Thoughts on these two- The Platypus or Katadyn. Also how about the Sawyer water bottles with filters while canoeing?

There have been lots of threads and discussion of gravity filter setups, it's a popular topic. Many home brewed setups based on a variety of bags/bottles/bladders and inline filters.
My only experience is with an inline setup using Sawyer Mini, that can also be used as a draw thru in a bottle when traveling.

Have not used the gravity set yet but have tested at home. It filled the 100oz bladder in 4 minutes. The filter bottle I have used and it works well.
My filter mainstay for a long time has been a First Need and will get use on solo canoe trips.

One item I took a long hard look at Canoecopia was a MSR TrailShot . Lighter and more packable than a filter bottle, I used it in a few demonstrations, good flow easy hand pump action. If I was looking for an on the water/trail/moving filter it would be my fist choice.

butthead

If you are considering gravity filter systems (and I would be) the two most common are Platypus and Sawyer. There are plenty of owners of both systems that are extremely pleased with how well they work and how easy they are to maintain.

Katadyn owners on the other hand have many a horror story about making it through one or two bags before being hopelessly plugged. They do not have a very good reputation. their pump filters may be okay but they are a lot more work, take more time and require more maintenance.

I have the Platypus system and couldn't be more happy with how well they work. In the field raising the clean water bag above the dirty water bag and letting 6-8 ounces of water flow back through the filter is all it has taken to keep water flowing freely through our system.

The Sawyer mini filters work very well too, haven't tried them inline on a gravity filter although I think they would work fine. But with a bottle or the reusable bags they often come with they are very convenient, especially for on the water drinking.

A gravity system is the way to go for in-camp filtering. Of the three main suppliers - MSR, Platypus, and Katadyn - filters of the first two are field-maintainable by back flushing, while the Katadyn is not and has a history among the BW tripping community of clogging beyond use during trips.

The size of system and bags for dirty water and clean water storage will depend on the size of group and your water usage needs. I have an MSR system for group trips.

I started using one of the Sawyer Water Filter Bottles with the Sawyer Mini-Filter inside a few years ago and find it to be a very effective solution to drinking on the go - just unscrew the cap, fill with water, replace cap and drink. The mini-filter is attached to the cap with tubing which extends through the cap, making a straw that you use to suck the water up through the filter. It's easy to use and I no longer carry liters (or pounds) of filtered water, nor do I have to stop and filter water. I hand carry it on portages and drink while walking. I also have a carabiner attached to it to clip to a pack.

For solo in-camp filtration, I just use a Sawyer mini-filter gravity conversion with a couple of 2-liter bags and some tubing and attachment accessories. It's modestly slower than bigger filters, but still doesn't take too long, although I have never sat and timed one. I just hang any of the gravity filters first thing and then go about camp chores. The water is always filtered by then.

I switched last summer from an MSR pump to a Platypus and could not be happier after two trips. Very easy to set up and backslash if needed for either particles or air bubbles. I always keep the dirty water bag in my "under seat" bag so I can fill offshore before pulling into a new camp.

Don't pump - when in camp use gravity filter/siphon system. the Sawyer bottles are great. We use it on the trail and then pull the filter to use in camp in a DIY gravity/siphon system.
check out Butthead's post - great information and ideas

A couple of other things I forgot to mention:

While you can drink out of the Sawyer Mini-Filter/Squeeze systems with the bags, it's easier to drink out of the bottle with one hand.

There is a lot of information, if you are interested, on hiking websites/blogs and on YouTube about converting the Sawyers to a gravity system.

Technically, the tube on the water bottle does not extend through the cap, but attaches to a fitting on the cap and there is a short piece of tubing attached to one on the top. It is covered by the cap, which swivels closed when you are not drinking.

Neither. MSR.

I made my own using an MSR Dromedary bag for the clean water, a Seattle Sports collapsible bucket for the dirty water (thinking I'll switch to a non-PVC bag eventually), a Sawyer 0.02 filter, a Katadyn charcoal filter, and Kent Systems fittings/connectors and Acrolene XP tubing. It will do up to 10 liters at a time.

quote DCfreebird: "Thoughts on these two- The Platypus or Katadyn. Also how about the Sawyer water bottles with filters while canoeing?"

The new little Katadyn is just another pump and their gravity filters clog fast and are expensive. Check MSR, Platypus or Sawyer.

Search this site - there are lots of threads about water filter systems and DIY rigs. Good ideas.

Make a Sawyer gravity filter. Easy to do a search here and there is about a hundred threads on making one.

Sawyer mini for $20 and some tubing.

I have been carrying the sawyer mini as a back up. Last fall it was worth it's weight in gold when our msr failed in some very arid Idaho back country, I guess it wasn't up to filtering water from an elk wallow??? A task the sawyer handled without a problem! Clear north country lakes are cake! One drawback to the sawyer is that it will freeze if you aren't careful and when it does it will not be effective and you won't know it. Not an issue for most canoe campers. No problem for cold weather either if you put it in your bag with you.
It's very easy to rig the mini for gravity feed and it is upper fast! Works great and you can't beat the price!

I absolutely love my Platypus GravityWorks 4.0 liter system.
I also bring one or two Platy Water Tanks depending on the group size so we never run out of clean water. The system with one 4L water tank weighs 19.2 oz. and the 4L water tank separately weighs 3.6 oz. I appreciate that the bags are clear so you can see how much water you have. The only issue I have with the system is that the heavy duty ziplock seals on the bags can be a hard to close.