My Three Season Gear List – Round 2

Considering the items you already mentioned will eventually be replaced, your list looks pretty good.

Have you considered selling your current tent and footprint? It looks like that model sells for about $400 (with footprint) so you could probably get something like $250 for it if it's in good condition. Same deal with your pack, it's an expensive pack new so maybe you could fetch $125 to $150…?

With $400, you would have many excellent UL and SUL options for shelter and pack.

For example:

* Gatewood Cape, $135 (new – often can find used for $90)
* Zpack Blast 26 with customized options, ~ $150 depending on options
* polycryo groundsheet, ~$5
* Ptarmigan bivy tricked out ~ $145

Combined weight of these four pieces is about 27 ounces vs your current weight of 158 ounces.

BOOM! 8 pounds right there with minimal to no out-of-pocket expense…

Your sleeping bag isn't too bad for now, you can stick with that until you can afford to upgrade, and still reach a 10 pound base weight.

Lot's of people have a hard time giving up the filter. Bring some Aquamira tablets on your next trip and bring the filter "just-in-case." Make a little prefilter with wire screen or a modified Coughlin fuel funnel, and a "water scoop" by cutting the top off a 1 liter platy. These two pieces will allow you to get at shallow water sources, and also to filter debris from the water. After one or two trips, you will leave the filter at home.

Actually I dont think your list looks that bad to me.

I would hit the heaviest items first.
The pack has to go. Buy a GG mariposa plus and save over 5#. Just that gets you to 13 and change which is not bad.

Beyond that…
Go to GG poles, -13oz

Although 3# is not bad for a nice tent..you could
go to a lighter tent or tarp later on. 8×10 plain sil tarp, gatewood cape etc. and a bug tent or build a bivy out of tyvek for cheap. Also tarptent moment, contrail, the one etc.

The MB #2 UL is a really nice bag and not that heavy.
I would keep it. If you want a quilt add it later.

You could shave a little here and there throughout the rest of your gearlist, but those are the large items I saw.

You've got a Montbell Handyscoop trowel listed under tools, and an MSR Packtrowel listed under Miscellaneous.

Many of us on this site are on tight budgets. Even so, there are many opportunities to lighten up cheaply on the Gear Swap forum. The deals are out there for you.

I know you aren't concerned about your worn weight at the moment, but the boots are way too heavy. You won't need them anymore with your new lower base weight. I've bought 3 pairs of used trail running shoes recently—cheap. Two were Montbell pairs for $40 and $30 shipped, both in brand new condition, and they fit great. I also got a new Inov-8 pair for half price. Then I got a pair of used REI returns for $3.50 at their semi-annual garage sale.

Packs—I've bought used GoLite Ion, Jam and Gust packs and a Gosammer Gear G5 at really reasonable prices off the Gear Swap. Of course, I still want to try pack offerings from ULA (Ohm), MLD (Prophet) and Z-packs, but higher priority is to get out to use what I've already got.

Watch closely and you'll find an affordable deal for yourself.

Hi Henry –

Actually I only have one trowel. The MSR is a PocketTowel – Towel haha.

I actually purchased a new pack last night – Gregory Z55. It would work very nicely as a transition pack for me. Plus, it cut my pack's weight in half (almost).

I will upload the new list to reflect the pack change.

I know everyone is really into trail runners. I just can't bring myself to give up the boots. I appreciate the the added ankle support on level ground, lord knows how it saves me in the backcountry. I'm not saying I wont make the switch sometime, but I'm at least going to wear out the boots first.

Thanks for the feedback everyone. Keep it coming!

I'm with John on this. You can sell some of your gear and buy lighter stuff without spending extra money. You should be able to buy a TarpTent Moment (28oz) with the money you get from selling that Copper Spur (48oz). If you have a bit of extra cash from this, you can sell the Z55 (58oz) and buy a cuben pack (4oz). All told, you could be ahead 74oz or over 4.5 lbs!

You also might be able to get enough money for your Montbell bag (31oz) to buy a Golite Ultra 20 (19oz) which would save another 12oz and put you into UL territory.

