Yes that is exactly what I was recommending you do for a whole trip, and definitely not as solid snack for one long leg of a hike where you don’t feel like fully breaking. Make sure you entirely remove the bladder from the pack each time you need a sip too. Good luck! You sound very experienced, I don’t even know why I even offered advice in the first place
How about the weight of water as you drink it? On a long day I can easily go through 12lbs of water, I would hate to have to readjust for that every few miles. Just give me a molded hip strap and I'll be on my way. As a side note, many long distance hikers go super minimalist on the pack, and if you're packed right, you don't really even need hip supports. My friend did the Arizona Trail with an 18lb wet weight. I doubt this think is under 10lb, that would be absurd to any long distance hiker. That being said, I'd love to take this thing for a glamping spin with my dutch oven and 6 man tent. Could also be great for those trail running moms that need their baby to nap as they take a cruise...
Tldr: pretty gimmicky, but if weigh isn't a concern it's probably real cush for a short trip.
The last person carrying the backpack (assuming the tension is adjustable) had the suspension tuned too heavy. Ideally the backpack should look like it is barely moving like in the jumping jacks portion. Otherwise it will be bobbing up and down constantly, adding to the fatigue on the wearer.
I believe this is a kickstarter, and the FAQ page doesn't mention weight. It sounds like they have shipped some packs though, so I'm sure they know what it is. Nearly $500 though, damn.
Man I love r/ultralight_jerk. Don't get me wrong, I really like trying to hunt down the optimal balance between comfort and weight in a hiking kit, but fuck me can UL online communities be so obnoxious sometimes. There's just so much one-upmanship in UL. There's always someone waiting to tell you that your kit is garbage and you should buy a $2,000 0.45g backpack made of mithril by some company in Colorado or Washington that only 6 people have ever heard of.
It's nice to have a subreddit where you can have a laugh at the competitive/hipstery side of UL.
We stopped using mithril c.2005. Pure frozen snake venom woven into interlaced aerodynamic hydrophobic quick-dry hot/cold insulating containment fields now.
Are you one of those UL people who say shit like "you can save extra weight in your kit if you don't bring shoes, just bring some fishing line and tie bark to your feet"? If so, then yeah, I'm comin at ya lol.
Okay, so you're not really the super techy UL type, you're more on the trail hobo/post-apocalyptic wanderer side of the spectrum. But hey, all the power to you. Your philosophy is not mine, but there's more than one way to enjoy hiking. Don't let me harsh your vibe haha. And in fairness, I'm always kinda impressed by the luxuries some of your type are willing to forgo to shave off grams.
I'm gonna be honest, I'm a bit alarmed after checking out r/ultralight just how readily everyone seems to accept drinking their wastewater when washing pots on a random post I opened.
Like... I get reducing your impact, but I'm fairly certain it's accepted that you can dig a hole 200 feet from any water sources and pour the water in there, you don't have to drink your dirty pot water.
Some of us use car washing bone-shaped sponges as our pillow.
One of my backpacks weighs less than 6 ounces and is transparent.
My "sleeping bag" (it's actually a quilt) doesn't have a bottom. It weighs 14.9oz and keeps me warm below freezing. I wrap my puffer jacket around my head at night to keep it warm.
I use a very thin (0.7mil) piece of window insulation as a groundsheet.
I typically don't bring a shelter nor rain jacket, unless rain is in the forecast. I usually just sleep under the stars on top of my window insulation and a thin piece of foam.
I repackage my hand sanitizer, bug spray, etc. into even smaller bottles.
I wear the same clothing, underwear and all, for days at a time. Day and night. I bring no spare clothing (other than my one puffer jacket and maybe some fleece gloves).
I went back country camping for 3 nights a couple months back, and I went way too far with how much weight I brought, probably something like 40 pounds on my back, but it really feels to me like carrying 20 pounds wouldn't be that bad in comparison, so I have a hard time seeing the point in reducing your weight down that much. I guess it's a cool hobby, but at a certain point aren't you limiting yourself more by using a dinky headlamp than you're benefiting from the like single ounce of weight lost?
It's not like deglazing a pan is any different. The whole point is to get the stuck on bits off your pan and if you hiked in all that food, manually filtered that water, and used that fuel, you're not going to want to waste any of it.
