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VANQUEST HYDRA BOTTLE HOLDER (REVIEW)


The Vanquest Hydra Bottle Holder was one of the first pieces of EDC carry I bought and still use to this day, almost 3 years later.

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The initial plan was to use it to carry and keep in place my RAVpower auxiliary power pack. This is a large model being 3.1/4” X 6.3/4” and holds enough charge for 7 days, in the way I use it. For this purpose the the Vanquest Hydro Bottle Holder works really well. But how can this be, given it primary design is to carry a water bottle.

FOR MY PRIMARY PURPOSE OF SUSPENDING, ORGANIZING AND CARRYING MY AUXILIARY POWER PACK

ADJUSTABILITY AND DESIGN BRILLIANCE
I don’t own many pieces of Vanquest gear but those I do, have demonstrate what a great company for innovative and considered design they are. The Vanquest Hydra Bottle Holder dose exactly what I wanted it to and what I thought it should. It’s ultimately adjustable vie a shock-cord corset like matrix and has an adjustable hook and loop base base to allow for bigger, longer bottles such as a vacuum flask or even a bottle of Prosecco if that’s your bent : )

THIS IMAGE SHOWS THE FULL INTERNAL HOOK AND LOOP FIELD USED TO MAKE THE HYDRA ADJUSTABLE FOR WIDTH AND LENGTH

There’s an extra piece of hook and loop at the top of the Hydra allowing us to cinch it down flat! when not in use, a really nice design feature.

MOUNTED TO THE SIDE OF MY GORUCK, CINCHED DOWN

The Hydra can be mounted to any PALS field via X2 integrated MOLLE straps these can then be secured with press snaps... Don’t like this, probably for the unreasonable reason that the MOLLE straps are a bit short to work with a RIP-(M). Greyman Tactical Rigid MOLLE Insert

INTEGRAL PALS STRAPS TUCKED AWAY, ALLOWING US TO WEAVE SLIGHTLY LONGER STRAPS, MAKING THE USE OF A RIP-(M) MUCH NICER

There is a solution for this and that is to ignore these straps and weave your own into the 5 rows X 2 columns of PALS on the back of the Hydra, this works very well.

THE ABOVE IN ACTION

To the face of the Hydra Bottle Holder is a Hypalon panel with 2 rows X 1 columns of laser cut PALS. For a while I found it useful to mount a; Maxpedition, PHP, smartphone case here making it neat to carry and charge on the go. Side-by-side as I have configured now works well too, but we like options : )

MY CURRENT CONFIGURATION, MAXPEDITION PHP AND VANQUEST HYDRA SIDE BY SIDE AND INSIDE MY GORUCK

MULTI USE, MULTI CARRY, MULTI ROLL.
Options, options, where would we be without options? The Vanquest Hydra Bottle Holder gives us a tone of options. I mount mine inside my GORUCK GR1 21L to carry an auxiliary power pack and sometime I use it to carry my Nalgene 32 oz bottle or vacuum flask for my tea!

USING MY EDC FOR RUCKING, EVERYTHING STRIPED BACK, HYDRA EXPENDED FOR A NALGENE 32oz

WE LIKE OPTIONS, SO WHAT ELSE CAN IT CARRY?
For this post I thought it would be useful to see what the Hydra can handle. From spare clothing in a dry bag to a small bottle of water. Pictures below.

5"X 9" 3L DRY BAG CONTAINING A MID LAYER FLEECE

3.5" X 10.75" VACUUM FLASK 40oz

NALGENE 32oz

2.50" X 8.50" STANDARD BOTTLE OF WATER 17oz

WHAT DO WE THINK?
So, the Vanquest Hydra Bottle Holder is well designed; not just for its primary purpose of carrying a water battle but anything else (within reason) you can think of. It has integrated into my EDC backpack seamlessly, I just use it everyday and never think about it, because the designers down at Vanquest have done all the thinking for me (spoilsports). As I said earlier, most days I don’t use it to carry a bottle, I use it to carry a battery and it does this as if it were made for that task and for that... I love it : )

THE VANQUEST HYDRA BOTTLE HOLDER MOUNTED UP AS NATURE INTENDED

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