Random Thoughts:
1) Ditch the sleeping bag liner. Just wash your bag when it gets dirty like you do anything else. (-4.4oz)

2) You're cramming your 25F Montbell down bag into a 5L compression dry sack? Ouch! I hope you aren't cranking it down further. Take it easy on that down. I would use an 8-10L dry sack and not compress it much further. I've got an 8L dry sack from MEC that weighs 1.3oz for my Ultra 20 quilt.

3) 55 squares of Charmin? You're actually counting out the number of squares? Charmin is heavy. Get some single ply TP (my prefence) or go without like a lot of crazy SUL dudes do :)

4) Nice job with the travel sized toothpaste but squeeze half of out it out so it weighs about 0.5oz. You can squeeze it into a larger tube of toothpaste and then refill the travel sized one back to half full after each trip by squeezing paste back into it from a larger one. (-0.5oz)

5)Flint/Sparkers are cool, but they are also awfully heavy so I no longer carry one. MiniBics are under 0.5oz versus 2.2oz for this. Carry an extra MiniBic and a couple waterproof matches instead of the Flint (-1.5oz).

6) Flashlight and headlamp? I'd use the Tactikka for everything (-1oz). Better yet, get something lighter like a Zipka or E-Lite and save another 2-3oz.

7) You could probably go with a lighter knife instead of your 2.4oz clunker. A SwissArmy knife has a knife, sissors etc for 1oz. I personally like a bigger blade so I carry a Buck Hartsook UL Knife which weighs 1oz including the case. (-1.5oz)

8) 11oz filter? Seriously, just go to AquaTabs.com and be done with it. These tabs are 1.2g (0.08oz) for 10 L worth. You'll be set for the weekend with 0.2oz worth. The taste is hardly distinguishable and the ease of use is awesome. You'll laugh when you think back to the days of using a filter. (-10.8oz)

9) Now that you are using AquaTabs, why not replace that bladder (5.7oz) with a second 2 liter platybottle (1.2oz), thus saving 4.5oz.

10) With a lower powered headlamp, you won't need 3 extra AAA batteries (-1.25oz)

11) Your pack cover weighs 5oz. You could buy an entire waterproof cuben pack (ie. Zpacks Blast) for less than this. Grab a cuben pack and you can leave this at home.

Total weight savings suggested: 107.4oz or 6.7 lbs. New baseweight: 8.3 lbs

"Lot's of people have a hard time giving up the filter. Bring some Aquamira tablets on your next trip and bring the filter "just-in-case." Make a little prefilter with wire screen or a modified Coughlin fuel funnel, and a "water scoop" by cutting the top off a 1 liter platy. These two pieces will allow you to get at shallow water sources, and also to filter debris from the water. After one or two trips, you will leave the filter at home."

If you're worried about particles from sketchy water, fill up one of your water bottles and then put a bandana or clothing item over the mouth of the other bottle as a crude filter and then pour the water in. To fill both bottles, use your cup or pot to pour the water in.

" I still want to try pack offerings from ULA (Ohm), MLD (Prophet) and Z-packs, but higher priority is to get out to use what I've already got."

Better yet, sell this stuff while it still has value. I agree it's good to use up stuff before replacing it, but selling the item to someone else who will use it is just as environmentally friendly and it enables you to transistion your kit much quicker. Since most UL gear is cheaper than traditional gear, you can move to UL very quickly without spending much cash and your old gear will still get used up by someone.

I played with these items, and saved you 8.7 pounds!

The items I suggest replacing are standard lightweight fare, and not too expensive.If you are going to attempt to go light weight, these "traditional" items are inappropriate anyway.

(NIX meas you just leave 'em behind)

– – – – – GEAR THAT IS EASILY NIXED – – – – –

NIX Foot print – 4.5

NIX Sleeping bag liner – 4.4

NIX second pair of undies – 3

NIX toilet paper – .64 oz

NIX the camp towel – .52 oz

NIX the camp trowel – 1.6 oz

– – – – – GEAR THAT IS EASILY REPLACED – – – – –

2.18 fire starter kit? Figure a way to lighten it to 1 oz
saving 1.18 oz

48 ounce tent?
Replace with a 10 oz tent and a 1 oz bug head-net saving 37 oz

53 oz backpack?
Replace with a 26 oz GoLite JAM2 – save 27 oz

53 oz sleeping bag?
Replace with a 19 oz GoLite Ultra20 – save 34 oz

5 oz backpack cover?
Replace with a 2.2 oz HEFTY compactor bag – save 2.8 oz

2.4 oz knife?
Replace with a 0.1 single edge razor – save 2.3 oz

11 oz water filter?
Replace with a 1 oz set of repackaged aqua-mira bottles – save 10 oz

