Camping Rear Tent, Mosquito Prevention and Sunshade, SUV Car 4x4

Flies and sun turn the tailgate into a no-go zone.

You park somewhere good, drop the tailgate, and for about twenty minutes it is the best seat in the country. Then the flies find you. By mid-afternoon you are eating with one hand and waving with the other, and eventually everyone gives up, climbs back into the vehicle and winds the windows up. Hot, cramped, and the afternoon is gone.

This is a coated ripstop canopy with mesh walls that hangs off the back of the vehicle and gives you a screened area you can actually sit in. The roof takes the sun off the tailgate. The mesh is a physical barrier between you and whatever is flying around. Two poles, twelve pegs and nine cords — there is no frame to fight with and it goes back into a bag that fits behind a seat.

Be clear about what it is: a sunshade with a bug screen, not a tent. There is no floor, the car-side edge is open onto your vehicle rather than sealed to it, and no supplier publishes a wind rating or a waterproof rating for it. It is built for still, hot, buggy afternoons — not for weather.

What It Does

• Gets smoko out of the cab: a screened area off the tailgate means you can sit, eat and work on the tray without wearing a fly veil the whole time.
• Shade where the country has none: gibber plain, salt flat, gravel pit or beach car park — the canopy makes its own shade instead of you driving another hour looking for a tree.
• A camp kitchen you can stand in: the 2 m support poles hold the open edge high enough to work under, so the stove and the table come out of the vehicle and stay out.
• Kids, dogs and an open boot: the mesh gives them a defined patch to be in while the tailgate stays up and the gear stays reachable.
• Packs down small enough to always be aboard: 2.8 kg in a 440 x 200 x 150 mm bag — it lives behind the seat rather than getting left at home to save room.

Key Features

• 210T ripstop polyester canopy: the grid weave is visible in the supplier close-up photograph, which is what stops a small nick running into a tear.
• 3.2 m x 2 m canopy panel: about 6.4 m² of cover. In every supplier photograph the long edge runs along the vehicle and the 2 m dimension projects out from it.
• High-density polyester mesh walls: the walls and the outer end are mesh, so air moves through instead of the space turning into an oven.
• SBS-branded zip: the mesh joins the canopy on a zip, and the slider in the supplier close-up carries an SBS mark.
• Two aluminium alloy poles: supplier-stated 2 m each, in push-fit sections with a moulded end cap. They carry the open edge; the vehicle carries the other one.
• Twelve hook ground pegs: counted in the supplier kit photograph. Standard skewer pegs — fine in soil, ordinary in sand and gravel.
• Nine cords in the kit: guy lines with sliding tensioners plus shorter elastic shock cords for pulling the canopy edge in against the bodywork.
• Two colourways: army green or off-white — the off-white reads as a light khaki in the supplier photographs, not a bright white.
• Carry bag included: 440 x 200 x 150 mm with a webbing handle, sized off the supplier’s own dimensioned panel.

Limits

It is not rated waterproof, and we are not going to call it that. No hydrostatic head figure in mm is published for this canopy by our supplier or by any seller of the same style we could find. A coated ripstop roof will shed a passing shower the way a tarp does, but with no rated figure behind it you should plan on it being a sunshade that copes with a bit of rain, not a wet-weather shelter.

There is no wind rating and it is not a wind structure. Two poles, guy lines and skewer pegs is a still-weather setup. If it comes up, drop it — a canopy tied to your vehicle and loaded by wind is pulling on your paintwork as well as on the pegs.

The mesh is a barrier, not a repellent, and no hole size is published. It is a fine polyester screen that physically blocks insects that are bigger than the aperture. Nobody publishes that aperture in mm, so we cannot tell you whether it stops sandflies, midges or thrips, which are far smaller than a mosquito. It does not repel anything, it does not treat anything, and nothing about it should be read as protection from any insect-borne illness.

There is no floor and it does not seal. The mesh walls hang to the ground with a skirt that lies flat; on uneven ground or spinifex tussock, things will still get under the edge. The car-side edge drapes over the raised tailgate and is pulled in with elastic cord — that is a close fit on most bodywork, not a seal.

No vehicle fitting dimensions are published. The supplier says only that it suits most SUVs and wagons, and no seller of this style publishes a tailgate height range or a body width it fits. The numbers you have are the real ones: a 3.2 m edge along the vehicle and a 2 m projection off the back, with the open edge held up by 2 m poles. Run a tape over your own vehicle against those figures before you decide.

No suction cups or roof-rail hardware are supplied. The kit is canopy, two poles, twelve pegs, nine cords and a bag. It relies on the raised tailgate, the elastic cord and the pegged guy lines.

No UPF or UV-block number is printed. It is opaque fabric and it makes real shade, which is the point of it. But no rated UPF figure is published for this canopy, so we are not putting a number on it.

It is not a sleeping tent. No floor, no sealed door and no separate bedroom. People sleep in the vehicle with the tailgate up and use this as the screened porch off the back of it.

Q & A

Will it fit my 4x4?

No supplier publishes a fitting range for this style, so measure rather than assume. What you are checking is whether your raised tailgate or hatch gives you an edge roughly 2 m wide to drape the canopy over, and whether you have about 3.2 m along the vehicle and 2 m of clear ground off the back to peg into. Wagons, dual cabs with a canopy, vans and most SUVs are the shape it is built around. A low sedan boot lid is not.

Is it actually mosquito proof?

It is a mesh screen, so it is a physical barrier and nothing more. Without a published hole size in mm we cannot tell you what it stops and what walks through it, and there is no floor, so anything crawling can come under the skirt. Realistically it is very good against flies and mosquitoes in the middle of the day and much less convincing against the small biters at dusk.

Can I leave it up overnight in rain?

We would not. There is no hydrostatic head figure published, and there is no wind rating, so an overnight change while you are asleep is exactly the situation it is worst suited to. Put it up for the afternoon and evening, and drop it before you turn in if the sky is doing anything.

Can I use it without the vehicle?

Not really. One long edge is designed to hang off the tailgate, so the vehicle is a structural part of it. There are only two poles in the kit and they hold the outer edge.

How many people fit under it?

The supplier quotes three different numbers across its own material, so we are not going to repeat any of them. The honest answer is the footprint: about 6.4 m², which in the supplier photographs is a camp table and four chairs with room to walk past.

What does delivery cost and how long does it take?

Shipping is free to Australia and New Zealand. Allow 10–14 days from the day you order, and up to 3 weeks to be safe. Regional and remote addresses take longer again.

Specs