Great bottles, love the higher capacity. They definitely have a faster / higher volume flow per squeeze which makes it much easier to grab a quick drink. I like the clear bottles so I can easily see how much I have in there. The caps can be a tiny bit leaky. A few drops here and there are irrelevant outside, but can add up during longer indoor rides. I'll certainly take light-weight over unnecessary extra weight, but the weight of the bottle is a pretty minor factor when you consider you'll have almost a whole kg of fluid in one.
I got the brushed stainless insulated version. You definitely lose a little bit of capacity for the insulation.
My Arundel Mandible carbon cages hold them very securely on my gravel bike over rough technical sections. Not one bottle eject after hundreds of gravel miles. The stainless is abraded a bit by dirt and the cages but they still look great to me.
Great flow. Like seriously great. If the flow seems slow, and the bottle has water in it, pull the nozzle a little with your teeth while riding to make sure it's open.
I have several of these on multiple bikes. They securely hold any bottle I have. My mountain bike has never lost the bottle over some pretty bumpy terrain. And when we put the bikes on the car rack the bottles are still there when we get home if we forget to take them off when we get in the car.
The tightening knob on most recent two I bought is a little harder to turn so it is a more difficult for my wife to use on her bike due to arthritic hands. Hopefully they will loosen up and it will get easier to use as it wears in. Overall these are the best holders I have found for our use.
My wife and I each got one of these and we both like them. Not sure what the straw is for, it doesn't seem to make a difference in how the water pours out (either way air gets in through the lid) and not using it just means one less thing to keep track of and clean. You can leave water in these bottles for a long time and it won't taste funky. Insulation works great, and worth the extra weight. There are two issues to be aware of:
1) if you leave the valve in the open position and the bottle tips over it will spill water (unlike the plastic bottles, which you have to squeeze for them to leak substantially).
2) After drinking, a little bit of water sits in the valve, so even if you have the valve in the closed position this little bit will spill out if you tip the bottle over.
Even with the two issues above, I don't think I would ever go back to the plastic bottles...
