Wild Red and Black 30L Non-Woven Dyneema WorkSack

John Frieh snaps Doug Shepherds Butt on the Escalator.

This year the trend has been to go even lighter. We know of several teams aiming for big objectives with 30L packs.  A couple of teams have already accomplished big, long routes with their 30L packs. Check out John Frieh and Doug Shepherd’s Trip Report over on Cascade Climbers.

The 30L is an amazingly versatile model, and will hold  much more than most people imagine. Some anonymous users (such as an over-worked 6’7″ fellow who recently moved to Portland) find the 45L model simply works better for long torsos, but otherwise suggests the 40B or 30L models. If you’ve got plans for a single-push climb in Alaska this spring, consider the a lightweight new backpack and let us know about your climb!

They’ll be here at the end of February. Yep, that’s right, we’re finally going to sell the damn things.

Forget about WMD. That’s last year…this is NOW…it’s time for NWD!

1. Between 20 and 35% lighter than woven Dyneema.
2. Remarkably abrasion resistant.
3. 200+ pound tear strength.
4. Easily repairable in the unlikely event of a hole.

We blend our woven Dyneema with the NWD to create a whole new league of pack: it’s got superior abrasion resistance where it needs it, and it’s almost ridiculously light in the rest of the bag. It’s not nearly as durable as our woven Dyneema, but it is lighter.

If you have to ask which is better for you, pick the woven Dyneema. If you know that 26 grams will make a difference…it’s gotta be NWD.

And now some more DM for me…

CiloGear will not have a booth at this OR, but we will be there doing a few appointments and there will be some CiloGear WorkSacks made from a new woven Dyneema material and nonwoven Dyneema material on display at the show.

We’ll have limited office coverage and limited shipping while we are at OR. Basically, the plan is to get a few things shipped when they’re done, but not too much will go out until the 13th or 14th. There will be coverage for rush shipments, but please allow an extra day.

That’s the 30L in Dyneema. This one has the current shoulder straps which (despite my commentary above) are a teensy bit different than the current 30L packs…The hipbelt on the Dyneema pack is exactly the same as the hipbelt on the regular packs.

The above is the 45L or 60L Dyneema pack suspension. The 60L and the 45L share a backpanel design. The 40L or 40B have a shorter backpanel. The shoulder straps are Dyneema, however, again, the hipbelt is exactly the same as the regular pack. You can see the back of the lid in this shot. The lid is made with Dyneema on the top panel, and VX07 on the side panels. The rigidity of the VX07 makes it work much better for the lid. We’re going to be making another kind of lid for these packs, but right now, the lid is the same design as that of the regular packs, just different materials.

The major difference in the suspension of the Dyneema packs is that they have a much simpler attachment point — with removable foam — for the hipbelt. It works as well or better, it’s lighter and you can remove the foam for added weight savings.

Here’s the front panel of the 45L / 60L pack with a crampon pocket. The lid is nicely obscuring the grab loop. The logo is inside, not on the outside. This particular pack was made without scotchlite on the ice axe holsters.

• 1 45L Dyneema WorkSacks in Large: First edition of these packs. $400 + S&H.
• 1 45L Dyneema WorkSacks in Small: First edition of these packs. $400 + S&H.

The exact same Dyneema pack only received 4 stars from Alpinist’s Mountain Standards Blog (apparently, mostly because bending the framesheet was a bit difficult and it was too small for the reviewer’s winter gear…he wrote: “For a summer alpine climbing pack, the Cilo Gear pack will be seen on my back for the bulk of my overnight trips...Super lightweight; endless compression options; design fits tools and crampons well; Dyneema(R) fabric is extremely durable considering its light weight.” The only real difference between this pack and the ones we make now is that the front haul loop is bartacked on rather than sewn into a seam. With the Dyneema, you’ll never notice the difference. This is the same pack used by sometime climber sometime editor Kelly Cordes, French Canadian Super Dynamo Maxime Turgeon, and the Omega Expedition in Antarctica last summer. These packs are proven bad ass. You’ll jump higher and run faster with them! The only change between these two packs and our current custom production is the construction of the front haul loop.  On these two packs, it’s double bartacked right onto the fabric of the front panel. In all current packs, it is sewn into a seam and then bartacked. In terms of strength, it doesn’t matter at all with the Dyneema.

• 2 One V2.5 45L WorkSacks in large, one in Medium. Check out the Mountain Project review for more details…$100+ S&H each.

This pack is a steal at the price. It’s got the new lid, the framesheet closure pocket, and uses the 210d Dyneema Ripstop and light grey VX21 that we weren’t able to get for a looooong time.

Kelly Cordes took his 45L Dyneema WorkSack to Pakistan last summer as part of our testing program.

He sent it back so we could look at it, and put a ridiculously long strap on it.

Curious at the damage it took in 75+ days of climbing and expedition life?

Check out our picasaweb gallery. One small hole in one of the ice tool holsters. That’s it. Pretty amazing…

Well, we’ve done the testing. Now it’s your turn…

The first Dyneema® WorkSacks that we’ve got available are a selection of 45L packs, the same as tested and used by those SuperAlpinist fellows over in Pakistan a few weeks ago. After reviewing the minor damage done to their packs after fifty days of climbing — after all, I did tell them to break the packs — we’re confident that this material is not just a superior blend of durability and light weight, but also good for using in a backpack for climbing.

Grabbing two representative packs from our current production run, I weighed the 45L Dyneema® WorkSacks in at 590 grams with the crampon pocket and 575 without the crampon pocket. That’s about 200 grams or so lighter than the regular 45L WorkSack, and these Dyneema® WorkSacks are much much more durable for the alpine environment.

The packs are $675 with the crampon pocket and $650 without the crampon pocket. Email us if you want one.  There will be a bunch of pictures up tomorrow night, but I’m just too tired right now to take a decent picture and get it up online.