Cubic " 's - Pacific Crest Trail

imported
#1

Hey all,
I am planning my thru-hike and am trying to go as light as possible. However, I was just wondering about the average size pack some of you have used. Thanks in advance.
hube

Hube

#2

I would look for something less than 4000ci.
As far as the pack its self remember that the LIGHT weight stuff i.e go-lite and such you have to be carefull with (You can’t throw it around) As compared to the other packs that weigh more but will take all the abuse you can throw at it.
Anyway back to the point you don’t need a HUGE pack with lots of pockets and bells and whistles. Most of them you will be cutting off (or at least I did… and most every one I hiked with did)
Good luck

SweetAss

#3

Hube, I think many of us go about buying a pack backwards. We buy a pack first and then try to fit all our gear into it. You really need to do it just the opposite. Buy all your gear first and THEN buy your pack. This gives you a couple of advantages. First, you can make sure that all your gear fits into the pack. You don’t end up with a pack that’s too big or small. Second, you can make sure the pack you’re buying will support the weight you’re carrying. If you buy one of the new lightweight packs that’s meant to carry no more than 25 - 30 pounds and then try to load 40 pounds into it, you’ve got problems. Or if you’ve got all this super light gear and a 6 - 7 pound pack, you’re carrying more than you need. Finally, find a GOOD outfitter that understands pack sizing and fitting. Nothing will make your hike more miserable than a poorly fitted pack. Good Luck!

Moose

#4

If you have all your gear, you can do this.

Take a large cardboard box, say 2 feet by 2 feet by 4 feet. This will be 24 inches times 24 inches times 48 inches. Inches times inches times inches equals cubic inches. You get the idea.

Pack all your gear inside the box and pack it tight. Then measure the box width and depth in inches and measure how high in the box in inches your gear packs to. Then do the calculation inches times inches times inches and that will tell you what cubic inch size pack you need.

Remember that a sleeping bag and tent can be tied on to the top or bottom of the bag and hence will not necessarily have to fit into the bag.

Also I’d go with a little larger bag than necessary, so you can fill up the top part of it with say corn chips (160 calories per ounce, marshmallow, potato chips, cookies and the like). You consume a lot of food out on the trail hiking so lots of high calorie snacks are made to order.

Try to keep pack weight loaded down as light as possible. Those extra pounds beat on you mile after mile and will wear you down over time. At first it don’t seem like much, but over the long haul, a lot of extra pack weight will really do a job on you.

See you out there.:cheers

Maintain

#5

Maintain, what a great idea. Wish I’d thought of it. But the 24x24x48 inch box gives you about 6 or 7 or 8 times the cubic inches your pack will hold. Maybe a better size would be 12x18x24 inches. That gives you 5184 cubic inches, which is probably about 20 or 30 percent more than you will carry and leaves you room to play with. I fit all my 40 pounds of stuff last year into a 4350 cubic inch Kelty Haiku and will try to go smaller for my next attempt.

disco

#6

What ever you do don’t put your sleeping bag on the outside of your bag. 1) If you have to do that…you have to much stuff. 2) You will have a wet bag 3)You will not have that bag for long… crawl around/through a couple of blow downs…hike about 8 more miles and get ready to bed down just to find out that you bag is not there.
That pretty much goes for everything…if it is on the outside of your bag you don’t need it.
Just my .02 with a ton of military miles, a ton of civilian miles and one thru-hike.

SweetAss03

#7

I wouldn’t recommend putting a sleeping bag on the outside of a pack either. I know of a PCT hiker who had his sleeping bag on the outside of his pack. It fell off and he didn’t realize it. When he got to the top of Muir Pass, he took a break. Two other hikers arrived, one of them had found the missing sleeping bag on the way up Muir Pass and carried it until he met the owner. Luckily for the owner that was only a few hours.

I must admit that there were two times when I did strap my sleeping bag on the outside of my pack. In 2002 and 2003, I chose to walk the 190 miles from KM to VVR without leaving the Sierra to resupply. That meant carrying 10 days of food out of KM. Not enough room in my pack, so I put the sleeping bag on the outside for the first 5 days out of KM. I attached that sleeping bag with three separate straps. I was very careful – that bag was NOT falling off!!!

yogi

www.pcthandbook.com

yogi

#8

Everyone is right about tieing things down on the outside of the bag. Make sure it’s really done right with multiple ties if you do it and I’d say double wrap it in plastic to waterproof it. But that will rip if you aren’t careful going thru blowdowns, etc.

Anyway good luck. See you out there.:cheers

Maintain

#9

The Box idea sounds good; I have used a conversion from weight to volume that works fairly well for me. If you don’t know how much you are going to carry, then this may not work that good for you…

How much weight do you want to carry in your pack?

I did a couple of 9-10 day trips in prep for the PCT, and needed to carry 32LB. The conversion
is 1000 inches to 10LB. I picked the Mountain Smith Ghost (2003 version) witch is 3100 cubic inches.
It works ok for up to 34LB’s, but is more comfortable with 31 LB or less. Before PCT, I got a 4000 cubic inch pack, and it was good to about 40LB. You can go a little over, but the packs tend to become less comfortable. And I can’t speak for the Go-Lite or other Frameless packs, they may come under a different set parameteres…

Happy Trails.
-Mountain Goat-
www.geocities.com/pct_2005

:slight_smile:

Mountain Goat

#10

It all really depends. How light are you going? Like Mountain Goat mentioned the Mtn Smith Ghost is a good lightweight pack at 3100 cu in. I wouldnt use anything over this size if you want to stay on the light side. Personally, I’ve gone out for a week on the AT with my 2500 cu in. pack. It’s all quite relative and depends greatly on how much weight you’re carring.

guru

#11

thanks everyone for your responses. I was planning on going with a pack with a good suspension and load carrying capabilities. It has been personal experience that tells me a good weight bearing pack is a comfortable one, however have not been able to try any of the newer fast and light packs lacking some of the support and suspension. I realize that everyones body and torso shape differs, but do you think that a couple extra pounds of actual pack weight with a good suspension vs. fast and light with barely any at all makes a significant difference over time? thanks again… I was actually thinking 4500 CI, but am rethinking the size now. Thanks

hube

#12

I started the PCT with a Gossamer Gear G4, which weighs about a pound but has no suspension…it was not comfortable when carrying heavy water loads, which was quite often at the start of the hike. I thought to myself that I would gladly use a pack that weighed another pound if it meant that it was more comfortable to wear. That pack turned out to be the Granite Gear Vapor Trail, which I used the rest of the way and absolutely loved.

Pacer

#13

In july i have hiked from Walker Pass to Echo lake with a 60 liters Osprey pack, i was 42 pounds with 8 days of food and water, and i can tell it’s too much for my body, my own weight is only 63 kg so it’s a lot.
I’ll try to cut the weight for the desert sections in april!:wink:

french bob