Zpacks Packing Cubes are brick-shaped packing pods that include compression straps so you’ll be able to shrink the quantity that gear takes inside your backpack. This will mean you can carry a lighter weight, smaller quantity backpack, or carry extra meals, so you’ll be able to keep out longer and hike additional.
Out there 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 water resistant. All of the cubes have a single webbing compression strap that hyperlinks the 2 ends of the bag to type 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 Buddies Flicker 40 quilt sleeping bag inside when zipped up and compressed.
I attempted these Zpacks Packing cubes as a result of I’ve observed that the packing pods I personal from Hyperlite Mountain Gear aren’t very efficient in relation 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 dimension small and 1.2 oz / 34 g in weight. After I put the identical sleeping bag in a 6.9L HMG packing pod, it fills it utterly and takes up near twice the quantity of the 4L Zpacks packing dice.
It is a easy instance, the place dimension does matter, particularly when you have a few these packing cubes in your backpack. In case your purpose is to maximise the utilization of area in your backpack, I believe Zpack’s Packing Cubes are a greater answer 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 assessment.