To each their own- my experience was that they were surprisingly fragile in real use, except for the military issue versions.<br><br>Have you considered Sigg aluminum bottles? The anodized versions are intended to resist "beverages", and they at least don't have soldered seams to fail.

"but, as mentioned, the problem is that it's not terribly useful once frozen, so there's not much point in letting it happen. "<br><br>Why not? I may have missed something, but if I was dying of thirst sitting next to the fire I had started with contents from my psk, I could think of a use for a block of ice--if I studied on it for awhile...

My wife has been putting frozen plastic water bottles in my lunch box for years with no problems of leaking. <br><br> If one were to use some of those disposable hand warmer packets wrapped togeather with the frozen water bottle possably in a towel or water parka, it may melt the ice so the water is available to drink. <br><br> The type of hand warmer listed in Campmor claims average temperature of 135 deg. F. for up to 7 hours. Just a thought.<br><br>Neal

It's a good thought- I do keep some of those "Grabber/Mycoal" things in the vehicle anyway, for winter emergencies- it might take awhile, but it seems like you could use one to get useful water from a frozen bottle. Those readers who aren't familiar with them should know that we're not talking about the kind of handwarmer that's made of metal and burns fuel, but the kind that's essentially a gauze pad and gets its' warmth from the chemical oxidation of some pretty common, innocuous ingredients.<br><br>I have some of the old backpacker's Austrian poly bottles that I would trust to freeze, and Nalgene bottles are probably strong enough. Normally, I'd say that the typical water bottle (Evian or whatever) is plenty strong enough- they're amazingly durable- but I had one (admittedly, out of thousands) leak on me as soon as I pulled it from the shrink-wrapped six-pack, and it shook my faith somewhat.<br><br>Mabe put the plastic bottles in plastic bags for the winter, just as a failsafe... in any case, it's a good thought. Might be worth some testing. Thanks.