Part 2:

You WANT  the tip of the screw to go UNDER the rim of bucket and JUST into the side but NOT all the way thru. 2 reasons for that. No sense making a potential leak point and you don’t want a sharp screw tip on the inside of bucket to cut yourself or tear your food bags.

After adding the screws, I ran another bead of silicone sealer and completely filled the gap between lid/bucket and covered the screws. No bear will POP the lid off, they’ll have to tear it open which we all know their more than capable of doing IF they scent your food and have the time.

I plan on using 2-13 Gallon garbage bags as can liners. They make them with non-scented odor eating coating which should add another layer of odor protection.

Finally, I didn’t like the idea of leaving the metal handle on the bucket. Besides making the buckets less easy to pack, I thought about them as being a possible point for a bear to bite hold of and carry bucket off OR as a leverage point to hold the bucket down with one paw and pop lid with the other.

I removed the wire handles and used some Paracord to make a couple of small loops that I ran thru a ¼” stainless washer and fished them up from the underside of the bucket handle mounting hole.

I made a rope handle out of more Para-cord and used some ¼ “rubber fuel line to make 2 –handles. I tied a knot on each side of handle to center it.

On each end of Para-cord handle I attached a simple galvanized squeeze clip. The idea is after stashing buckets, you take the handles off and leave stashed on hanging limb so you don’t lose them or some critter hauls them off.

Here are 3 pics of the finished product.
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The REAL test will come in the Q this spring.