Just got back from a 10 day trip of 173 miles from Maine Junction to the Canadian Border on the Vermont Long Trail. I brought both the 1L and 2L Sawyer bags and the filter (ALL NEW AS OF THIS TRIP) and within 6 days had two catastrophic blowouts of both squeeze bags (super glued them -- held for two more days) and ended up on the last day simply using someones Steripen for the last 8 miles till I walked into North Troy. Having used a Steripen Opti for the whole A.T last year without incident, I'm amazed at the utter failure of this unit in so short a time. I would estimate a total use of around 40-50 liters through the filter. AND YES I did bring the syringe with me and backflushed the unit nightly. Will be ending up in the REI Garage sale pile after I return it. A good idea, but not really functional yet IMO.

that sucks seth. the problem is with the bags not the filter. filter is awesome. and can be easily fixed with Evernew bags. Steripens have their limitations too.

The bags are fragile, the filter itself is awesome and lightweight.

One of the best combos is bringing two one liter Aquafina water bottles in addition to a Sawyer Squeeze bag.

If your bag fails then the filter will screw directly onto one of your water bottles.

Some people even bring those flexible long smart water bottles and use that to squeeze.

If you would have done 5 minutes of research before you left you would have know this. Then you could have left your Steripen home and saved more weight.

I've been using a Sawyer filter for the past 15 months, and it's been great. I did have to replace the Sawyer pouches, because they're not very durable; I had two start leaking pretty early on. On my last trip (one week), I took a pair of the Evernew pouches, one liter each, and they worked out quite nicely. It was nice having two of them along, because I could fill them from a stream and then set them in the sun to warm up when I wanted a non-freezing sponge bath :)

That said, the filter itself has been fine. I haven't had to backflush it yet, either. I like the Steripen idea, but the fact that it relies on batteries and tends to eat them made me start to mistrust it. It failed on me even with fresh batteries in it, and even though I'd put one in backward when I replaced the batteries, it didn't work when I needed it. I put new batteries in it when I got home, and it worked fine. I stopped using it after that.

For what it is worth, I watched the Sawyer video BEFORE I used the filter and I don't believe I squeezed any harder than they show themselves in their video.

I also don't recall any warnings or instructions on squeezing the bags on the website or with the product. Maybe they need to put some serious warnings on the product.

I agree the filter is great but the customer service is shocking and the bags fall short of what I consider to be acceptable quality.

Will probably go with the Evernew bags but for me no more Sawyer Products.

Regards
Andrew

I correct myself. Checking my notes on the filter, I see the packaging included a note which states:

While these bags are rugged, they are not indestructible. Sharp objects will puncture the bags, excessive pressure will pop the bag and wringing the bag will cause leaks at the threaded area. There are no warranties on the bags.

So there you go..

Andrew

Yeah, I definitely didn't buy it because of the bags. The bags were a bonus. I could care less if they're worthless. Unfortunately it gives the less informed a bad taste about Sawyer.

As a water scooper.

I took the smallest one, cut the top off of it and use it to scoop water out of the creek and fill my Evernew bladder (which btw works great with the filter and doesn't leak). Probably takes about 8 scoops to fill the 2L bladder.

My new water scoop is small, light (sub 1 oz), and packs down to almost nothing (just roll it up and put a rubber band around it).

At least this way, I was able to get some beneficial use out of the otherwise worthless Sawyer bags!

Great idea. I had been using a cut down PET bottle as a scoop but I like your idea.

Andrew