Vargo Bot 700 Review (First Looks)

The BOT really never made much sense to me.  At first, I thought that the value would be in multiple uses: cooking and a water bottle.  That being said, a lot of people store gear in their cookpot so now you have to store that gear somewhere else.  Net sum gain of zero.
The value that you pointed out was the ability to cold soak AND THEN to heat it up.  Many people have cold soaked in a Ziplok and heated their meal up in a pot so this is not a real game changer here.  I do hear about the negative sides like vacuum sealing the jar and being unable to unscrew the lid as well as thread damage.  The BOT does not seem like a compelling product to me.  Given that people have been experimenting with the stainless steel “Ball” jars

, the BOT seems really expensive for what it does.  My 2 cents.

I’ve been testing the vacuum sealing issue today. It’s legit.

But I solved it by drilling a 1/64” hole in the lid. Small enough so nothing leaks out as long as it’s held upright, even with lots of sloshing and tipping around. Or drill a larger hole and put some type of stopper in I guess.

I get edgy about wet food in plastic baggies. It’s a known chemical paranoia of mine. Same with enamel coated metals when you apply heat to them.

I like cold-soaking in Stasher bags (silicone) but they are 4-5 oz as well.

Jon – do you know the weight of that single wall mason jar?

I do not know the weight of the SS mason jars.  I have read that a lot of people are trying them out for cold soaking/cooking, but I am not interested in that.  Apparently, most of the lids are not compatable with regular Ball Jars.  Some companies seem to be offering optional/additional lids without the hoel for the straw.  Good hunting.

https://backpackinglight.com/forums/topic/another-dirtbag-cook-pot/

Ryan,  I see some cases of 25 weighing 10.8 pounds so less than 6.9 ounces = 195 grams each since the box holding them must weigh something.  With handles (sold as a mug) it appears to be less than 8 ounces.  That’s for the 22 ounce SS “mason jars” = 650 milliliters, 700 ml with no freeboard.

One of many things that appeals to me about these are that with those standard Mason/Ball jar tops, many accessories would work: standard flat lids plus threaded ring, all-in-one plastic lids (we usually use those for pickles because the steel lids/rings can rust), and vacuum sealing equipment that I already have.

Dang!, I found a sample one for $4.79 (plus $35 shipping, UPS Air because I’m in Alaska).  Maybe some of you in the 48 states would like to check if they offer UPS Surface shipping to you:

https://www.4allpromos.com/product/steel-mason-jar-tumbler-22-oz?default-tier=sample&default-qty=1&mkwid=sTyTxvRCJ|pcrid|322811728040|pmt||pkw||pdv|c|product|739-D294-SAMPLE|slid||&pgrid=63991977789&ptaid=pla-294682000766&st-t=ppc&vt-k=&utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&gclid=EAIaIQobChMI2I3n7Zbx6gIVYgnnCh1mMQjKEAQYBSABEgLsTfD_BwE

I picked up one of these 700 Bots when Brian Vargo put them on Massdrop. I think it was $69, which was a decent discount. I showed it to my local Boulder friend Jenny Askey, who posts here sometimes. Her assessment was that it “solves a problem that doesn’t actually exist.”

I found that out of the box, the threads were wonky, making it a bit hard to screw on the lid, so I smoothed them down with my Dremel tool. I also found that the included silicone seal leaked a bit. I swapped it out for a 4″ nitrile one that provided a perfect seal. The stock silicone seal is now relegated as a great ‘rubber band’ to secure a rolled up rain jacket.

One problem I had when I used it on a backpacking trip – I simmered some dinner in the Bot, and there was some slightly burned food that stuck to the bottom. I filled the Bot about 1/2 way with some boiling water, screwed on the lid (tightly?), and set it aside after giving it a good shake. I sort of forgot about it and left it out all night, and when I tried to unscrew the lid in the morning I couldn’t get it off. The water had cooled to ambient, which sort of “sucked the lid tight.” I finally managed to break the seal, but I broke a fingernail in the process. This won’t happen twice…

I think that this is a unique piece of kit. It works as a canteen for carrying water in a side pocket of your pack, you can cook/simmer goodies with it, and it looks cool. I’ve wowed some newbies at a group campsite kitchen area in Glacier Park, which was almost worth the price I originally paid for it.

It’s too bad Keith didn’t make a 700 ml version of their ‘bot’. They solved the Vargo Bot problems by having a small hole in the top center of the lid (like Ryan did to his Vargo) and they used a bayonet mount instead of a screw mount. It was, IMO, a much better bot because of those changes.

I have 3 stainless steel Vargo bots  available and also have a dozen of the small ss containers with ridge added for use with diy cone. Pm me if interested.

$100 is ridiculous! News Flash, I store my peanut butter jar inside my $35 SP Trek 700, instant cold soak/heat up system.

