Grayl Water Bottle Review
I really wanted to love it, I even stood up for it on Back Country Post Forums, before given it a real test. The Grayl Ultralight (Amazon Affiliate) is a new water filter and purifier that works almost like a coffee press. For a quick and dirty of how it works check out their video:
Grayl Water Bottle - Home Tests
The Grayl Water Bottle Ultralight intrigued me and I was excited that Grayl was gracious enough to give me a free purifier to test 6 days on the High Sierra Trail to Mt Whitney. Before I got out on the trail, I did some in-home tests and it worked great. It was simple, sturdy and filtered water quickly and easily. My first impressions of the Grayl Ultralight were superb!
Grayl Ultralight Water Bottle Review - Back Country Test
But then I took it out on the trail and filtered water from creeks, rivers, and Mt Lakes. Now all of these water sources on this trip were not very silty and the water was very clear. Unlike my Grand Canyon trip where I was filtering water from the silty Colorado River. Basically all the water sources I hit on the High Sierra Trail should not have been too difficult for any water filter to cut through.
I used the Grayl Ultralight for myself and a friend, as our only water purification means for 6 days, 5 nights. The Grayl started off great, it worked just like it worked on the tap water in my apartment that I tested it on. On the second day, we filtered some water from a stream and had no issues topping off a couple Nalgenes.
On the 3rd day, we were pretty low on water and had to fill both our camelbaks (3 liters each) and water bottles. This is where things started to go downhill.
We stopped at Hamilton Lakes, a beautiful stop on the way to the Kaweah Gap. I was excited to really test out my Grayl and see what it could do, so I dipped it into Hamilton Lake.
So let us take a look at what topping off all my water sources in one go with the Grayl Ultralight.
-One Press of the Grayl Water Bottle Ultralight = 16oz of clean water.
-1 liter = 33.8oz
-3 liter (1 Camelbak) = 101.44oz
-1 Camelback = 6.34 Grayl Ultralight fills
That's not including my water bottles, my buddies Camelbak etc.
It started out fine, the Grayl Water Bottle worked great, but each press became just a tad bit harder than the previous one. Each press took just a little bit more effort to press.
The more and more water I pressed and purified, the more I found myself concentrating my pressing form. You can see in the above picture I am pretty much just using my arms and shoulders, this is fairly early in the trip. The more and more I used it the more, I would find myself focusing more and more on putting all my body weight over Grayl. Toward the end of our water resupply at Hamilton Lake, my hands were sore as hell. The rim of the Grayl is hard and if you use it multiple times back to back your hands will be in some pain.
The Hamilton Lakes stop, was not completely horrible for water purification but my hands ached at the end of it, and I was glad to be done filtering water for the day. It just wasn’t exactly an enjoyable experience. But I had clean great tasting water!
The next day we camped high in Kaweah Gap, and it wasn’t until the next day that we filtered water again. The more and more we hiked on the more I slowly began to hate filtering water. It became harder and harder to press down, and my hands hurt more and more.
By day 3 I started to wear gloves while filtering water my water with the Grayl Ultralight. The gloves helped ease some of the pain on my hands, but still, it became tougher and tougher to purify our water.
I began not topping off my water sources, because I just hated filtering water at this point. I then resorted to extreme measures to save my hands, I resorted to my trusty Ka-bar!
First off, I do not recommend what I am about to describe, but its what I decided to do, in order to continue to filter water more easily. I put the blade of my Ka-bar across the top of the Grayl and put one hands palm across the top of the blade and the other on the handle of the Ka-bar. I then pushed and twisted, and it seemed to go down a little bit easier.
The filter on the Grayl Water Bottle seemed to get clogged extremely quickly. It made filtering water a chore, something I loathed doing every day on the trip. The bottom line is that the Grayl was the least enjoyable piece of gear that I brought on the trip.
I wanted in the worst way to enjoy the Grayl Water Bottle, I really did give it a chance. I loved its design, simplicity, and strength. But the amount of physical effort it took to get clean water, was just not worth the squeeze.
Its a lot more expensive but I am now looking into the MSR Guardian for a future trip, as it is self-cleaning.
Grayl Water Bottle FAQ
How long does Grayl filter last?
About 40 gallons of water if filtering from clear water sources. If you are filtering water from more silty sources the filter will degrade at a much quicker rate.
Grayl water bottle vs Lifestraw
Lifestraw has a number of different filtration systems. Lifestraw's Ultrafilter will remove viruses while their microfilters will not. All Gray filters will remove viruses.
Grayl Water Filter Cleaning
The filters themselves do not have any back flushing capabilities.
