Gear Grams Gear List Calculator
I've never been that into using software to create gear lists (mostly because I fear the daunting task of entering all the data on all of my gear).
Many people use Excel spreadsheets and it works but it's not as convenient to slap together a gear list for a specific trip. You have to do a lot of cutting and pasting.
I recent came across a really cool gear calculator called Gear Grams and have been playing around with it this morning.
It's a free, very user friendly program that allows you to quickly build specific gear lists with a simple drag & drop interface. You simply enter all of your gear into your "gear library", then drag individual pieces of gear into a list. I like this a lot because you can easily build lists for summer, winter, ultralight, or even specific locations or conditions. And, of course, every list automatically calculates your total weight.
One feature I really like is the ability to quickly shift between grams, pounds, ounces, or kilograms. That makes conversion simple for the mathematically challenged (like me).
Once you make your gear lists, you can easily share them by generating links and sending them to friends or posting them in a forum.
Overall, this is a very intuitive program and if I can get over my data entry phobia, I might just use it and become a gear list person.
Here is a video showing how easy Gear grams is to use.
Do you make gear lists? What program do you use?
Gear Grams Gear List Calculator
Reviewed by Jason Klass
on
July 16, 2011
Rating:
Reviewed by Jason Klass
on
July 16, 2011
Rating:
14 comments
I can't thank you enough for pointing this one out to me. I'm just enough of a gear geek to NEED one of these. And this one is by far the best I've stumbled across. For some of us, seeing it on the spreadsheet is the only way we can really "see" where we can improve. I feel like I need to warn your other readers. This one is a bit of a time killer.
Looks slick Jason. The look and feel gives me the impression that it's Mac software. Is it? I hate to give out my email address to create a logon. I've been burned before so I didn't check it out personally.
I can say that spreadsheets have come a long way. I have spreadsheet that has all my gear listed. I put an X next to each piece of gear I plan to carry and I automatically get the weight and can print out a list of the X'd items. I also have a column for price and can get the cost of the gear carried. It's not a feature I recommend for the faint of heart.
Finally! I've used many calculators and they never seem to work for me. This one looks easy to use. Thanks.
I too use spreadsheets, but I particularly like the way you can categorise gear between stuff you carry, stuff you wear and stuff you consume along the way with geargrams. And also the ability to have multiple lists based on a common library of gear. Of course i try to do this in Excel, but only with limited success.
Gear Grams is awesome! I discovered it last winter and entered all of my gear. I really enjoy that it is easy to use and fairly quick. Much nicer than an empty excel spreadsheet.
I just tried it and it wouldn't let me enter gear in the Gear Library. I could enter gear in the GearList I made but then it still didn't show up in the Gear Library so I could drag and drop it into a new GearList.
I use Excel lists all of the time. In the lead-up to a trip I will make lists on my blackberry as I day dream about the up coming adventure. However when it comes to packing I never use them. And if I did I might not have some of the great stories.
Jason,
I too have recently found Gear Grams, and I really like it. I have tried to use different spreadsheets from the old BPL spreadsheet/gear list contests, but I think GG is just a better way to do it. My only concern is the longevity of the site, because I don't see how they make money to keep the site going. Hopefully it will be around for awhile, because it is a very cool way to keep up with everything. I don't think I will be entering every piece of gear I own. Maybe it will just slowly build as I enter everything that I take on trips. This way I will only have to enter what I actually.
I have spent the summer "too hot for my pansy hiney to hike" months researching gear blogs to lighten my pack and have succeeded in losing 10lb in 2 trips. I hate to say how excited I was when my new 11lb scale showed up from amazon the other day!! I have wasted several days weighing gear and entering the info into excel only to find that creating a user freindly spreadsheet wasn't a simple matter. Thanks so much for this tip! Much, much easier.
After playing with geargrams for a while I noticed that it also (thank goodness) has an upload feature. You can copy/paste or reformat your existing spreadsheet into the format that geargrams exports into and then upload your gear items into the program. No need to re-enter, just a 10 minute edit.
I came across gear grams this summer and it really is awesome. My favorite feature is that I can share gear lists with others easily and access it from any internet connection!
The only thing that is frustrating is if I want to make a winter list I have to add several clothing items twice. Once for summer where I don't wear it and one for winter where I do wear it, but the overall ease of use is well worth this one issue.
i didn't like to have to be online to work on my lists... i switched to the linux verion from sherpagear.org, its pretty much the same but its faster. Else i would have get back to my old spreadsheets :p
What a great tool! Thanks for sharing.
jas the gear grams turorial does not work can you tell me the website its on, like is it on youtube or vtube or something like that and then an you tell me the name of the video...thx
Post a Comment