Roll-Up Soft Bottle + Steripen recommendations

Andrew… there are other 20oz bottles that the Steripen will fit into (barely)… I find them in the unrefrigerated soft drink section at the grocery store… one of the brands is called something like Vitamin Water, or something like that. I've used these on backpacks before. Also, the squareish Odwalla small bottles will work and they look to be HDPE material.

Billy

Andrew:
http://www.amazon.com/s/?ie=UTF8&keywords=zero+vitamin+water&tag=mh0b-20&index=aps&hvadid=3482718543&ref=pd_sl_4fmgjla1gt_e

Zero Vitamin Water… 20oz bottles… Steripen Adventurer fits…

Billy

http://www.ultrunr.com/giardia.html

The Rockwell article

Buck Nelson goes into that ad nauseum, very interesting, you got to look at all those threads of which I gave one

My take-away was that you can't make any definitive conclusions. Some people do get sick and they test positive for Giardia. Some people are more sensitive. Some people have no symptoms. Some people cure themselves. Some people are carriers. Most water sources are okay. If you drink untreated water enough times you will eventually likely get unpleasently sick.

Either Steripen or Sawyer Mini are so light weight and easy to use, it makes sense to use them.

Thanks Billy, I'll check those out…

Ben: " One set of CR123 batteries will last about two months."

Billy Ray: "That is WAY different than my experience. One set of CR123s last for an 8 or 9 day backpack for me… treating 4 or 5 liters of water each day."

Thanks for pointing that out, Billy Ray! I will need to clarify. As mentioned, I used my Steripen when traveling — not hiking. So, besides water, there's also plenty of juices, tea, coffee, soda, beer, wine, and myriad of other liquids. I treat about 1 or at most 2 liters per day when traveling — and not necessarily every day, even. A few of my el cheapo hotels provide free bottled water or an in-room kettle for boiling water. Both save on batteries. But I do use my Steripen most days than not.

Either way, one set of CR123 will be more than plenty for OP's 4-5-day backpacking trips.

And yes, I buy my batteries on the internet too — which is why even on a 2-month trip, bringing four of them is no big deal at all — both in terms of space and weight. That's why for me — I think the choice between one-use versus rechargeable batteries is more a matter of personal preference.

I tried rechargeable CR123s on Adventurer Opti and they didn't last hardly at all

I bought 4 Energizer non rechargeable CR123s. The first 2 treated about half as many liters as advertised. The second 2 treated 4 liters before failing. Maybe that was a bad batch of batteries or a bad Adventurer Opti.

A lot of people are happy though so I don't know. I would suggest always taking a spare set of batteries that haven't been used.

Jerry, you got to stop buying those deep discount batteries man! :)

I've never had a problem with the CR123s… maybe you got some bad ones from a bad batch.

Billy

Yeah, many happy Steripen users, I wouldn't recommend against it, I could even imagine trying it again