anyone used vacuum bags airplane luggage?

[Mels]

Has anyone used those plastic bags that you suck all the air out of for reducing size of stuff in their checked in baggage?
thought we could get a couple of duvets in a suitcase this way.

Mels

[neilw71]

What happens if you have to break the seal at Security during the trip? Where can you find a vac in an airport check in area?

Not a good idea IMHO - duvets are dirt cheap over here - just buy a couple when you get here

Neil

[YouMeAndThree]

What happens if you have to break the seal at Security during the trip? Where can you find a vac in an airport check in area?

Not a good idea IMHO - duvets are dirt cheap over here - just buy a couple when you get here

Neil

Haven't used them myself, but I do know that you can roll them to expell the air. Not as good as a vaccuum cleaner though.

I've also heard, from this website, that quality of cheap duvets is very poor. Again, I don't know how true this is having never been to NZ.

Lx

[Hejwitch_uk]

My Mum and Dad recently moved to France and bought a couple of the good quality vaccuum bags. They were brilliant - until they were lifted, then the seal went and everything fluffed up again. Needless to say, the hoover had been one of the first things to go into the moving van. Great in theory, perhaps not so good in practice.

[BkyMonster]

I have some of the roll-to-express-air type. I'll be using those for some clothes. The ones I have are actually camping supplies so seem fairly sturdy. I thought about the vacuum ones but I'm pretty good at squishing things and they don't cut down on weight of course, just size.
Another thing to think of is finding some kind of stuff sack, like for sleeping bags, to stuff your duvets in.

[mgbridges]

I've used the vacuum bags for storing bedding and although they do reduce the size of the duvets they end up really rather heavy. As others have said you also run the risk that if the seal breaks they could fluff up again at the most in-opportune moment.

I sent a couple of duvets via Fedex (1 x kings size, 1 x single) plus a ton of other useful household stuff to my OH as he was out here ahead of me and DS. It was well worth the £160 (ish) I spent on the two massive boxes and saved us a lot of NZ$ which we would have had to spend on basics until the container arrived.

HTH
Anneliese

[peebles16]

We basically had four enormous bags and hand luggage on the flight. With two 'boisterous' boys in tow one child and one luggage trolley each was enough for us to manage One of our suitcase just had bedding and towels in it including duvets (that *cough* still managed to fit in their original packaging ) I have to say I agree that the quality and especially the tog ratings on duvets here in NZ are not up to much compared to those you can buy relatively cheaply in the UK - but will happily be proven wrong

Karenx

[Brian]

I bought a few of the squeeze-type bags to test out. Most of my clothes are very dense - cotton, denim, fleece, etc. Using the bags did not save me any space at all in my luggage. I have a heavy plastic trunk with a locking lid so I can already squeeze things in a bit. In a way they actually made it more difficult because it limited how I could position things.

It seems like they would be useful in two cases - if you have duffle bags or other difficult to compress luggage, and if you have fluffy items like down blankets.

They're cheap enough to be worth a try - just don't count on them doubling the amount of clothes you can take!

[marcia]

i used them in our suitcases, but for T-shirts, shorts etc for Kev and myself, it did save quite a bit of space, meaning we could bring extra clothing, but not sure I'd risk a duvet!

[JasonS]

i used one to put my sweaters in (we came down here in january, summer, but we also needed winter clothes to visit family in the northwestern states during the christmas holidays before arriving to NZ). it worked good to get them all mushed down. i did not have any issues with security needing to get into the bag for a "look-see".

laurel