Introducing Basin and Range: Live in the Basins, Retreat to the Ranges, Clothing for Both.

I’m very thankful to Sawyer Products for coming out with this water filter, or any of their filters to be honest.  I have three Sawyer filters altogether and they are all outstanding.   Their simplicity and size is the attraction for me and I’m sure it’s the same for most others who use them.  Just don’t let it freeze and don’t filter glacial melt water!  I’ve heard that if it freezes internally it may or may not be visible on the outside without taking it apart.

When I’m hiking with mine in the winter I will take precautions to make sure it doesn’t freeze.  First off, anytime I use it in the winter I will blow it out to try and get the residual water out of it.  I figure by getting rid of the residual water in it will lessen the chance that it will freeze and just in case it does freeze it has as little water as possible in it to keep it from actually bursting internally.  Then I bring it inside the tent with me where the air temperature usually warms up with my body heat to a decent temperature.  Now, if it gets extremely cold I will put it in a Ziploc bag (to keep any residual water that is still left inside from leaking out on me) and put it in the bottom of my quilt or sleeping bag.  So far, this has worked well for me.

 

The Sawyer Mini Filter is my favorite of all the Sawyer filters at this point because of its’ miniscule 2 ounce weight.  I’ve yet to have an issue with the filter clogging or the flow rate seriously decreasing but I tried back-flushing mine after each camping trip.  I will say that I used mine for nine days straight while hiking the Wonderland Trail without having to back-flush it once.  It worked like a charm.  I will mention that I’ve seen some breakage of the plastic hinge that attaches the cap to the mini, although it hasn’t happened to me yet.

The Sawyer Squeeze Pouches work pretty well as long as you don’t try to wring them out like a dish-rag or stand on them to increase their flow rate, even though sometimes you just want it to hurry up and get done.  The weak spot from what I’ve seen seems to be where the plastic bag attaches to the lower portion of the plastic mouthpiece.  From my experience, this is the most critical part of the bag and the only place where I’ve seen them fail.  I really wish Sawyer would strengthen the bonding at that point because it is a bummer when these fail in the field.  It has forced me to carry at least two squeeze bags of some type with me at all times when hiking.

As of late I have begun using Platypus 1L SoftBottles and 1L PlatyBottles and I’m quite happy with their performance.  They seem to be a little tougher and more durable than the Sawyer factory bags so I’ll stick with them until something better comes along.

 

 

I have experimented and attached some reflective hang cord at the very bottom – using a leather punch to add holes for hang cords.  I find this gives me the ability to hang the bag from a branch or carabiner when I’m in camp – possibly utilizing a little gravity assistance for filtering water.  Just my take.  I’ve also added cord to the filter which serves to help either lash it to a biner or the bag or just plain find them in the dark.

One way this cordage addition has served me well on more than one occasion is when I need to fill up the squeeze pouches along the way and take them with me for whatever reason.  I can quickly lash that cord loop over a carabiner hanging on the outside of my pack and go.  This works for very well for me but it may not be for everyone.

One of the best reasons for adding cordage to your squeeze bags is because that it gives you something to hold on to when you’re filling it up in a swift moving stream.  It’s easy to lose a grip on it and watch it sail away but with a piece of cordage attached it gives you something easy to latch on to quickly.

 

 

 

 

Improvements:  I’d really like to see Sawyer add eyelets to the bags or an eyelet to the filter for lashing/attaching because I really think it would make a great product even better.  The bags are easy enough to add cordage too though so no big deal there but I’d like to see an eyelet added to the filters which would allow you to use cordage with it or attach a small carabiner to it.

No matter what when you’re using this system it’s always a good idea to have either a scoop cup or scoop pouch to assist in filling the bags in low-flowing streams, ponds or extremely fast flowing streams.  Anytime one of my squeeze bags break I cut them down into scoop pouches.