Keith does make a 900 ml version. Agree with Doug that their design is superior.

http://keithtitanium.com/product/DRINKWARE/164.html

I don’t have any issue breaking vacuum seals in my Bot 700 if they happen. I just use the end of my Ti spoon handle.

One thing I think could be lightended is the lid. Its overbuilt. There’s so many bends in it that you could drive over it with an Abrams tank and it wouldn’t be crushed. Also those bends get bits of food in them, particularly the bottom most curved lip. I’ve been really tempted to cut that curved lip off, as it really does seem superfluous, but I haven’t yet. Would save a few grams and more usefully save stuff getting caught in it.

I think the ability to warm up your cold soak is grossly underated. You don’t have to heat to boiling…just going from cold to something like 40C is wonderful. Takes much less stove energy to do so, hardly any time, no risk of burning…30 seconds or so of watching it directly on your gas and you are done. Same goes with my rolled oats in the morning. Eating them a bit warm rather than near freezing is amazing. I’d never heat up my breakfast without the BOT, I’ve never been bothered in the past.

Slightly off-topic, but what about Sunny Sports makes it the “preferred merchant”? I’ve not heard of them before…

Adam brings up two really good points that are worth emphasizing:

1. It’s easy to break the vacuum seal with a spoon, knife blade, etc. Sort of like the old trick of using a church key to break the seal from a difficult screw-top jar.

2. The difference between cold food and warm food is huge. I almost never heat my food up to “hot” during the summer – 60 seconds of warming on low stove heat uses an almost imperceptible amount of fuel – less than 0.1 oz.

Since you cold soak and warm up people like to cook that way, you should consider using a cozy and a hand warmer as it will probably do the trick.  My 2 cents.

The handwarmer thing might be a simpler solution than a stove kit.

What’s the weight of one of these handwarmers? They’ll be heavier than 0.1 oz of fuel, so at some point, there’s a point of diminishing returns, but probably irrelevant for short trips.

It doesn’t solve my hot coffee needs, but in the absence of needing to boil water, this might be OK…

Ryan,

They are pretty light (and cheap).  The operate on a redox reaction (David or Roger could probably fill in the teh details).  The rate of heat delivered is somewhat a function of the amount of oxygen that it is present, note that they are stable in the plastic wrap, but once removed they start to react.  The technology has been around for a long time.  They tend to be slow and last a long time, but that it kind of what you want with the cold soak method anyway.

Ah – I see, I think. So you add this to the cozy when you start the cold soak process, not just at “cooking time”. That makes sense. Gonna try it!

A little info on the smaller ss mason jar type container:

https://backpackinglight.com/forums/topic/z-bot-bottle-pot-all-in-one/

I showed it to my local Boulder friend Jenny Askey, who posts here sometimes. Her assessment was that it “solves a problem that doesn’t actually exist.”

Well, that settles it. I had the same first thought.

I think the use case is pretty narrow, but it meets a number of criteria for a use case that appeals to me:

1. I don’t want to hydrate or “cook” my food in a plastic container. Metal is easier to clean. Silicone bags like the Stasher would address this concern.
2. I don’t want to do it in a plastic bag because of chemical leaching with hot water. Mylar bags would address this concern.
3. I want the ability to make hot drinks or soup or poach fish. Thus, a metal pot is needed.
4. I want the option to cold soak my dinners. An non-leaky container is needed.
5. I want to cook in a chemically-inert pot. So no aluminum (unless hard-anodized) or polymer-enameled metal. SS and Ti would be ok.
6. A “pot-shape” rather than a “bottle-shape” like the Keith is better for cooking efficiency and easier to eat from. The Keith 900 is heavier and leaks (more) when tipped.

As of today, the Vargo Bot 700 seems like the lightest solution to these issues for me. The single wall SS mason jar may work as well but I don’t have my hands on that yet.

These containers are the best option.

https://backpackinglight.com/forums/topic/cold-soaking-containers/#post-3550107

The backpacking community has been using aluminum pots since forever.

I like the fact that the BOT has handles, which makes it easier to eat from. To lighten things, one could leave the heavy lid at home and use a plastic lid from a can of Planters nuts, or Crisco, or Ensure, all of which securely snap onto the BOT. This won’t work well when simmering your food, but it will be fine for cold soaking your goodies.

The BOT really never made much sense to me.  At first, I thought that the value would be in multiple uses: cooking and a water bottle.  That being said, a lot of people store gear in their cookpot so now you have to store that gear somewhere else.  Net sum gain of zero.
The value that you pointed out was the ability to cold soak AND THEN to heat it up.  Many people have cold soaked in a Ziplok and heated their meal up in a pot so this is not a real game changer here.  I do hear about the negative sides like vacuum sealing the jar and being unable to unscrew the lid as well as thread damage.  The BOT does not seem like a compelling product to me.  Given that people have been experimenting with the stainless steel “Ball” jars

I agree with Jon, the Bot doesn’t have much value. Better off with ss “Ball” jars.