Manitoba Geocaching Association

winnipegk5 · Joined: 12 Jun 2005 Posts: 49 Location: Manitoba

Thaught it might be a good idea to start a container post. Either ideas for containers, places to buy or sales that you have seen.

I will start with army surplus ammo containers. I found nice size ones at Mills Fleet Farm in Fargo and Fergus Falls for $3.50 US on sale. Excellent condition and a great price from what I have seen. I picked up 13 of them for future hides. These are great for in the bush not so great for urban caching.

-- Edited by winnipegk5 at 19:40, 2006-02-28

winnipegk5 · Joined: 12 Jun 2005 Posts: 49 Location: Manitoba

Also on topic Lee Valley has some killer magnets for micro caches , also good magnets on sale occasionally at Princess Auto.

1Queenand4Jokers · Joined: 07 Mar 2005 Posts: 268 Location: Manitoba

Ditto on Lee Valley magnets (small and powerful), old magnets from hard drives are awesome too! Sounds like Fargo has a very good price on Ammo containers. If you want a very good inexpensive container that has held up very well for us check out Player tobacco containers which you can often pick up at Goodwill stores or Value village. Screw on lid for 25 c a pop that holds up under extreme temperatures and moisture well.

Where does one find cheap detox containers? Those are very nice but we've used none since we've found none anywhere yet.

MHz · Joined: 20 Apr 2005 Posts: 268 Location: Morris

Last spring Cabelas in East Grand Forks had a great big parking lot sale and were selling ammo cans for $1 US. Gord and I looked at them but decided we may have trouble getting them across the border as they had arabic writting on them and had a lot of sand in them. A good deal but we decided to pass. Deals like this will probably show up in various places in the US from time to time.

Next time we went down we looked for them at Cabelas again but they were sold right out and all the new ones they sell are plastic and expensive.

Just another place to look if your driving through! MHz

winnipegk5 · Joined: 12 Jun 2005 Posts: 49 Location: Manitoba

It was a good thing my car wasn't searched this past weekend, they would have opened the hatch and saw 13 ammo containers lining the floor. :)

TheStuntman · Guest

Recently I've noticed that the Lock n' Lock Containers are becoming very popular. They are also available at most big stores Wal-mart, Zellers, Superstore, ect. These containers come in all different shapes n' sizes, multi packs and have a great seal when snapped shut. A little cammo tape and your off.

TurdleEggs · Joined: 31 Jul 2005 Posts: 685 Location: Ste Genevieve

I’ve got a little problem with Lock ‘n Locks. The Turdle-femme has found my stash of Lock ‘n Locks and has found they also make great lunch containers. My problem is, even after eating the meatloaf, the container is still no longer useable as a cache container because it has had food I it. Has anyone else run into this and how did you resolve it?

1Queenand4Jokers · Joined: 07 Mar 2005 Posts: 268 Location: Manitoba

Response to the Turdle lock n' lock problem

1.You must put on the camo tape (outside), or spray paint them (from the inside), BEFORE you bring them in the house

2. buy his/hers sets. Then she'll let you buy all you want - 1 for you - 1 for me.

3. buy her the cheap blue lidded ziploc containers that she can throw away - tell her you're saving the environment by not wasting the natural resource called water.

4. Pack both your lunches pretending to use the lock n' lock's but just use Saran wrap instead...slip out of the house quickly and go hide the containers before she notices at noon.

5.Wrap them up and send the lock n' locks to yourself from a secret admirer. It may cause other problems but at least you'll have the lock n' locks..

lizardo · Joined: 02 Sep 2005 Posts: 497 Location: Winnipeg

I noticed a shipment of lock & locks of a few different sizes at Dollarama last week. Ok, so they're not actual lock & locks. But the mechanics are similar. Four tabs that close over the edges of the container.

And they're a dollar!

lizardo · Joined: 02 Sep 2005 Posts: 497 Location: Winnipeg

I went to Army Surplus yesterday. There were about 200 ammo cans there. The ones that are 15.00 at Princess Auto are 13.00 at Army Surplus. And they are clean. They have TONS of those smaller 10.00 containers.

If you want to break the bank, you can spend around 40.00 on a container big enough to hold one of Bevro's dogs, and likely both of grnbrg's! Although they wouldn't be happy about it.

Cache and Cary · Joined: 20 Mar 2006 Posts: 18 Location: Winnipeg

Does Westbourne Manitoba still have that Army Surplus place that sells ammo boxes?

I prefer staying in the Province for shopping

Say, what kind of paint would you use to cammo a PLASTIC container (wouldn't think it would stick)

-- Edited by cache and cary at 13:09, 2006-03-20

MHz · Joined: 20 Apr 2005 Posts: 268 Location: Morris

cache and cary wrote:

Say, what kind of paint would you use to cammo a PLASTIC container (wouldn't think it would stick)-- Edited by cache and cary at 13:09, 2006-03-20

I use sand paper to scuff up the surface of my plastic containers and then use model paints. Either the oil based enamels or latex/water clean up ones work.

I've used them on 4 of my caches so far and all seem to be holding up fine. MHz

TurdleEggs · Joined: 31 Jul 2005 Posts: 685 Location: Ste Genevieve

Visited a hand painted MHz cache just yesterday and it seemed to be holding up quite well. I bet it’d be completely invisible against a leafy background!

MHz · Joined: 20 Apr 2005 Posts: 268 Location: Morris

TurdleEggs wrote:

Visited a hand painted MHz cache just yesterday and it seemed to be holding up quite well. I bet it’d be completely invisible against a leafy background!

Thanks to you and Lizardo for checking on it! Been watching for foot prints at 1st landing all winter! That one actually has many coats of paint on it. I tried one color combo, took it to the cache site and one or more colors made it stand out. So I took it back and tried again. The 5th try seemed to work the best. Don't ask me to reproduce it as I can't remember which combo worked but I suspect some of the first 4 paint jobs are still poking through too. None of the other caches I have took quite as long to match up as 1st Landing did. MHz

Cache and Cary · Joined: 20 Mar 2006 Posts: 18 Location: Winnipeg

The real object of container consideration in Manitoba should be "Is it TurdleEggs-PROOF?"

. And after witnessing one searching "accident" (Teal's Treasure) I have strongly suggest STURDY (bear proof, bullet proof, & even T proof) containers.

Unfortunately some containers that are inexpensive do not survive the "boot test". Especially when it is cold out - some plastic containers get REALLY brittle. That's why I like covering my caches in camo duct tape because it adds to the structural integrity of the container, as well as making it harder to find.

So, whenever I consider a container for the cache, the really important question "Is it sturdy enough to survive a caching accident (>cough TurdleEggs