Rightline Gear Universal-Fit SUV Tailgate Portable Canopy Tent, 8 by 6 by 8.5 Feet

Pros: The nice sculptured shape of this canopy is very well-tailored, with a good arching canopy, and a rear contoured portion that tilts downward almost like a short, rigid flap that adds shading, can shed water, and probably will slightly minimize wind uplift if it channels wind over the ‘turtle-shell’ shape aerodynamically. The sides also have a nice but smaller turned edge to them.—I like that the canopy at the car end is slightly narrower than the far end; it’s about 54” wide whereas the far end width by the poles is about 6 feet wide. (72”). This makes sense, as most autos/SUV’s hatches are not 6 feet wide, so this lessens the need to corral surplus fabric at the car end.—I am using this for a roof top tent. It can attach to the side of such an elevated tent to make a sheltered area if you’re clever with carabiners. I can also attach it to one of the tent bows at the narrow end; being tucked under the rainfly of the roof top tent, it will make a nice long overhead shelter where one enters/exits the tent, warding off sun or rain.—Another Pro: they provide two nice black sandbags for weighting the ends of the vertical support poles.Now, some Cons: The fiberglas sectional poles that shape the awning (3 different poles) are difficult to insert into the sewn pole sleeves underneath the shelter. Each segment has the typical fiberglas-pole zinc joining sleeve. These ~3” metal tubes are thicker than the fiberglas pole portions, so they catch on the openings of the fabric sleeve sections. Every single metal segment seems to hang up, as you try to slide the assembled poles into the sleeve openings. And, the sleeves are sewn very narrow, not much wider than the pole itself. (One of the sleeves near the car-end on mine tapered to only about the diameter of a pencil, like it has a sewing error; was hard to even begin inserting the pole there—but, I fed pole from the outer end instead and got it to emerge.) There are multiple sleeve sections, and multiple pole sleeves, so, multiple snag events. All this makes it pretty darn slow to get the poles into place. Also, the poles are arguably on the long side, in my opinion. (I’ve assembled many different tents with various pole configurations over some 47 years.) It takes enormous strength to get the end of the pole into the end-pockets that trap the poles into place. (And I have strong hands.) You’ll want to be sure to insert the long poles into the pole end-pockets at the area by the car hatch; because that is a much longer nylon pocket at that location. The pole-pocket at the outer edge is a shorter sewn ‘trap,’ with an angled hem, to (ostensibly) help ease the pole end into place. (You’d never get enough ‘bow’ to back the pole up enough to insert it into the longer car-end ‘trap,’ so definitely don’t do the final pole tensioning/inserting at that end.) Meanwhile, I still had to make a custom bent hook in order to grip the opening of the pole pocket so that I could strain to insert the pole into place. You can’t have your fingers in the way, but you’ll need to hold open the mouth of the ‘trap,’ and the super-tight poles call for crazy grip strength if you try to just grab the hem. This doesn’t auger well for the future durability of either the stitching, nor the poles. (Fiberglas poles stressed over-much are known to snap.). So, I will be cutting about 1/2” off of at least the two long poles, which I believe will still result in a rigid canopy, and will lessen the herculean tugging required now to insert the poles. (I don’t believe the tent fabric is the kind to stretch much over its life.). Final Solution? I will soon be substituting better aluminum segmented tent poles, the kind that has internal sleeves, and so will provide smooth insertability into the sleeves. I will set their length to achieve good tension but not require crazy tugging/stressing.-Another Con is the design of the vertical support poles. These are pretty thin steel tubes, with simple crimped ends to make them insertable into each section. There’s a wire ‘bobby pin’ type of sprung loop to give each section some ‘grab’ where it slides into its neighbor. This is not the more typical robust ‘bullet’ catch that pops out into a side hole in the tubing as you might see elsewhere. Actually, it’s kind of clever; but in use, these pole sections don’t feel as robust as do some thicker aluminum telescoping poles with better design… If vertical lift is applied, the pole segments can slide apart a little and reveal separation gaps. Now, at least they do provide top and bottom hooks to restrain the poles between the canopy and the bottom sandbag. So their system does work after a fashion.—Because I enjoy making improvements, I will be using two aluminum telescoping poles that I already own, instead of the provided poles. These twist to release, and slide infinitely to length you desire, making height adjustments a breeze.

Works great

Really liked the quality of the product, and the setup was fairly easy. Take down was even easier. On the downside, I found the canopy frustrating to use at a baseball game tailgate. Every time the wind would blow even the smallest bit, the canopy would begin to fall over and I would need to reset the harness that connects to the car and reset the poles. Ended up taking it down after about 20 minutes.

Works nice if you park in the right space and there is no crosswinds. Even with sand in the bags, the poles want to go down.

I wish it had sides for rain but otherwise live it

Rightline had responded to a question about mounting on a wrangler saying they were gonna upload directions for roll bar mounting. They never did, and when I asked they said there were none.I bought with the idea that they were gonna have these.

This is a good concept, though I would like to see it a bit heavier, material wise. It can easily be moved, even with the sand bags in a light wind. I put rocks in the bags to act as cement pillars instead.

Instructions not clear. Sleeves for poles too small for poles to fit thru. Had to make adjustments on the fly for it to work. Concept better than execution