Zpacks Packing Cubes are brick-shaped packing pods that include compression straps so you possibly can shrink the amount that gear takes inside your backpack. This could can help you carry a lighter weight, smaller quantity backpack, or carry extra meals, so you possibly can keep out longer and hike additional.
Obtainable in small (2L / 17g), medium (4L / 21g ), and huge sizes (8L / 27g) sizes they’re made with seam-taped 1.0 oz/sq yd Dyneema Composite Cloth and a water-resistant zipper that makes them extremely waterproof. All of the cubes have a single webbing compression strap that hyperlinks the 2 ends of the bag to kind stackable bricks when compressed, making them good for packing backpacks in addition to extra typical baggage.
Right here’s what the medium-sized, 4L Zpacks dice seems like with a Feather Associates Flicker 40 quilt sleeping bag inside when zipped up and compressed.
I attempted these Zpacks Packing cubes as a result of I’ve seen that the packing pods I personal from Hyperlite Mountain Gear aren’t very efficient relating to compressing gear so it makes use of much less quantity in my backpack. They’re good organizationally, however the smallest quantity pod that Hyperlite Mountain Gear makes is 6.9 liters in a measurement small and 1.2 oz / 34 g in weight. Once I put the identical sleeping bag in a 6.9L HMG packing pod, it fills it utterly and takes up near twice the amount of the 4L Zpacks packing dice.
It is a easy instance, the place measurement does matter, particularly if in case you have a few these packing cubes in your backpack. In case your purpose is to maximise the utilization of house in your backpack, I feel Zpack’s Packing Cubes are a greater resolution than Hyperlite’s Packing Pods and people of different distributors as a result of they’ve a built-in compression element.
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Disclosure: Zpacks donated packing cubes for this overview.