Hey.
Have you already gone on vacation? I am not yet, but I am going, and these fees can be safely called pleasant chores. Considering that on vacation my wife and I give preference to a cognitive form of leisure, when you need to walk a lot, watch and learn a lot, for several years in a row not one of our vacations is complete without a thermos, or even two.
In one, usually cold tea with lemon, and in the other hot liquid soup-puree, or another nutritious mass that allows you to quickly refresh yourself without interrupting the cognitive process and contemplating various wonders of the world.
Such thermoses help out at the airport, with long docking, allowing you to kill two birds with one stone – and not stay hungry and save a lot, without overpaying in an airport cafe, where prices are usually so cosmic that you involuntarily begin to wonder if this is a cosmodrome?
Source: pikabu.ru
Therefore, from a pleasant addition, a thermos has turned into a must-have travel attribute. However, finding a good thermos was not an easy task. We tried many options from different manufacturers, mostly, of course, Chinese.
I didn't want to spend money on something professional and expensive, but, as we found out above, it was necessary to have a good thermos.
For a long time, various equipment and accessories from the company Xiaomi and its partners periodically fell into my hands, which allowed me to form an opinion and created a certain credit of confidence in these products. That is why I decided to try the heroes of today's material – Viomi thermoses.
Two thermos of different volumes were taken for the test at once, one for 460 ml (Viomi Stainless Vacuum Cup 460ml), the other for 1500 ml (Viomi Steel Vacuum Pot 1.5L). Below are my impressions of testing this pair.
Let's not change traditions and start with packaging and appearance.
The packaging is standard for most products, both Xiaomi and their partners. In this case, these are white cardboard boxes with a schematic representation of the contents and characteristics.
Inside is a self-contained thermos in a matte protective bag, as well as a 'extremely useful' instruction in Chinese.
Inside the thermoses themselves, there was a bag of silica gel and a card with the production date in each.
We turn to the thermos themselves, their appearance and materials.
Appearance, materials and design features
There are three color options in total – black, white and gold.
In my case, both thermos are black. This is paint applied to metal, so we can assume that it will get damaged and chipped over time, but given previous experience with devices of this type and materials, this should not happen as intensely as, for example, with iPhone black color.
Both the body of thermos flasks and flasks are made of stainless steel AISI 316, which contains molybdenum and nickel, due to which the corrosion resistance of the metal is so high that it can be used in cryogenic conditions and corrosive environments.
Well, okay, we're distracted, I'm not going to carry sulfuric acid in a thermos.
The covers are made of dense plastic with rubber gaskets.
Large thermos lid
The paint has a special anti-slip structure. Thanks to this, the thermos really does not slip out of your hands, and practically no fingerprints remain on it.
As for the small thermos, it has a design that can be described with one phrase – nothing more. This is an elongated bulb without protruding parts and elements, fits comfortably in the hand and has a small size.
Both thermos flasks are comfortable, lightweight and quite compact for their size. The weight of a small thermos is 292 grams. The big one weighs 740 grams. This is the weight of the thermoses themselves without liquid. The dimensions are as follows:
- Small thermos – height 235 mm, diameter 65 mm.
- Large thermos – height 282 mm, diameter 105 mm (excluding the handle).
To understand the scale and size, here is a small thermos versus a regular 1.5 liter bottle.
The larger thermos is made in a classic design for such things, and additionally has a carrying handle, as well as a special valve lever in the lid for pouring.
Here's a comparison with a standard plastic bottle of the same volume.
The only moment that is a little upsetting is that both thermos do not have the lids-mugs familiar to us from childhood. And if in the case of a small thermos this is not important, since a small thermos itself is perceived as a thermo mug, then in the case of a large thermos, I would like to have at hand not only the liquid storage itself, but also the utensils for its use.
Among other features, it is worth noting the valve lever in a large thermos – it is quite easy to press, which means you should not put it in a bag with tightly packed things if you do not want the contents of the thermos to be absorbed by these very things.
However, this is hardly a big problem, since, given its size, this thermos is more suitable for outdoor trips, picnics, and will take pride of place in the trunk of a car, rather than for flights with carrying it in the luggage. But still, I would like to see some kind of retainer of this lever for insurance against accidental pressing.
But the small thermos has a special bracket that acts as a lock and prevents the lid from accidentally opening. At the same time, the lid itself has a button and opens with a spring, which allows you to use the thermos with one hand.
On the manufacturer's website it is indicated that the inner bulb itself on the outer surface additionally has a mirror-like copper coating, which should retain more heat.
Also one of the advantages is the vacuum between the walls of the flask and the outer casing. And, as you know, vacuum is very reluctant to conduct heat. Practice will show whether this is really so.
Now about how the thermos showed itself in work, in fact, for practice.
To test the capabilities of the thermos in the evening at 21:00, boiling water was poured into them and left overnight. The first measurement was taken at 9:00 the next day. The liquid temperature in the small thermos was 74 degrees, and in the big one – 76. Not bad. In 12 hours, the thermoses lost almost 25 and 24 percent of the liquid temperature, respectively. At the same time, the ambient temperature was around 22-25 degrees.
After that, the boiling water was renewed and both thermos were placed in the freezer compartment of the refrigerator, where it was 18 degrees below zero. Two hours later, the temperature of the liquid in a small thermos was 82 degrees, but in a large one – 78. It turns out that thermos keep heat differently at different ambient temperatures. Although, perhaps, an error crept into the experiment, and I did not take into account something, but I tried to put both thermos in absolutely equal conditions.
Alternatively, a large thermos has a higher contact area with the cold shelf of the freezer, which means that the heat loss was higher.
Considering that when you carry the thermos with you in your bag, there will be no contact with cold surfaces, you can expect even better heat retention.
Be that as it may, I think the result is good.
We were also pleased with the quality of the plastic covers. It is durable, looks reliable, and it is also easy to clean, which should please the lovers of cleanliness and neatness, to which I also include myself.
Of the unobvious advantages, I can note the partially collapsible design of the covers, from which some of the seals are removed, which makes it even easier to maintain cleanliness and hygiene – removed, washed, and put back.
Conclusions instead of conclusions
They keep warm well, look good too, are comfortable in the hand, and take up little space in the bag.
It is also pleasing that thanks to the use of metal both in the manufacture of the body and the flask, there is no need to worry about the safety of the thermos, as it was once upon a time, in my childhood, when almost all thermos had a very fragile glass flask, and at the same time were in short supply , because of which each fall of such a rarity on the floor was a small tragedy that added gray hair to the parents.
In Russian retail, thermoses can be bought for about 1,500 rubles, which is a normal price for such a product. Chinese nameless thermoses for a lower cost, I would not write to competitors, primarily because of the unpredictable quality.
Therefore, from the main competitors we can single out Xiaomi Mi jia Mi Vacuum Flask for the same 1500 rubles.
The choice here is primarily in design, although the shape and mechanism of the lid make Viomi more convenient to use.
Here, perhaps, are all my impressions of two thermoses from the same manufacturer. Now the only thing left is to test them in the real conditions of an active vacation, which I am going to do in the near future, which is what I wish for you.
The author is grateful to the Ulyanovsk branch of the X | STORE store for the devices provided for review.