pack cover? pack liner? neither!

"Does anyone else use this method?"

I've never used a liner or a cover, and my gear stays dry.

Food produce bags are amazingly light for small items.

–B.G.–

I've wanted to do away with a liner and/or cover for a while. Much of my gear is already in stuff sacks, and in the case of my sleeping bag, in a dry bag. So what's the hangup?

Well, smaller things like clothes, socks, packtowel, and pillow (Cocoon AirCore) work well to fill in the small gaps between my shelter, sleeping bag, food, and water bladder. If I put them in a stuff sack, it'll take up a bit more room. Now, if your packing system can easily handle this, then cool. But for me, I like filling in the gaps in my pack. Until I figure another system out, I have to suck it up and use my cover.

Edit: I suppose I could use Bob's grocery bag idea for each item, or get some sized cuben stuff sacks for each item…..

"Bob's grocery bag"

Just to be clear… the produce bags are the super-thin ones in the produce department at the grocery store. Grocery bags are the semi-thin ones when you check out.

If I need the waterproof sack to last for just a few days and nights, I take the former. If it is for a longer trip, I take the latter.

–B.G.–

To get rid of empty spaces inside the pack i use a slightly larger stuff sack than needed. That way the contents can shift conform better.

For example. Remove the poles from you tent bag. The extra room allows the tent to conform to the pack, and there us almost always a little room left inside to slide the poles into one of the corners along the backpannel.

I actually started doing this unintentionally, when I realized one day while hiking in the rain that my pack cover wouldn't fit over my pack with the tripod attached. So I hiked in the rain without a pack cover.

My pack's made of Dyneema, which is pretty well waterproof. The pack only leaks at the zips, which with the flaps over them don't get water on them from rain. My sleeping bag and extra layers were in the bottom compartment, and the only thing in the top compartment was my camera (which is pretty weather tolerant, since it has no electronics in it).

My gear stayed dry.

Rakesh,
What about your pack's seams? Could you tell if any water at all made it through? My pack is Dyneema as well, has no zips, but of course has seams.

Bread bags, as in from a loaf of bread from the supermarket. They are light and have a shape and trim down intelligently. I use one for my sleeping bag. Just be sure to get all the crumbs out.

I don't use a liner or cover, either. I used to use lightweight ponchos as a shelter, and I would use one as a pack cover. But once I switched to a tent, I never replaced it. I pack the sleeping bag in a bread bag and use knockoff ziplocks for everything else that needs to be dry. I have a Jam and it keeps most of the water out.

To be fair, though, I am almost never in sustained heavy rain.

"My gear stayed dry."

Including the tripod?

(I mean, let's get our priorities straight!)

–B.G.–

Scott:

I bet if you do a quick search, you will find hundreds of threads on this one topic. That should tell you that:

(1) multiple methods can work, and
(2) personal preference/packing style is the major determinant here.

One shower is no big deal, but three days of rain and wet brush, mud, etc, etc, makes for a sloppy mess. A good ol' trash compactor bag will do a lot for very little.

I like the Sea to Summit roll top bags to keep things organized and dry– one for clothes, another for sleeping gear. My kitchen stuff goes in a one gallon ziplock and I use one more one liter bag for my emergency essentials. My food is in a drawstring silnylon bag for bear bagging. That's it!

…

I recently purchased a variety of cuben dry bags from http://www.mountainfitter.com/Cuben-Fiber-CTF3-Rolltop-Drybags-p508.html- they had a good sale awhile back

they appear to be very robust (and quite light)

Just like you one will be used for my clothes, the other for my quilt

they do a good job of reducing volume in addition to being waterproof

smaller bits that need to be waterproof reside in ziplocks or aloksaks

Travis,
"What about your pack's seams? Could you tell if any water at all made it through?"

I think some water DID soak through the seams on the lid last year when I was out hiking for around five hours in a steady (moderate) rain.

I have not seam sealed my pack or anything like that. Since then I've been more careful about being sure to flatten out the flaps over the zippers.

"Including the tripod?"

Well, my tripod that was outside the pack DID get wet, but one advantage to professional field gear is that it doesn't mind getting a bit wet. The ball head isn't quite so egalitarian about water (even though it's a Really Right Stuff head), but it has a neoprene cover, so I wasn't particularly worried about it. :)

Yes, I've used that method exclusively for… decades now? Except for the "already in stuff sacks" part, because I get rid of the extra sacks.

Depends on the bag I bring, but these days it's usually one dry sack for clothes and bag, one for food, & one small one for my midlayer, first aid, etc. Everything else just gets shoved into the pack. It doesn't matter if the tent gets wet; if it's raining, the tent's probably already wet anyway. Your cookpot doesn't care if it gets wet, etc.

I size up the dry sacks; with them being larger, I can squeeze all the air out (leave a bit open at the top when squeezing, before rolling down) then flatten the bags out into little bricks. Cool thing about this is none of the "shoving my tshirt into a corner & it got wet" junk; it packs just as efficiently, and guarantees your stuff is dry no matter what.

Cost-wise a few dry sacks come out about the same as pack covers. Weight can be roughly the same, too… but the weight of the dry sacks is never dead weight, whereas the pack cover is a dead quarter pound in your pack most of the time. Pack materials are, of course, synthetic, and dry relatively quickly. I'm not concerned about carrying a couple extra ounces of water for an hour or two, but I don't want to carry the darn pack cover all the time.

This system also completely ditches any concern about multiple plastic bags, punctures or short life of plastic bags, etc.

In terms of the GG Uberlight cuben dry sacks, they're great, wicked light. But they do puncture pretty easily. (I made the mistake of stuffing a bag w/a hang tag attached, & the wimpy paperboard went right thru the material.) I probably won't switch all my dry sacks to this weight of cuben.

I also have a Dyneema pack (ULA Circuit). I recently bought a Z-Packs Cuben pack cover which works great. Between the 2 nothing I have has gotten wet so far. I'm a hammocker so since my quilt and UQ are at the bottom, I don't worry about them getting wet with the cover on. It is also very nice since it has a lock that goes through the shoulder straps or load lifter straps to keep it from popping off. Mine was a Sz. Medium for $45 and weighs less than an ounce.

I use dry bags also. One for my sleeping bag and another for my extra clothing. A third is for my essentials/first aid/PLB. I used to use a trash compactor bag as a pack liner but got sick and tired of pushing small items down into the pack only to have them pop right back up at me thanks to the slick plastic.

Pack covers and stuff sacks, by the way, are not the answer for keeping your critical insulating gear dry. Stuff sacks do not have a watertight closure, so water will get into the opening. Pack covers keep the front and top of your pack dry but don't keep heavy rain from running down your back and soaking into the pack there. Neither will keep out water if you slip and fall during a nasty stream ford. That happened to me two years ago (the first year I used the dry bags) and I was thankful that not a drop got to my sleeping bag, even though there was a good 2 inches of water in the bottom of my pack. The weather was cold and wet and I was 2 days from the trailhead–if my insulation had gotten wet, I'd have been in big trouble.

That being said, I do use a pack cover (Z Packs cuben, 1 oz.) to keep rain off the outside of my pack, because I use the pack for a pillow. The pack cover lets me bring the pack into my tent without getting everything soggy.

Any of the rest of my gear that could be harmed when wet is either in plastic bags (food, camera) or inside my cooking pot.

"Neither will keep out water if you slip and fall during a nasty stream ford."

That's an excellent point, which is why a light drypack is on my shopping list for my quilt.

I use Sea to Summit roll top bags for my quilt and cloths. They also fill in as my pillow.