When I saw your post, I immediately wanted to place an order for Elite’s 1 l bottle. Since you see to have experience, what is the difference between Elite’s Jet bottle and Elite’s Fly bottle?
If not, I’ll just buy one of each and post my impressions here.
Edit: I checked Elite’s website, and it seems the Jet is made of biodegradable plastic whereas the Fly is supposed to be “the lightest”. Not that I care about weight, but different plastics have different “squeezeability” and springiness. The 1 l variant of the Elite is prettier to my eye, but in the end, form should follow function.
Yeah… I’ve had a full one pop out from a cage when going down a gravel descent.
Have the Elite 550ml ones and they’re great in the same cage, just the larger ones had that issue. Was fine once there was less liquid in the bottle, just at the beginning of the ride when was full
I’ve only tried the Fly version. I just ordered the other one.
Agreed. I’ve lost countless Zefal’s. Luckily I stocked up when I saw them on sale for $5 each a while back. Bought a dozen of them. I’ve got 6 left. The others have broken during ejections.
I think most the ejections happened early in a ride, when full, and with a particularly weak bottle cage I was using.
I’d blame the cage 2x as much as I’d blame the bottle shape. They’ve never been launched since I bought better cages. But they do require a higher security cage than “cheapo amazon aero carbon cage” if you’d like to keep them secure. Especially if you’re using them on gravel.
I just placed an order as well: 1 big Jet, 1 big Fly (transparent) and a smaller 750 ml Fly in black.
Agreed. I’ve been partial to Elite’s cages, and the only time I lost a bottle when I hit a massive pothole on my road bike (it was in a corner and there was no way for me to see it in advance). Ditto on my mountain bike: Elite’s bottle cages have always worked very well. On my mountain bike I use the cheaper plastic ones, my road bike has the lightweight carbon ones (although more for aesthetic reasons). Zero problems with Camelbak’s Mark 1 and Mark 2 bottles and Specialized bottles.
I’ve got the old SIS wide-mouth ones. They were my favourite.
The newer SIS ones aren’t wide-mouth and the mouth piece on one of them “bites” your lip when you pull it out to drink. So, very disappointing. Also, small mouth makes it trickier to dump powder into.
For what it’s worth - I recently ejected myself over the handlebars and ended up one pedal clipped in on my back with the bike above / on top of me upside down, and my 26 oz purist came out and broke my garmin, but my New Zefal did not. I’m using Arundel Side loader cages. Haven’t been using them a real long time, but I have maybe 3 ~2 hour XC MTB rides on some smooth but also plenty of rough and chunky stuff and I haven’t lost one yet.
I use Elite Fly 950mL, one black, one clear. I have had them for exactly 1 year and they have worked really well. I use them in my Arundel side-loader cages and have never lost a bottle, even on some gnarly gravel. I admit to squeezing my legs on a bumpy section worried, but they have never popped out.
They are pretty squeezable and like any bottle that weighs nearly 1kg when full, a little hefty when riding. The nozzles work great and don’t seem to leak, although I have misthreaded them and they leaked out the lid (user error). They seem almost flimsy due to the thinness of the plastic, but still going strong. I will buy another set when these give up the ghost.
I just want something thats larger than the camelbak podium big chill, that dont leak, are easy to clean (the new camelbak lids are easy to clean) and are easier to squeeze than camelbak (to refill the front water bottle)
I tried the smaller FLY bottles a few years ago (came free with a SIS order) and got the impression they are disposable bottles for races more than something to invest in to reuse on ultra rides (for example). Also find the nozzles fairly useless and they closed themselves way too easily as I’m trying to drink from them.
More interest in this than I expected for this. I’ve had good luck on bottle retention with nice metal cages. I’ve broken the lid on one, but that was a high-speed ejection out of a sub-par bottle cage. Do any of the ones listed above not leak at the nozzle? My zefals develop leaks there in a matter of months from new, and that means using drink mix requires a bike cleaning. I wish I could get some specialized purist lids on a 1L bottle. I sent an email about this to specialized bottles too. I tied it to #gravel and the spirit of not dying of thirst. Maybe with the support for the lifetime Grand Prix athletes they might have some new interest in this area.
I’m in the exact same boat. I’ve only used Zefal bottles. And only have to clean the bike due to drink mix spill. And I’ve always drunken a litre an hour so haven’t come up with a better solution.
If you go over the bars, as @BCM and I apparently have the propensity to do, and you land on your back, and said bottle is in your pack as a spare fuel bottle, it may save you from the rock you land on, but it will be shorn in half by said rock, too. All contents immediately cover everything in your pack. In all reality, I suspect this would have happened with any bottle and was just grateful to have had some extra padding on my back when it happened.
(when that happened, I immediately bought 2 more)
Yes still pretty pliable. Almost does feel disposable. I kind of like that feeling.
And the nozzle does seem to close easily, which I kind of like. Since the nozzle is so large it’s easy/natural to keep it open while drinking, I’ve found. I have other bottles with smaller easily-closeable nozzles which I accidentally close while drinking all the time, and hate for it. That hasn’t happened yet with the Elite bottles.
My wife has experienced the same problem. I have found that if you close the nozzle harder, that leak issue is delayed by many months up to a year or more. But let’s just say I know the “sticky bike” problem all too well.
The other bottles haven’t done this yet, though I haven’t tested them as long-term as the Zefal. Our house is moving away from Zefal and onto SIS & Elite, most likely. Soma is interesting and promising too, but has only been tested next to me by my computer desk because I currently have covid. (no riding)
I use Polar insulated bottles where the nipple is removable from the rest of the lid (for cleaning). If those are loose, the bottle sometimes leaks. As a result, when I first open the bottles, I give them a quick twist to ensure they’re fully sealed. Not sure if that would help with the Zefal, but worth mentioning.
