Dutch outdoor brand ‘Nomad’ has initiated in the past the development of inflatable tent poles, so called air beams. This near to be finished air beam technology is separately developed and is currently not yet implemented in a tent design of the (future) portfolio of Nomad. The goal is to have tents implemented with air beams for the collection of 2014. With this new collection of inflatable tents, the desire exists to return to an earlier abandoned user group that consists of ‘serious outdoor users’. For this group, it is asked to develop a lightweight tent construction principle with implementation of the developed air beam technology. This principle will then later have to be translated into whole product range proposal of lightweight inflatable tents. Context Analysis: lightweight tents This thesis describes the development and embodiment of this desired lightweight inflatable tent series and starts with a context analysis of lightweight tents. Nomad as a company is analyzed and future market position and user groups are determined for a Nomad lightweight tent. Both discussed marketing position and user scenario’s match in the implementation of a tent for travel and trekking purposes. Furthermore, it appears that the current lightweight tent market is saturated, and that deviating properties are needed to (re)enter this market. Both internal as external experts agree that it is in line with Nomad’s values to deviate on ‘comfort per weight’. In addition it is found that the most benefits could be gained in a four person tent. In the end, a provisional design goal is composed that describes the development of: “A four person inflatable lightweight tent with a differentiating comfort to weight ratio per price in the travel and trekking segment” Technology analysis: air beams A definition of air beams is given by Malm et al. (2008) as follows: “An air beam is a high-strength fabric sleeve fitted around an air retention bladder which, when sealed and inflated, acts as a load bearing structural beam or arch”. The application of this technology by Nomad is evaluated, and it turns out that their developed technology is far from finished and need further improvement and substantiation. Subsequently, air beam’s mechanical behavior is studied and the most important design parameters for an air beam tent are determined to be the beam diameter and inflation pressure. These high influence parameters on structure stiffness and capacity will receive the most focus during future dimensioning. Hereby it should be taken into account that the travel/trekking purpose of the future product only allows small dimensioned inflation means. A strategy is composed that will first develop a spacious but stable four person inflatable tent structure, and will later evaluate the resulting design on inflation time to validate its success. To finalize this section and the analysis phase as a whole, a design brief is composed. Design goal and challenge for this project are pointed out, and the differentiating product properties ‘comfort’, ‘deviation’, and ‘feasibility’ are composed that give direction to the upcoming concept design phase. The design challenge is composed as follows: “The real challenge in fulfilling the design goal is the contradiction of a stable four person inflatable structure, that on the one hand needs to be as spacious as possible, and on the other hand should deliver an acceptable pitching time with the limited inflation means that the ‘trekking’ proposal offers.” Concept Design During concept design, the design of a lightweight inflatable tent is initiated. The concept design process is subsequently described by idea generation and concept development and results in an overview of generated concepts. The three product ideas that are developed into final concepts have each another focus point; representing the differentiating product properties ‘comfort’, ‘deviation’, and ‘feasibility’. Since the design goal asks for a tent with a differentiating comfort per weight ratio, concept development has put focus on the optimization of the volume of the selected concepts for the amount of material that is used. In the end, the resulting concepts are evaluated and the best proposal for set design goal and challenge is selected. The biggest advantage of selected concept (shown below) is its relative short inflation time, and forms thereby the most feasible four person inflatable tent that is able to conquer the set design challenge. Final product To go from selected concept to the final product, a last design step is taken. The main focus during this step is the embodiment and dimensioning of the air beams and valve system. Here it is calculated that the final air beam design with a diameter of 70 mm and inflation pressure of 0,75 bar can withstand wind speeds of 18,5 m/s. Features of the final four person tent are subsequently presented, and the final design is transformed into a proposal for a whole series of inflatable lightweight tents. The created ‘Nomad Air’ tent range contains a four, three and two person model. During product evaluation, a conducted user test shows that the pitching of an inflatable tent takes substantially more time than a similar model with conventional poles. The inflatable pitching process is nevertheless perceived as acceptable, but not seen as a outstanding improvement compared to conventional pole tents. In further evaluation it appears that the proposed four person tent is expected to have a too long inflation time and will most likely not be accepted by consumers. The final tent series proposal will therefore only exist of a three and two person model and will be equipped with 65 mm air beams. These proposed tent models offers feasible, producible solutions that are believed to be able to grow into good functioning products. However, compared to existing lightweight tents, the inflatable tent series can not bring outstanding advantages. True unique selling points other than ‘inflatable’ are not present. This makes it a too weak proposal to enter and stand out in ‘specialized outdoor sport shops’. Therefore, it is concluded that the final designed inflatable tent series should not be executed by Nomad.