That 'cutting edge' water filter I bought almost ruined my trip

I was super skeptical about those cheap squeeze filters everyone was raving about online... I figured spending $40 on a random brand from Amazon couldn't be better than my old iodine tablets. Three days into the Wind River Range, the thing clogged up so bad I couldn't even force water through it. I had to backtrack two miles to a stream I knew was safe and spent an hour just soaking it and backflushing with a syringe. Meanwhile, my buddy with the Sawyer Squeeze was filling bottles in 30 seconds flat. After that trip, I bought the real deal and tested it at home first. Has anyone else had a filter fail on them mid route? I'm curious what backup you carry.

3 comments

3 Comments

evan_cooper731mo ago

Dude same thing happened to me with some no-name filter in the San Juans. Clogged on day two and I was stuck drinking straight from a beaver pond because my backup tablets were still at home. Swore off cheap gear after that and now I always pack a Sawyer Squeeze plus a few Aquamira drops just in case.

logan5251mo agoMost Upvoted

Funny you say that cause I've been running the same cheapo Sawyers for like 5 years now and never had one clog up on me mid trip. Maybe I'm just picking better water sources or my streams are clearer but I've never needed a backup, just a quick backflush and I'm good. Could be that Wind Rivers water is just cleaner than San Juan stuff.

drewr151mo ago

Honestly, three days in the Wind Rivers and your cheap filter clogged? That sucks, but I dunno if it's that big of a deal. I've been using the same generic Amazon squeeze filter for like four years and it's never given me trouble, I just backflush it before every trip. The way people talk online you'd think you're gonna die if your filter fails, but I've drank straight from a lot of mountain streams without getting sick. Maybe I'm just lucky, but I feel like half these stories are from people who didn't even try to clean their filter on the trail.