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I normally take enough to cover everything once things are inside.

For example just a top layer. I pretty much believe all iceblocks are the same no super special liquid, some proberley last longer than others.

Just finished making my own ice packs with salt water (recommended on here last year)

Not sure how they will come out, but you all seem to know what you're doing so followed advice.

Got bottles stocked in freezer ready for next weekend. Oh my. i can't wait

If I could offer a tip it would be to freeze three 5 litre water bottles and use them.  Yes they are bulky but this means that they have mass and will take ages to defrost.  They need at least 2-3 days in the freezer though to freeze properly.

When they are nearly defrosted in the cool box, we have bought packs of ice cubes from Lidl (89p per bag) and stuffed the ice cubes into the bottles, resealed them and put them in the cool box.  This is handy when there's nowhere to freeze water by the bottle and where campsites will charge a small fortune for freezing small ice-packs.  It also keeps your coolbox free of water from molten ice-cubes leaching blood from packs of meat etc as they get submerged and contaminating everything else that's in the box.

I bought a Coleman Xtreme 36 Qt for two of us and found it very efficient, considering the old coolbox that it replaced.

We take two lots of four large ice packs, leaving one lot in the campsite freezer (if available of course) and swop over half way through the trip.

Just remember that cold air sinks downwards - ice packs need to be kept on top of the food if possible.

Thanks for the Coleman Extreme advice .. we have an electric Mobicool W35 and were looking for a good standard coolbox for when we go non EHU!

Reviews on it look good ...

had also not heard about using brine as the coolant, will google that, sounds interesting!