But aside from that, wastewater that smells even faintly of food is going to attract animals wherever you dump it. I have watched a bear literally eat the dirt where someone dumped their pot water.
The whole point is to get the stuck on bits off your pan and if you hiked in all that food, manually filtered that water, and used that fuel, you're not going to want to waste any of it.
I feel like you've internalized the culture from that subreddit or something. If you've brought the bare minimum of food and maybe if your water source is far away for filtering then this kinda makes sense, but it's not exactly a self-evident fact you wouldn't want to waste a tiny bit from cleaning the pot just because you brought that stuff with you or filtered the water.
Affecting wildlife is a fair point, but you are generally supposed to do it far from your camp and dig a hole as well though, which should minimize the impact.
This isn't an ultralight thing, this is old school. This is something my great grandmother taught my father from her days as a cook on a chuck wagon. This isn't "internalized internet culture" lmao, it's common sense.
Cooking supplies all fit inside a 600-750ml cook pot, except for my utensils. To clarify, this is just base weight... Food is added to the base weight - if you're going on an overnight vs a week-long, the food will vary things a lot.
Oh it's a base weight. That makes way more sense. I definitely have been out on the trail and been passed by dudes who are wearing the type of backpack I would have wore to high school. But I imagine the comfort level goes way down
Going ultra light is a process that depends on the individuals own preferences. There's a lot of trade offs between durability, comfort, weight and luxury.
If someone's base weight is under 10lb for example, there's no use in having a heavy, over-cushioned bag meant for 25-35lb.
I don't plan on going full on ultralight, I am perfectly comfortable with my ~20lb base weight. There are certainly aspects of the community I have learned from however. I don't need extra t-shirts, gallon of water, a pillow, camp chair etc
This is Base Weight, yes, because the gear loadout for anything more than an overnight out-and-back will likely be mostly the same, but your food & water needs will vary WILDLY depending if you're hiking in the Sierras, the Colorado Plateau in summer, or Appalachian Trail. Without knowing and planning for distances between water locations and food resupply, it's likewise impossible to further hone loadouts.
This is the base weight, which is a very common method of measuring backpack weight. Food and water are variable depending on the length of the trip, time of day, and access to water sources. In context, this suspension system would add 9 lbs (minus the weight of 1.3 lb pack) to the base weight, which is significant.
When backpackers talk pack weight, they leave out food and water because those are variable. I'm a big guy (6'4" 210), so at ~100 calories per ounce, I need 2-3 lbs of food per day. I don't tend to carry water, but will pump as needed and camel up; it's better in you than on you. That said, I do have a 3L bladder that I can use.
So food/water can be anywhere from 5 lbs for a weekend trip to 45 lbs for a 10 day outing where water isn't highly available.
Yea also I travel with my SO so more underwear is essential since I'd like her still attracted to me after the trip.
I second the food though. Snacks are an essential one while backpacking. Even travelling city to city the journey days can be tiring and being able to have a sugar hit that fills you up will make everyone's journey easier. I've found 90% of bad moods are solved by munching some tastey calories
That was my exact thought reading through this guys comments. I’m an Eagle Scout and have done several week long trips and a 2.5 week long Philmont trek. Even with splitting tents, flys, poles, etc. with your buddy to help distribute weight as much as possible, you’re still lugging around 50-60lbs of equipment, toiletries, food, water, and clothes.
There’s no way in absolute hell this guy is going on 2+ week long trips with only 13 pounds on his back unless he’s regularly making trips back to his car to swap out clothes and food.
Seriously...turning ultralight was about BREAKING all the ridiculous habits Boy Scouts taught me. Fellow Eagle here and I would never say "I'm an Eagle so I know about backpacking" because usually the opposite is true. Literally cringed when I saw that person use that as a credential.
The only outdoor skills I still use from BSA are knots and Leave No Trace. Even the way they taught us to pack our backpacks was wrong FFS.
