Dometic makes a better portable water faucet

As a reluctant last day prepper and eager vanlifer, Dometic’s battery-powered Go Faucet has, for the past fewer years, played a cardinal domiciled successful my bougie bug-out kit and my camping rig’s h2o system. So it took maine each of 2 minutes pinch Dometic’s caller Recon 360 Faucet to recognize it’s an upgrade successful each azygous measurement that matters — and past confirmed aft a week of testing it.

The Recon 360 Faucet lets you pump h2o retired of a retention instrumentality for illustration a emblematic faucet successful places that deficiency accepted plumbing, beryllium it wrong a boat, cabin, aliases van, aliases astatine the beach, occupation site, aliases campground. A agelong silicone h2o hose attaches to the backmost of the faucet and snaps into the CPC quick-connect fitting recovered connected Dometic’s Go Jug aliases Recon Hardside Coolers. But there’s thing to extremity you from dropping that conduit into immoderate jerry tin via a third-party CPC adapter. It besides useful pinch inline filters for illustration the 1 I usage from LifeStraw and Camelbak.

As to the upgrades, the Recon 360 Faucet ditches the easy-to-miss touch aboveground for existent mechanical buttons. One fastener produces a modular h2o travel to brushwood your teeth aliases capable a glass, and the second, larger fastener emits a much forceful watercourse for washing dishes, your hair, aliases quickly filling a h2o vessel earlier heading retired connected a hike. The h2o watercourse shuts disconnected pinch a 2nd property of the progressive button, different it’ll automatically extremity the travel aft 90 seconds aliases 1.5L/3L to debar depleting that precious resource.

In my testing, pressing the smaller fastener extracts 1 liter of h2o successful 41 seconds (at a large 52dB from arm’s length), while the accelerated fastener yields 1 liter successful conscionable 24 seconds astatine an moreover louder 60dB. The low-flow mode is quieter than the original one-button Go Faucet, pinch a little annoying drone owed to its little pitch. However, it’s still excessively large for vanlifers to sneak a solid of h2o astatine nighttime while others sleep, though the agleam LED ray that illuminates the watercourse surely makes it possible.

And arsenic the sanction suggests, the guidelines tin now beryllium rotated 360 degrees for much placement options. It’s a invited alteration that should trim the number of times I person to cleanable h2o disconnected my room antagonistic erstwhile the stiff, crimp-resistant h2o hose — included pinch some Dometic models — caused the lightweight Go Faucet to twist distant from the sink.

Thankfully, the caller pat has besides been migrated from Micro USB to a USB-C connector for charging, pinch a artillery that’s still bully for astir 150 liters (about 40 gallons). The Recon 360 Faucet now besides has a 4-stage LED metre connected apical that shows the remaining charge.

The faucet is somewhat smaller but a small heavier than the Go model. It comes pinch a action of metallic pucks that tin beryllium adhered to a countertop aliases h2o jug to create a level for the faucet’s magnetic base. The unit of the caller magnet feels astir doubly arsenic beardown arsenic the older model, which should clasp the faucet successful spot amended erstwhile driving down bumpy roads. That’s bully because I’ve sent my Go Faucet flying done the van astir 5 aliases six times now, yet it conscionable keeps connected pumping. I dream the Recon 360 Faucet is conscionable arsenic durable.

The only existent rumor is the price: $149.99 for the Recon 360 Faucet, alternatively of $99.99 for the Go Faucet, which Dometic still sells. The Go Faucet is great, but the Recon 360 fixes truthful galore small complaints that I deliberation it’s worthy each other penny. Yes, location are cheaper and less-functional alternatives to beryllium had connected Amazon and Aliexpress, but if you request to usage a portable faucet regularly, for illustration I do, past Dometic’s durable and feature-rich faucets won’t disappoint if you tin spend them.

All photography by Thomas Ricker / The Verge