5.7 oz hydration system?
Replace with a 1 oz soda bottle – save 6.7 oz

3.96 oz head-lamp?
Replace with a .9 oz petzl E+lite – save 3 oz
____________________________________________

total weight savings = 139.26 ounces (or 8.7 pounds) ! ! !

You have a lot of good advice so I will only suggest one thing that I didn't see anyone else mention.

You can probably trim your pad down to torso length and save some ounces.

-Sid

Sid –

I have been considering this. For those that do it, how do you keep your legs off the floor of the tent? That wouldn't be too fun in the chilly nights of the fall.

Your pack can be used to keep your legs off the floor. However, you may need a full length pad if you are expecting very low temperatures.

Another option is to get a torso length pad (Ex: Gossamer Gear NightLight) and combine it with a 1/8" insulating pad (Ex: Gossamer Gear ThinLight). This combination would still be lighter than your full length Z-Lite.

-Sid

Here are my suggestions:

First off let me say that I was always a big fan of one piece leather boots (although I never liked GT boots), but finally tried trail runners about two years ago and haven’t worn my boots since. I also tore three ligaments in my ankle(not backpacking) about 3 years ago, and haven’t noticed a lack of support from trail runners.

Secondly, your tent; Selling your tent and buying a tarp or other lighter shelter is an option as mentioned by a previous poster, but for a double wall tent, that is pretty light, so you might want to keep it. I would ditch the footprint though and save your self 4.5oz. I used a Big Agnes Seedhouse SL1 for well over 100 nights with no footprint and never had a problem with the floor. I since have gone to a Gossamer Gear SpinnShelter and Alpinte Bug Tent.

Personally, I think your sleeping bag and pad are fine. I am not saying that there are not lighter alternatives, but those are both pretty light options.

I would ditch the bag liner and save 4.4oz. I always carry clean clothes to sleep in (Capaline 1 top and bottoms, socks) so that keeps my bag from getting dirty, and I don’t get tangled in a bag liner either. I also wear the clothes once I get to camp but before I go to sleep so they are sort of duel use (camp and sleep).

You might consider selling your pack and getting a Gossamer Gear Mariposa Plus, ULA Ohm, or similar. You could probably sell your current pack for what you could pick up a lightly used UL pack for.

I agree with the above poster about that stuff sack seeming too small. I prefer oversized stuff sacks for sleeping bags allowing them to take up more space in my pack as food space is decreased.

I would (when money allows) sell the mug and the .9L pot and get a smaller pot/mug combo (assuming this is for solo use, and mainly boiling water) like the BPL Firelite 550.

Although you won’t save much if any weight on longer trips, on short trips an alcohol stove might be something to think about. The problem with a canister stove even the smallest canister weighs 7.3 ounces with fuel.

I may get flamed for this, but I would drop the firestarting kit. I might add another bic or book of paper matches as a back up to your current bic.

Why don’t you drop one of the two lights? That is total overkill.

2.4oz for a knife is overkill. I have a nice Spyderco Ladybug that is more knife than I will ever need at 0.6oz.

You might try using a trekking pole or shoe heel to dig a hole next time, I have found that I don’t need a trowel.

I would replace that heavy Big Zip platy with a Gatorade bottle or Platty bottle. That is way too heavy for what it is. Personally, I like hard sided Gatorade bottles myself.

I carried the Pur Hiker filter for years, but went to Aquamira drops years ago and haven’t looked back. There have only been a few water sources that I have been too where I wished I had something more. I found the drops to have less taste than the tablets and they are cheaper, but the tablets are lighter and easier than my 1oz repackaged Aquamira drops.

Why are you carrying extra batteries? Change batteries before you leave on a trip so you don’t have to carry spares. You should also be able to find AAA’s at most resupply points for longer trips.