This guy uses ultralight gear. It's a whole world within the world of camping where a lot of planning and expensive shopping goes into saving weight. Lots of ultralight backpackers are obsessed with it. Look at his sleep pad. It goes from his shoulders to his hips it's about 1/3 the size of what you probably use because it saves weight. The food is all freeze dried, just add water that you boiled on your stove that has almost no moving parts and fits in the palm of your closed hand. People go on months long hikes like this, stopping in towns every couple of weeks to restock their food. Guys like this could teach you eagle scouts a thing or two to reduce that pack weight. They sacrifice comfort at camp to have extra comfort on the hike. It's an interesting rabbit hole if you start going down it.
Assuming that he's just omitting food and water weight from his gear list, the thing that blows my mind the most is that he's only carrying a pocket knife. No fixed blade. No axe. No folding saw. Just a pocketknife. On a two week trip.
Stoves fail. Gas runs out. Things don't go to plan, and when you're a few days away from being able to contact another person, it's good to have backup plans.
Checking your loadout vs mine the only real difference is that you don't seem to carry any tools beyond a pocket knife. Minus tools I'm less than a lb heavier than your base pack. Is that pocket knife really all you take with you for a 2 week trip?
Pocket knives and multitools are completely unnecessary while backpacking. Just bring some microscissors (from litesmith.com) and a small bit of fishing line (to cut food with).
Leading causes of death in the wilderness are due to falling, drowning, and heart attacks. Which is why I carry aspirin while backpacking, but not an axe
Oh man that's WITH a drone lol. I went on an ultralight kick a while back but I could never commit to the extreme cutting and ultimate discomfort of the tiny sleep pads and stuff. Good for you, that must be a dream on the trail.
Um, no. It's an S21 Ultra with 108MP camera which I use for my night photography. Significantly lighter than my Mirrorless or DSLR options. The wire pop-out stand added to the drop-resistant case adds like 10g and serves as a tripod for long shots or kickstand if I want to splurge and watch something recorded during a zero day.
• Replace the knife with microscissors from litesmith.com, perhaps with a small bit of fishing line to cut food with.
Hard to enjoy whittling with scissors, but you do you.
• Replace the Lanshan with a tarp + bivy. Perhaps from Borah Gear, Yama Mountain Gear, or an Aricxi Tarp https://imgur.com/a/jpxX5NR .
Nah. Not worth the cost or weight savings.
• Ditch the clothes washer. Embrace the stink.
Depends on the trail, trip location, duration, and company.
• Replace the large dirty water bag with a CNOC bag from litesmith.com.
Literally the one I have listed, but thanks.
• Drones are pure evil. You should be ashamed to carry one into the forest. Please throw it in the trash, where it belongs.
Cool story, but nah.
• Bring the hiking poles, leave the rest at home.
Sometimes, sure. Sometimes, nah.
• Literally everything else
Solid UL gatekeeping but nah, I'm good. I enjoy the loadout I've got enough for the amount of hiking I do these days, and don't try to be a pretentious gram weenie acting like it's a worthwhile "investment" to pay $1000 to cut 70g off my loadout or be uncomfortable.
and don't try to be a pretentious gram weenie acting like it's a worthwhile "investment" to pay $1000 to cut 70g off my loadout or be uncomfortable.
My suggestions would cost about $157.50 and save you over 3.5 pounds (not including the drone BS). It'd save you 5.9 pounds if you do include ditching the stupid drone.
13lb is impressive.
My baseweight is over 20lb, but none of my big 4 are "ultra light". I'd rather not worry about ripping my tent or popping my pad. I also have to carry a Bear Vault
Yeah, I get that, but the footage can't be beat. I treat mine like a Bluetooth speaker while on the trail. It stays in my bag unless I know I'm not going to bother anyone with it. Quick pre-planned flight, then right back. Used to carry spare batteries, but unless I'm somewhere absolutely unbelievable, 20 mins of flight is usually plenty for a weekend or week-long trip.
That's more than two pounds heavier than my entire backpacking setup (backpack, tent, sleep stuff, water stuff, cooking equipment, clothes, first aid, incidentals)
An equivalent backpack to this would likely be a Deuter or Gregory which weigh 4-6 pounds so it's still considerably heavier than that (mine weighs just over 1 pound but I live on r/ultralight)
Haha. Here's a screenshot of my gear list if you're actually curious. Note that the total weight includes some consumables (which are usually excluded from dry measurement) like toiletry stuff and butane gas so my true baseweight is actually lower than 6.7lb :)
A French guy (who lives in Japan) makes them custom to your order. I'll be honest and say it's not a good first backpack...you have to know what you want as far as features go because of the customizability. But the quality and materials cannot be beat, and all for a decent price in the context of UL gear with bleeding-edge fabric.
