Snow melting techniques

[James White]

I meant that the plumbing is mostly exposed. Temporary coldness, much less than getting out of your shelter, and it requires no gear.

[Bob Gross]

If you have a lake or stream that is mostly frozen and you need to get water, a good way is to use your trekking pole, ski pole, or tree limb. You don't want to get too close to the ice, because if you fall in it can be life-threatening. Instead, use your pole with some strong wire tied at the pointy end, and tie that to your water bottle at the neck. Tie it securely, because if it drops off, you are in worse trouble. Anyway, you can lower the water bottle into the water and retrieve it until your entire reservoir is full. That uses much less energy than trying to melt snow.

–B.G.–

[David Thomas]

Chad: After trying to get through lake ice with a full-sized axe (part of the USFS shelter equipment), I brought in the drill and siphon tube with check valve on the next trip.

It worked well and quickly. It wasn't UL to speak of but it gave us as much liquid water as we wanted. So clean pots or a hair wash wasn't a big deal. Also, we get a lot of wind-blown volcanic ash up here (not so often from new eruptions, but from it being continually redeposited on to the snow). So the snowpack is usually interbedded with gritty ash layers. The lake water has no turbidity, having been clarifying, under the ice, for the last 5 months.

Family trip, on skiis with sled, 3.5 miles in, 3 days with grade schoolers. If doing it to save fuel weight, it would have to be more people or more nights. Or a lighter drill. I like the ice screw idea a lot.

[Jim Colten]

David,

I'm guessing auger but … what type of 1" bit do you use?

Also, what sort of a setup for lifting the water from lake to bottle?

[Nick Gatel]

I hate cold. But for some reason each winter I subject myself to BPing the snow. Maybe I need to see a shrink.

Now I own and know what snowshoes, crampons, and ice axes are. However, a lot of the conversation has me confused as to what you folks are doing out there to obtain water.

But correct me if I am wrong. You are saying I can screw for water in isolated cold areas?

Where do I sign up, and is it legal?

[David Thomas]

Jim:

Yep, an auger bit is heavier but clears chips really quick.

For compactness, I'd imagine this would be best:

it has a check valve at the bottom and you jerk it back and forth to pump.

For surface water sampling, I've used something like this:

which would have a higher throughput and would work down an ice-screw0sized hole.

[David Olsen]

One of the water filters that uses a pump and hose should work.

[David Adair]

I been thinking about buying a Nils 4" ice auger. I don't catch any big fish anyway. The web site says 3 lbs which doesn't seem too bad.

http://www.fishusa.com/Nils-USA-Hand-Augers_p.html

[Alpo Kuusisto]

quoting myself:

Now as the lakes are getting thicker ice cover, reaching the water gets ever more challenging. There's no need to carry an auger. Small axe is sufficient, if you carry a suitable length of a threaded steel bar.
First chop a small bowl on the ice, then use the axe to drive the bar through the bottom of the bowl. Soon you'll have a spring filling the bowl.
…
– 8mm diameter bar is working

Wow. In just five lines, I was able to create six points of confusion, quoted and answered below. Maybe I can blame the cultural differences. Lines were anyway a direct translation of a text written by another person for different audience.

extra limitations on the route … Pounding a hole/bowl through the ice is a great solution if you plan your route to include these (lakes).
http://tinyurl.com/the-trouble-of-finding-lakes

Not sure if the thickness of the ice would be a factor in the threaded rod idea.
http://tinyurl.com/the-ice-thickess-is-a-factor

You will still need a method of disinfection or to boil the water.
I didn't remember water needs to be disinfected in your part of the world :)

Of course, it is all what you are use to, where I hike – we don't know what an ice axe looks like – now a hatchet – yes.
Me too! I didn't remember there's a thing called ice axe so I used a very generic term 'axe' when I should have written 'hatchet'.

I'd rather carry the extra 5-6 oz. of fuel a day to melt water rather than 8-12 pounds of ax and prybar to hack through the ice. ;)
Oh yeah, in some places you carry fuel instead of collecting it. Here hatchet is supposed to be carried anyway, for making a campfire.
+ I think metric and it's obvious to me 8mm rod is not that heavy stuff. Suitable length ~two feet~ of it weighs 6 oz. (Needed a calculator, just haven't learned to think in imperial/US units)

energy needed for another camp chore. (making hole in the ice)
Well, I think melting snow is a time taxing chore, even if fuel is abundant.

Two more, not directly related to responses to my post:

If you have a lake or stream that is mostly frozen and you need to get water, a good way is to use your trekking pole, ski pole, or tree limb…
Excellent piece of advice, but when you wrote "mostly frozen" I thought mostly frozen in vertical direction, and then, what on earth is he going to do with a ski pole or tree limb? Yeah, I got it one line later.

Finally: how about taste?
Don't you think stream water tastes better than snow melted in a pot? Is it different in US? Or should we wash our pots more often in Finland?

[Jerry Adams]

"Don't you think stream water tastes better than snow melted in a pot?"

I wonder why that is?

Melted snow water has an odd taste. Stream water is much better.

[stephen jennings]

If I am spending the night I will have a snow shovel. I just remove the handle and place the stove on it.

[Joseph Reeves]

As most of these responses deal with getting water rather than melting it, I will add this image from a few years ago. We would much rather find moving water than use snow

We just finished another two night stay at a local cabin and found water down a 5 foot snow bank among the hemlocks and spruce. No image from that but this is the country

[Travis Leanna]

Here's the scenario: Lakes and streams are frozen and there is little to no snow to melt. What to do?

So, is there any consensus or opinions on whether or not it'd be better to use a hatchet to chip and melt ice chunks from a frozen lake, or drill for liquid water with a brace and auger bit?

[Roger Caffin]

Odd situation, but … how about a large rock from a good height?

Cheers

[Jeremy G]

I can't remember a time where I haven't been able to find an open spot (or at least thin ice) in a stream to get water. Even a lot of the lakes have open water and/or thin ice near an inlet or outlet. And without snow, they are even easier to find. The currents always seem to erode away at the ice to keep the water accessible. I remember the days of snowmobiling or even cross country skiing in -20F weather and still needing to avoid certain areas of lakes and rivers due to open water or thin ice.

[David Thomas]

My experience is that except for really thin ice, a drill is MUCH faster through ice than an axe. And for really thin ice, or really, any setting, if you can find a rock, you can make ice chips.

[Bob Gross]

Glacier ice tends to be rather hard and almost impossible to chop up without a serious tool.

–B.G.–

[Rakesh Malik]

"I wonder why that is?

Melted snow water has an odd taste. Stream water is much better."

One factor is air. Melted snow water isn't aerated, but stream water is. Craig Connally recommends shaking air into melted or boiled water to get rid of the flat taste of non-aerated water for that very reason.

Another factor is that most streambeds have minerals that leach into the water, which are usually things like calcium, that add a pleasing flavor to the water. Snow doesn't have any of that in it.

Edit: fixed typo

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