One of the hardest parts of setting up camp is usually the huffing and puffing required to inflate your sleeping pad, especially at altitude. The Windcatcher Air Pad uses a unique wide mouth valve system that can inflate and deflate your sleeping pad almost instantly, with no hyperventilation required.
Leveraging the basic physical properties of moving air, inventor Ryan Frayne was able to create a better Rapid Inflation Technology. Fast moving air has a lower pressure than the slower moving air around it, while high pressure air is drawn to areas of lower pressure. Therefore, when you blow into the Windcatcher valve, you create a fast moving, low pressure stream of air that sucks in the surrounding air, resulting in 10 to 15 times more air entering the chamber than what you could produce with just your breathe.
Deflating and rolling up a sleeping pad is probably one of the most frustrating parts of backpacking for me (apart from stuffing an unruly sleeping bag with cold hands). The Windcatcher valve uses an invertible release that keeps air in as you inflate, but also allows you to bypass it for instant deflation. &
The Windcatcher Sleeping Pad is made from 75D Ripstop Polyester and internally laminated with Polyurethane. The 1.5 lbs pad is not exactly light, and with an R-Value of only 1, probably best used for summer car camping situations.
As an accessory, the Windcatcher Air Bag easily turns the Air Pad into a lounge chair, perfect for reading in your tent, use as a pillow, or to counteract the effects of uneven ground.
For a $70 pledge over on Kickstarter, you can pre-order the Windcatcher Air Pad. Another $40 will get you the Air Bag as well.