High Sierra Topix

Katadyn Hiker water filter (a replacement for the next sentence). A friend stepped on my hiker pro last year and broke it. Trusted them for years. That one was 10 years old. I think my first pump was a "first need".. that was a long, long time ago.

It takes me 30 seconds to fill a quart with a Hiker. No electronics. No waiting for gravity to work, esp if you have nothing to hang it on. When i go in a group, we actually carry two pumps. Above 11k in the sierra, you might not need it and we did without except in the stock sections of the trails.

YMMV.

I have used it through out the sierras including lakes above 11k. I have to believe they are talking about much higher elevation as I haven't noticed a difference up to 11k. Don't get me wrong, it's slow and steady at about 5 liters in 10 minutes. I usually hang it up on a tree or on a rock out crop and do a few things while it filters. If you don't want to wait around for 5 to 10 minutes, a pump would definitely be better. If you get a squeeze or g filter, make sure you put the filter in a baggy and then in your sleeping bag at night since it isn't effective if it freezes. The tubules expand from the freezing water, and they become to large to filter out giardiasis. Since I had trouble with the steri pen, I started bringing the g filter as a back up. Because I could get to camp or take a break and just hang it and have 8 liters while I set up the tent or got my snacks out, it soon became my main filter. When the steri pen broke again, I just got my money back. Each has its strong points and weaknesses I prefer the lighter weight and ease of the g filter, but I think the difference in the 3 is very minimal

overheadx2 wrote:I have used it through out the sierras including lakes above 11k. I have to believe they are talking about much higher elevation as I haven't noticed a difference up to 11k. Don't get me wrong, it's slow and steady at about 5 liters in 10 minutes. I usually hang it up on a tree or on a rock out crop and do a few things while it filters.

They only show the effect up to 7000 feet at which point the flow rate has dropped by about 30% compared to sea level.

How high above the filter do you hang it, about 3 feet? Extrapolating to 11,000 feet that would correspond to something roughly in the neighborhood of 0.5 liters/min. Try it at sea level with the bag hung the same height above the filter. You will get between 2 and 3 times the flow rate.

It doesn't sound like it matters to you though. Two minutes per liter isn't bad. And to speed it up you could always take a longer hose and hang it higher, assuming there's a place to hang it.

It almost makes me want to go back to carrying a filter.



Not really, though.

I'm not the engineer type and only care that it works. I generally use about 2 to 3 feet of tubing, but dont notice much of a difference. It's nice to fill up the bag with 8 liters on the PM and reattach the filter in the AM and filter hiking and breakfast water while breaking camp and not putting your hands in cold water at 6 AM. While taking breaks, we simply hang it from a tree or rock , get enough to quench our thirst and then fill bladders while we snack, relax or take pics for a few minutes. I'm never in a big enough hurry that I count minutes.

I've just been squeezing the "dirty bag" through the Sawyer filter. It's as fast or faster than my old First Need pump and my Katadyn Hiker Pro and the rig weighs less.

I have read reviews on the Steripen having issues with batteries as well as suddenly not working. Has anyone here had those issues? I am thinking about taking back my current filter (as it hasn't worked right since i bought it) and picking up a steripen.

The only time I've had problems with batteries is when they are too cold. A few minutes in my pocket and they are good to go. I have to add that I ALWAYS carry a spare set but have never needed them except as expected from normal usage.

gary c. wrote:The only time I've had problems with batteries is when they are too cold. A few minutes in my pocket and they are good to go. I have to add that I ALWAYS carry a spare set but have never needed them except as expected from normal usage.

That is what I read. It cracked me up because the in the review the person says that they had to take the batteries out and warm them up a minute before it would work, but then they say they took the steripen back because they didn't want a purifier that required so much work!!!

Like I posted earlier, tried 2 and one went through batteries in a day causing me to run out of batteries in several days (second set of batteries were only in the pen when in use, so that they couldnt be used up so they lasted longer) and the other one just stopped working in the middle of a trip. I had difficulty giving up on the pen since they Are light and easy. I just figured why get another steri pen if I would have to bring a back up every time any way. Gravity filters arent as easy or as light as a pen, but they are idiot proof, light and don't need batteries.

"idiot-proof" is an important criteria for my gear, ha ha!