Originally Posted By: hikermor
Phaedrus, thanks for sharing - and very interesting indeed. Let me plant a bug; now that you have made the capital investment, could you seal up some of my stuff, and perhaps that of other forum members, for a small fee?



This forum has been instrumental to my wilderness/survival education to a degree that's hard to express. So many forums are "survivalist", not "survival". I'm so weary of the birther threads and politics. ETS is my haven! The debt I owe specifically to guys like you, Hikermor, (among others) is immeasurable. To attempt to partially pay it forward I will gladly seal up anything you folks would like, for just the costs of postage (and bags if we're talking retort pouches). The machine is new to me to I'm fine tuning things a bit but frankly I'm blown away. This is a commercial product (at a commercial price!) and I'm loving it.

I've had some dealings with a few members here who will vouch for me. I won't jack your stuff! grin

I will say I'm still working out the technical details. It took a few bags to dial in the right sealing/cooling time/temp for retorts. And of course, I haven't had time yet to torture test them. To be fair I will try to tamp down my enthusiasm until I can verify that they work well. Of course, I would love to use you folks as Beta testers! I've long believed that the best way to see if your ideas are valid or if you're seduced by your own biases it to have others test your stuff. Finn has been kind enough to subject a couple of my "science projects" to the real world. His feedback has been invaluable (shout out, buddy! Thanks!).

Retort pouches cost a bit more. Just Google them. They're not "efficient", space wise, because they're very thick- and this makes them rigid. They hold less than a thinner bag would. Of course, this is also the reason we use them! Three layers and almost 6 mils thick, they have a good track record for reliability.

And again, help me test it! I'd love to put some stuff "out in the wild"! If the way I pack something doesn't cut the mustard I'd rather hear it from five of you than learn it when the chips are down.

I'd also love suggestions from you folks with more experience than I have. Which things should have oxygen absorbers? How many strikers for matches? What (aside from lighters) shouldn't you apply vacuum to?

So to make a long post a little bit longer ( grin) the answer is yes.
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“I'd rather have questions that cannot be answered than answers that can't be questioned.” —Richard Feynman