Not all 1 1/2" Fire Hoses are created Equal, OR I may be paranoid, but they are out to get me

[Will Truitt]

For those of you who have tried so hard to help me as I have struggled in
vain trying to get  my recalcitrant 1 ½” nitrile fire hose onto the barbs, I
have some developments today.  I got the smaller size pipe expander (sized 1
1/8” to 1 5/8”), inserted it into the hose and was able to dilate it fully
out to 1 5/8”, the limit of the tool.  But when I backed it off, it
contracted back to its original position, with no discernable gain in
diameter, even after several tries and with heat applied.  I knew it was
time to stop beating my head against the wall, although I was beginning to
really enjoy seeing all those stars.  I called the seller, who gave me the
manufacturer’s phone number in Canada.  I called them and spoke with their
tech person, whom I am happy to say tried very hard to be helpful.  I told
him what I was doing,  all the things I had tried, and gave him the measures
of the barbs.  We both agreed that, despite my heroic measures, it was not
likely that barb would ever fit into the hose.  This hose is rated to 500
PSI, is of very high quality, and it is specifically designed to return to
its dimensioned shape.  He said that, when they want to change the shape,
they heat it in an oven up to several hundred degrees centigrade.  

 

Despite the fact that I spent $168.00 on 50 feet of this nitrile hose and
had cut it into the lengths I needed, it was time to accept the inevitable,
and get some other hose.  So I went back to the dealer and bought a 75 foot
length of domestic, generic 1 ½” fire hose, the white weaved stuff you see
everywhere.  This stuff is rated to 300 PSI.  Back in the shop, the barb
went on with relative ease.   I cut my first length, horsed down two hose
clamps at each end over the barbs, inflated it, and left it for a couple of
hours.  It did not leak at all in the water bucket, or lose pressure over
that time.  So I cut all my lengths, goobered the barbs with an adhesive
sealant, and torqued down two hose clamps on each barb.  I’m letting it dry
overnight, and will test inflate tomorrow, but I am optimistic that they
will work fine.  Once I had the right hose, it took me all of 1 ½ hours to
cut the hose and put everything together.  The pipe expander was useful in
that, where the hose was a little tight on a barb, I could expand it just a
tad and get the hose over the barb more easily.  Still worth the $21.43 I
spent for it. 

 

I was talking to Doug Kirkwood (a fellow New Hampshire Chapter member) this
afternoon, and he suggested to me that what I may have is a metric size that
is very close to but is not exactly 1 ½”, which a middleman distributor may
have substituted for 1 ½”.    I have no way to obtain exact dimensions, but
the Nitrile hose is visibly smaller than the domestic product.  I don’t know
for sure if that is the case, but it may make sense here.

 

Thanks again to all who were helpful.  Even though my problem turned out to
be something different from others experiences, your input helped me to
establish what is “normal”, and gave me a frame of reference.  Otherwise, I
would still be stabbing in the dark.  

 

Will 

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