Registered: 10/31/08
Posts: 43
Loc: Bloomington, IN, USA
I have a Steripen Classic. For it I have a 1 quart (946 mL) Powerade bottle, but I'm considering getting a Nalgene bottle which is advertized as 1 quart, but shows measurements up to 1 liter. Which of these would be best? Part of my reason for asking is the size of the mouth of the bottle (avoiding touching the side of the mouth with an untreated water container), but I realize that there may be other things to consider, such as the measurements on the side of the Nalgene.
I took a 2 liter pop bottle, marked 1/2 and 1 liter on the outside and cut the top off about an inch above the 1 liter mark. It weighs about 0.7 oz and is easy to stow. The wide open top makes for easy and complete stirring and virtually no uncontaminated water clings to this kind of plastic. It is also easy to pinch up a pouring spout so you can pour the treated water into your water bottle. The container also provides a bit more storage for camp water if you feel the need. The wide mouth Nalgene bottles I have seen are pretty heavy.
Registered: 12/31/07
Posts: 245
Loc: St. Louis, Missouri
I use a 1-quart size Twist n Loc container. It's a bit less than one liter but I carry it anyway as part of my cook set so I use it and tell the steripen it's 1 liter of water.
Probably the biggest thing to consider is weight. The wide mouth nalgenes are MUCH heavier than pop bottles. As mentioned you can put measurements on the bottle yourself.
Registered: 10/31/08
Posts: 43
Loc: Bloomington, IN, USA
Do you mean that you treat and keep the water in the soda pop bottle? What kind of pop bottle is it? The pop bottles I've seen have too small of a mouth opening to put the Steripen in it.
Do you mean that you treat and keep the water in the soda pop bottle? What kind of pop bottle is it? The pop bottles I've seen have too small of a mouth opening to put the Steripen in it.
If you will re-read my post you will note that I mentioned cutting the top of the 2-liter pop bottle off about an inch above the 1 liter mark. This creates a very wide mouthed container for stirring. You'll also note that I mentioned pinching the rim into a pouring spout to transfer the treated water to another container.
Food, Mostly I use a Thermarest Prolite 3, Short, sleeping pad rolled without folding lengthwise protected by a silnylon stow sack. It makes a cylinder about 24" long and I put it under the compression straps of my pack. The cut off pop bottle fits neatly and snugly over the top of the pad. Handy for a quick water stop and it also armor plates the top 7" of the pad.
For those trips when I don't use the Prolite, I just put my cook pot and its contents inside the "bucket" and stow the thing inside my pack. I just got a Six Moons Starlite that uses my sleeping pad as part of the pack. I'll be carrying the little pop bottle bucket inside from now on I guess.
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