This may not be an issue for most folks, but occasionally (as was the case with yours truly) packrafters may encounter a situation where their inflate bag fails in field, provoking hideous thoughts of having to blow it up solely with their lungs…and since I’d wager most river-runners don’t have the same VO2 max as Ed Viesturs or Lance Armstrong, this option will take a bit of time and energy. One bad scenario is that the valve connector detached from the silnylon, unable to be re-seated as designed.
Not to worry. The following will solve this problem in a matter of seconds.
- take valve connector and drop it inside the bag.
- reach inside an grab it, with the threads facing towards the hole at the bottom.
- force the bottle-neck of silnylon over and around the threads, pushing/pulling as needed to expose as much of the threading as possible.
There ya have it. The piece is fixed in-place (just don’t turn it inside-out), and despite some of the threading inevitably still covered by the silnylon, it will still screw tightly onto the raft valve. Check the side stitching on the bottle neck for any weak points, and go try it out. I’ve found that, for me at least, it’s easier to push the air through with this set-up. Obviously don’t wreck your perfectly good inflate bag to see if I’m right or wrong, but if you are considering buying a new bag on account of this precise problem, save your money.