Editorial Policy

Independence

• Commissions never set a score or pick a winner. Scores come from the published formula on How we rank.
• No paid placements. No brand pays to be ranked, and no brand sees a page before it's published.
• We don't accept free gear in exchange for coverage. If that ever changes for a product, the page will disclose it next to that product.
• When the best-value option isn't sold on Amazon (several cottage brands sell only from their own sites), we say so and link the maker with a plain, non-earning link.

How picks are chosen

Every page starts from the budget buyer's question: how much weight can I drop, and what does each gram cost? Candidate products are real, currently sold models that are listed on Amazon.com or, for comparison context, sold by their makers. Each one is measured against a named mainstream reference product in its category and scored on the same weighted formula, where grams saved per dollar carries the most weight. The buy link is added last and never decides anything. Every pick is labeled Spec-researched and names a reason you might skip it.

Where the numbers come from

• Weights: the maker's own product page or spec sheet, in grams (converted from ounces when the maker only lists ounces, and labeled as converted). We state which weight we use: a tent's minimum trail weight, a pack in a named size, poles per pair.
• List prices: the maker's own published regular price (MSRP) on its US website, with the date checked (or, where a brand sells in the US only through its official US distributor, that store's list price, named as the source). Never a sale price, never a general retailer's price, never a price copied from another review site. If the maker publishes no US list price, the page says so and the product gets no value score.
• Specs and ratings: the maker's published figures. Sleeping-pad R-values are shown as the maker states them, with the ASTM F3340 standard named where the maker cites it; sleeping-bag ratings say whether they're ISO 23537 tested or the maker's own rating. Boil times, flow rates and burn times are the maker's claims and are labeled that way.
• Safety facts: water treatment claims come only from the maker's stated test standard or a public-health source such as the CDC, with links.
• Forum anecdotes, star ratings, review counts and other sites' lists are never cited as evidence.

What we don't claim

• That we tested, owned or used any product on this site. Units we claim to have tested: 0.
• Credentials, titles, trail miles or experience the author hasn't shown you.
• Amazon prices we didn't pull live from Amazon, with an “as of” time.
• Testimonials, customer ratings or review counts of any kind.

Corrections

If something on a page is wrong, email mike@blackironathletics.com or use the contact form and tell us the page and the figure. We check the correction against the maker's source, fix the page, and add a dated note to that page's “What changed” list. Corrections are made whether or not the error favored a product we link to.

When a page counts as updated

The “Updated” date on a page changes only when its content really changes: a pick added or removed, a weight or list price corrected, a model replaced, new guidance written. It doesn't change for a routine redeploy, a design tweak or a fixed typo. Roundups and builds are re-checked every six months (spring and fall) and whenever a model is refreshed, as set out on How we rank.

How pages are produced

Pages are researched from the cited sources: makers' product pages, spec sheets and manuals, and published standards. Drafting and fact-checking can involve AI software tools. Every page is held to the same rule however it was drafted: each number comes from a source you can open, weights and prices come from the registry the whole site shares (so a correction fixes every page at once), and nothing is published that those sources don't support. If you find a line that fails that test, tell us.