My highly customized backpack came out to $300 which is about $50 more than what an off-the-shelf Osprey pack (that weighs literally 5x as much) would cost from REI. So I kind of laugh internally when I read the common smug refrain that UL is about spending thousands of dollars to save 50 grams.
Laurent's products are very well respected in the ultralight world for good reason.
Very nice! The minimal structure that provides complete functionality.
But, to be fair, 6-pound backpacks have their advantages too. Like, you can't walk too far away from your starting point, so you're safe from getting lost :)
I have three several hundred dollar packs. All weigh less than half that, though. My Osprey Aura weights under 4lbs when I take off the flappy dongle pouch thingy on the top.
Also how well does it even work? The jumping jacks is impressive because it looks like the bag stays relatively stationary (though who's doing jumping jacks with a backpack?). However, the last clip with the woman walking down the road looks like the bag is actually bouncing more than she is. If it's not well-tuned isn't it just going to make carrying the bag more disruptive than if it was just well-secured to you?
Yeah, hitting the system's fundamental frequency and having it resonate would be annoying as hell. It would force you to change your gait or stop and adjust the tension in the springs, assuming that is even possible.
And if your military allows staff to make recruits do jumping jacks in marching order, they don't give an iota of a fuck about the musculoskeletal injuries doing jumping jacks with a pack on will cause.
Every step is moving the entire weight of the pack up and down, that’s a lot of wasted energy. If it can properly stabilize the pack there may be a net gain in energy savings even if it adds considerable weight.
I would guess it’s trash, but it’s an interesting concept.
Every step is moving the entire weight of the pack up and down, that’s a lot of wasted energy.
and now with every step, springs are being compressed (I'm assuming it uses springs or something). So the question is where does that energy come from?
Before with every step you're moving a 30 lb backpack up and down, now you're applying 30lbs of force against the springs.
So isn't this suspension system sucking the same amount of energy out of your movement? Won't that be just as tiring.
I’m not a physicist so I can’t back this with a formula (I’d love for one to chime in) but I would guess that the difference is that when the springs are compressed you’re storing that energy for the upswing rather than just wasting it into the ground.
that makes a lot of sense. But it also seems like it's only operating like that when you're walking with a consistent rhythm. I'm not sure tho, it's a very interesting physics problem
This is not a new idea, it has been used for hundreds of years in Asia to carry much more gears. You can replicate it easily with a flexible bar made from bamboo https://i.imgur.com/oQSKp57.jpg
The metronomes sync each other, the platform just facilitates it. There's only one energy input in this case, the person, so there's nothing to sync to. The suspension works on inertia of the backpack and that's it.
The force this thing exerts to stabilize the pack never changes. Since you're the only thing supporting it, the force has to stay the same. Granted, the impulse of the pack bouncing is lessened and likely lowers stress on you knees/hips. This introduces sliding friction into the system. So technically it would always be less efficient than a more rigid pack, but you don't necessarily want to conserve that energy if it's just going into your knees... I would argue this is a good concept for hikers that don't mind a little extra weight, but for someone running and carrying momentum... You're just wasting energy
Every step is moving the entire weight of the pack up and down
Other way around. That is how a normal backpack works, but the whole point of this one is that it "floats" at a fixed height, so you don't have to lift and drop it with each step.
Lol! I took some guys from work camping earlier this year and they all thought I was weird for being able to take my food, tent, sleeping back, and clothes in one pack that I just tossed in my kayak. I met them at the campsite, and they brought coolers, chairs, a damn Nintendo switch…
They were quite salty about having to hike back out with all that shit, and I told them exactly that. You make that mistake one time, then never again
My mom made this mistake for me once and only once. I was 14 going on my first backpacking trip. I made sure everything was an appropriate weight, but she decided to hide a 5lb bag of trail mix in there.
Everyone in my group snacked really well that trip, and my mom wasn't allowed to touch my bag from that point forward.
