tedw said:
People might be interested to know the the filter Bearclaw sells is the one the British Forces put in their survival kits. Seems like a pretty good endorsement to me!
There's the NATO Stock Number for it somewhere on a previous water filtering thread.
Ted W
Ted quite true, I have also used them and done the water duties course at Ash Vale (it is run by the RAMC), this is where people are taught to set up water points for battle groups all the way down to the proper use of a millbank bag for the individual.
The major reason that they find thier way into a survival kit is size and weight along with the fact that they are two stage filters (filter + chemical purification), this makes them simple to use and give no margine for user error (if you do not know that you will require chemical purification and don't use it you end up with nasties).
But they are not designed for long term use, the whole point with military survival is to get back to your lines as quickly as possible, hence a lower capacity two stage active purifier is ideal, however I have had other bits recommended to me that I have used and as a result I would stick to a filter where I can choose to actively add chemicals.
As I said earlier I currently use an old PUR filter that is active, has the flow rate of the Katadyn Pocket filter, this was due to a very good deal (I paid less than I would of for the Pre-Mac) and this was rated as the only alternative to the Katadyn Pocket filter at the time.
The red cross recommend Katadyn's for longer term use and they are used by a lot of aid agencies around the world, this is not just because they are nice and shiny. They have a long standing reputation as being the best and if you check out where they have been used you can see why. All of the katadyn's work on pretty much the same mechanism the only thing that alters is size apart from the one item that is active and that is the Katadyn bottle (not for long term usage).
The MSR range of kit are also getting quite a reputation as well and are also used by the armed forces.
