Sierra Designs Pyro Maniac 15/30 Review
August 18, 2012
80 The Good
- Versatility—can be packed as either a 15 or-30 degree bag.
- Solid interior appointments—draft guards, zipper guides.
- An exterior pocket on the mummy hood holds a pillow.
The Bad
- A bit heavy for a 600-fill, 15-degree down bag.
- Insert only covers the torso, leading to cold feet when used in chillier conditions.
- Slightly pricey, even for a 15-degree bag.
A versatile design concept that doesn’t quite deliver on its promise of being a single-quiver solution, but will suffice if your adventure schedule calls for two bags and your checkbook can only support one.
Depending on your patience for making gear adjustments and willingness to pay $320 for a 600-fill bag—even one that claims to be a single-quiver solution—the Pyro Maniac may represent a solid value. If those attributes don’t describe you, clock a few extra shifts and pick up a couple bags whose designs are more focused.
Materials
The Pyro Maniac is insulated with run-of-the-mill 600-fill down, which still has a better compressibility and weight-to-warmth ratio than synthetics. There is a large pocket sewn onto the top of the bag’s torso in which one insets a down blanket that adds an additional 15-degrees of warmth.
Features
Theoretically, the additional warmth in the core area translates to the rest of the body, but in practice the lack of additional insulation in the lower body can lead to cold feet. Our testers initially thought it was a clever scheme, but after hands-on experience some felt it was clunky to work with and cooled on the idea.
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