Gear Review - Guyot Designs TapGuard (out in November 08)

September 15th, 2008 Wade

A few weeks ago I listed several new products out on the market that could make your camping experiences even more cushy. Here is one coming out in November that could improve the taste of your water.

Guyot Designs TapGuard

This nifty little product will be out on the market just before Thanksgiving at REI stores. Then they will be distributed widely to other outdoor retailers after November 28th. The Tapguard won’t protect you from nasty stuff like Giardia. It is a water filter with a different purpose. The TapGuard aims to help people enjoy a better tasting tap water. Thus reducing the amount of bottled water we buy.

Here’s how it works.

• Pop a charcoal filter into your Tapguard (it will come with 2 filter cartridges).
• Slide the Tapguard into the mouth of your favorite Nalgene, Camelback, or other wide mouthed water bottle.
• Drink slowly, the water moves through the filter and removes chlorine and other chemicals in our tap water that make it taste like crap.

I tested the product for Guyot and like it. Here are the pros and cons as I see it.

Pros

• Clean tasting water. It really did make the water taste better, more like bottled water. It takes some of the tangy taste out of the tap water.
• Keep thousands of plastic bottles out of landfills.
• Save money on bottled water if you are a bottled water buyer.
• Will remove the iodine or chlorine taste from filtered water. Those of us who have used iodine or chlorine tablets to clean our backcountry water know what it tastes like. Anything that removes that taste is okay in my book.

Cons

• You have to drink very slowly. No gulping here. So if you’re parched after alot of activity you may want to just drink the tap water straight (you can drink it from the other side straight).
• The early design allows some water to spill through the “drinking it straight” opening on the other side and onto your face. But Guyot assures that this has been corrected in the version going to market in November.

Verdict

Definitely worth a try. At the price these are going to sell at, it’s worth it to save some money on bottled water if you drink it, worth getting rid of the iodine taste from treated water, and worth the environmental savings as well. Will be selling for $14.95

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