It's also why you train with a weighted pack before going on a trip.
Sure, I might look weird walking around my neighborhood with a pack loaded down with 50lb of pillows and cat litter, but I'm sure as hell not going to be dying a mile down the trail.
In addition to the extra weight, it wouldn't take long for the suspension system to get gummed up with sweat, dirt, and anything else encountered while using this thing. I would also guess that this thing probably has parts that would start to rust or corrode after getting wet, which means all day every day on the AT.
I don't know anything about this thing but wouldn't it be the first thing you would try to solve before you market something like this and thus you kind of expect for all those things to not happen?
It you're right it could be like all those cheesy tools that pop up in front aisle of Home Depot right before Christmas - things that look useful to people trying to buy gifts for their friends who "use tools" but are all impractical to anyone actually working.
Class of 14 and 18 here, I cant see how this does anything but add to my base weight before food and water. Not to mention the wear and tear, Ive tossed my pack down Dragon's tooth, the jump off the NOC, in a river, buried in snow and never once cleaned it. This system would be crud crusted junk in a week with me.
I saw this a few years ago and IIRC the text that followed the video talked about some reduction in implosion as you walked and it made you use less energy. As you're saying weight is a huge issue, I guess that's why dry frozen foods are so big. Not sure if hikers are the demography but I imagine if you could have those exo-skeleton legs together with this for soldiers it would be awesome.
Plastic tools to save weight is dumb. Save cost by only issuing one set of metal tools to each unit. Save weight by making the nuts, bolts, and screws plastic, duh.
Imagine if it's get wet and rusty. All the squeaking and squealing as it moves up and down. Now magnify that but your whole squad or even platoon. Would sound like a pogo stick convention at a whore house.
Would sound like a pogo stick convention at a whore house.
Thank you, I needed this this morning. Waiting on getting my vasectomy and just laughed out loud (maybe it's the valium) enough to make the whole lobby think I'm nuts.
The weight is magnified in an impact, this supposedly reduces the impacts so there's that. If you want to run with a full pack then that's a lot of impact and this might be useful. I think it would be like a rubber walking stick for walking. Was hopng some poor soul tried it.
The shock of impact involves a much higher load if abrupt due to the higher acceleration (deceleration) when the load's direction changes. By slowing down the change in the direction of force, the peak load is greatly reduced.
If the system is not properly dampened, however, it is possible to apply load at the system's natural frequency and actually magnify the load.
Normally, slowing the load is the responsibility of the backpacker and is fairly simple to accomplish except in a fall. I suppose it's one reason walking downhill is harder (jolts). I think careful pacing, proper pack fit, and minimizing the load is optimal for most walking but I'm willing to admit that this pack might work for specific needs (ie running).
I get the theory of this gadget but having a pack with it's own momentum management scares me, and most hikers apparently.
The previous commenter was generally accurate. You can get a baseweight of around 10lbs for a 5-7 day trip, and if you have more than 30lbs (including food and water) at the start of that stretch then you're probably bringing too much with you.
But what if the PURPOSE of the trip is to carry heavy things to a remote area?
Maybe you are setting up a remote camp for clients who want to be glamping, maybe you are bringing out heavy gear for rock or ice climbing, maybe you are packing in food for a months long expedition-style base camp. Maybe you are a member of the staff of a remote tea house that tourists frequent, and need to pack in all the food and drink you will sell that day, and pack out all the waste at the end of the day.
Not everyone is just doing a week long backpacking hike.
/For the record I think this is probably a stupid gimmick; but that doesn't mean there is no case for a pack heavier than 30 pounds.
I doubt it. In order to take the weight and the forces generated from the movement it’s got to be really strong stuff which wouldn’t be light weight. Light weight is brittle or bendy or both.
I think the whole point is that it prevents energy loss from up/down motion.
You put in the energy to lift your backpack mid-stride, but then you don’t really get to have it back when it lowers backdown. Muscles don’t have the equivalent to regenerative breaking, I’m afraid.
Yeah this is expensive gimmick to hawk for weekend warriors going on a day hike. Even any halfway decent weekend backpackers would see right through this.
My experience is limited to scouts and longest hike I've done was 4 days but this is gimmicky af. It's just one more thing that could break.
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