Expandable Garden Hose, Upgraded 3-Layer Latex Hose Pipe

 

We have a traditional 1/2″ hose on a reel, about 180’long. This is heavy to move around, and a pain in the neck to unwind and heavy going to fully rewind, especially in colder weather. When first unwound the coils are difficult to straighten, and it’s easily kinked; by comparison the expanding hose types, like the one being reviewed, are much easier to handle. The traditional hose reel is about 25 years old or more, and has been little trouble, staying out in all weathers, though the reel is a bit leaky now; but of course it is readily repairable – one short section near the end developed a leak after frost about 15 years ago, but was simply cut off, and a couple of the plastic Hozelock-style connectors have failed, but were easily replaced.Good value, but a pain to use.

Because the traditional hose is so heavy and awkward to handle, we have also had the expanding hose type for about 8 years, all of the original Xhose type, with a somewhat lighter outer cover than the type being reviewed. We have a100′ plus a 75′, to reach the top of the garden, these are connected with a plastic connector section, available fairly cheaply. Over those 8 years we have bought the original 2 (which were branded Xhose) and 5 replacements. A couple of early replacements were branded, others came from Amazon, or other sources. The more recent versions have had a smaller outside diameter than the Xhose originals, never clear whether this was due to the inner bore of the latex hose, the thickness of the latex hose, or the style of the outer covering, but it didn’t seem to have any effect on longevity anyway. Two leaked as soon as delivered but were readily replaced. Overall, excluding those that leaked on arrival, this gives them a life of about 2 years each. In all cases it is the the inner flexible part that has leaked – the outer cloth sheathe has never gone, and the connectors have been OK. Given the failure rate, we treat them very gently when in use, but this hasn’t helped. The hoses are stored over winter to prevent frost damage, but nevertheless most of the failures have appeared the following Spring on first use (though not always, sometimes they have failed mid-Summer). And of course this type of hose is not repairable, once it leaks, it’s off to the tip.

Obviously we have got fed up with this rate of failure, not to say that it’s expensive, though the price of the original lighter versions has dropped a lot over the years – tempting to say the failure rate is related to the price, but in fact the original expensive branded versions didn’t last any longer. This year both hoses failed independently upon first use in the Spring, one was 3 seasons old, one 2 seasons old.

The newer heavier weight versions (like this type, being reviewed) have been available for a few years, but this is the first of this type we have bought. The differences to the older type are: the ‘upgraded 3 layer latex hose pipe’, the stronger woven outer cover and the brass fittings – and of course they cost more. Again we got a 100′ and a 75′. I was concerned that being heavier they would lose the lightweight convenience of these expanding hoses, but in practice they are still light enough to be considered very light when carrying. They also take up a little more space than the older lightweight version when empty, but not enough to worry about.

The outer fabric is clearly more robust than on the old-style lighter weight versions, but I never found that the durability of the outer cover of those older versions was a problem. The brass connectors may be more robust than the plastic type on the older lightweight versions, but the plastic connectors on those were never a problem – though of course if a connector does fail, it is not really possible to fit a new one, there are some solutions on offer on the internet but they are a bit Heath Robinson and trying to fix a connector to the inner hose is tricky and apparently a bit hit or miss.

Some reviews mention a problem with the hose contracting as soon as it is turned on. Having had the hoses for a few weeks, our experience is that this does happen a bit, but not enough to cause a major problem. We have reasonable mains water pressure. The characteristic only shows when using both hoses coupled to the full 175′ length, it doesn’t show when they are used independently. Certainly at 175′ long the few feet of the hose closest to the nozzle does contract when the nozzle is first turned on, but only by 3′ or so, and it stabilises and seems to stay the same after a couple of minutes. If anything the expanded length of the hose is a little longer than advertised, and the couple of feet contraction makes no material difference. We haven’t used it with a sprinkler yet, I anticipate that at first it will drag the sprinkler a few feet, then settle down. I doubt if this hose would be much good if fed from a water tank rather than mains pressure, but that’s just a guess. This type of hose seems to me to be stronger when expanded and under pressure, the inner latex apparently being innately fragile – possibly the end nearest the nozzle, being un-expanded, will be prone to failure of the latex inner hose as a result, but it hasn’t happened yet. On balance I am if anything encouraged by this characteristic – clearly the inner hose is stronger than on the lightweight type, and therefore requires more water pressure to fully expand (and the longer the hose, the more this shows), but I hope this means it will last longer.

The nozzle is pretty much typical for the type, it works fine.

The hope is that the ‘triple layer’ internal expanding hose is more robust and longer lasting. Only time will tell – I will update this review when or if either hose fails. Early indications are fine – they didn’t leak on first delivery. The older style lightweight versions are still readily available, currently half price or less compared to this reviewed version, so these need to last about 4 years each to offer comparable value to the cheaper older lightweight style – we will see. 4 years still not good enough really, but we live in a disposable world now, apparenly. Honestly, I don’t think there is any hose technology that really works – if it is long lasting it is hard to use, if it is easy to use it is fragile, maybe this type will be a bit less fragile.