PERSONAL BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION
Rick Allnutt
51 Year old male
6' 0'' (183 cm) in height
200 lbs (91 kg) in weight
Email address: rick (at) BackpackGearTest (dot) org
Trail name: Risk
Personal Hiking Page: http://www.imrisk.com
I live in Dayton, Ohio

BACKPACKING BACKGROUND
Over the last several years, I have become an ultralight camper with a three-season base pack weight of about 15 lb (7 kg) and skin out weight of 23 lb (10 1/2 kg). I have completed many section hikes on the Appalachian Trail (AT) in all four seasons, with a total mileage of about 600 miles (966 km). I am a gearhead, a hammock camper, and builder of much of my own equipment.

PRODUCT INFORMATION
Manufacturer: Big Sky Products
Year Manufactured: 2004
Manufacturer's Link: http://www.bigskyproducts.com
MSRP: US$2.99
Listed Weight: 1.2 oz (34 g)
Measured Weight: 1.2 oz (34 g) (measured to the gram)
Measured Volume: 8.0 oz (0.24 L)

REVIEW
The Cup 2 go is a plastic cup with handle, marked in quarter cups with lines and printing on the inside surface of the cup. The plastic cup is surrounded by a neoprene exterior cozy that covers the bottom and 3/4 of the side of the cup.  This neoprene is 1/8 in (3 mm) thick and has been butt-welded at a seam on the side and around the bottom of the cozy.  A small hole in the center of the bottom allows air or liquids to flow through the cozy, making it easy to put the cozy on or remove it. 

For a detailed description of the Cup 2 go, a good source is my Initial Report.

The plastic cup and the cozy are somewhat conical in shape.  This makes it very easy to remove the cozy.  In the first two months of using the cup, I continue to find it easy to slip a finger under the cup to make sure the cozy does not fall off.  This hand position is demonstrated in the photo attached to the Initial Report. 

The cup is of good quality, made from an opaque green plastic.  I have continued using the cup for hot coffee and cold water and noted no bleaching or staining of the plastic.  Because the cozy only comes 3/4 of the way up the side of the cup, it does not interfere with my lips when I sip from the cup.

The unique portion of the design is the neoprene cover. This cover has two practical purposes: to keep the contents of the cup hot, and to keep a hot cup of liquid from burning my fingers through the cup. The cozy does work to protect my fingers when I pour boiling hot liquid into it and then pick up the cup.  It is much more comfortable to hold the insulated cup than the same cup without insulation.

To help test the first purpose, keeping contents hot, I designed a small experiment to determine how well the insulation helps.  The experiment is photographed in the picture that begins this Field Report.  For the experiment, I slipped the insulation off one of the two Cup 2 go cups.  I placed a stack of newspapers on a dry, shaded concrete porch. Weather: partly cloudy morning, wind was light, temperature of the air, about 40 F (4 C). The insulation from the newspapers was 1/8 in (3 mm) thick. I boiled about two cups (1/2 L) of tap water on a stove and immediately poured 3/4 cup (117 ml) of the boiling water into each of the two cups.

I took the cups to the porch and made temperature measurements with a Fluke Infrared Thermometer.  This device measures surface temperature without touching the object. I did not stir the liquid in the cups.  I did check the temperature of the surface of the liquid in the cups about a half dozen times for each measure and averaged the result. Here are the temperatures I obtained over a 25 minute period:

Time cooling	Non-Insulated Cup	Insulated Cup	Porch Temperature
5 min	154 F (68 C)	160 F (71 C)	34 F (1 C)
10 min	127 F (53 C)	131 F (55 C)	35 F (2 C)
20 min	92 F (33 C)	98 F (37 C)	35 F (2 C)
30 min	76 F (24 C)	81 F (27 C)	34 F (1 C)

From this test I concluded that the insulation was effective in keeping the liquid warmer than without insulation, but that the degree of insulation is not a practically useful amount. Most of the heat was probably lost from the uninsulated top surface of the liquid.

TEST CONDITIONS
Thus far, I have used the Cup 2 go on a number of day hikes for a hot drink in the middle of the hike. I look forward to considerably more backpacking experience in the long-term report period. Notably, I will be carrying it for a 6-8 week hike beginning in April.  I will use it for morning coffee, as my outside-the-pack cup to enjoy drinks from springs along the AT, and at the end of the day I will use it to measure the water for my evening meal. Between trips, I will be using the cup for my morning coffee on a daily basis.

I will be interested to note:

- Is the cup durable in the backpacking environment?
- Does it work to use my finger as shown above to keep the cozy on?
- Is it easy to keep the cup clean?
- Does the lettering remain readable over the long haul?