The smaller the tree you are tied to the worse it gets. It’s not really a problem for me, but my wife is really short and if I get in first or she gets out in the middle of the night, she kind of has to jump back into her hammock as my side drops and hers raises up when she gets out. We’re usually under a 12′ winter tarp with doors and width wise we fit under it pretty well. We’re even able to close the door on the foot end, but the head end doors really need to stay open because of the width of the straps on that end. You might want a bit of extra tarp length when 2-up. Since you are no longer riding along the center line of the tarp, you can expose the gathers on the head end if you were running right at the edge as a single. These are just things to consider and know about ahead of time, but most are easily worked out the first time you use the spreader. Some people ask about weight rating and really can’t see that being an issue. We’ve had 450+ lbs on ours between us and our packs hanging off the suspension line and I’d guess there’s only about 30-40 pounds of compression on the bar as you can still easily take the straps off the bar even with both of us in the hammock. One hidden benefit of the spreader is that the bar makes a great drying rack for wet clothes or a convenient place to hang your shoes/boots up off the ground at night.