Thread: Airline fittings - Which Type?

Originally Posted by Master Splinter

....... On a similar(ish) topic, has anyone found a garden hose type fitting that won't leak or let go of the hose? I swear, if hydraulic or air lines joined with the same leak-prone-ness as garden hose, industry would have ground to a halt decades ago!

The best garden hose fittings that I know of are the genuine Gardena. There are copies made of inferior plasics that do not last as long. There are copies made of brass that are prone to leaking. I found Gardena fittings last the longest. That said, we are still talking low cost consumer fittings for garden hoses.

There is actually no fundamental difference between water and air or gas or hydraulic fittings. As long as one stays within the specified pressure range and chooses couplers made from non-corrosive materials, an air fitting will work equally well as a water fitting. Just as a hydraulic fitting will work equally well as a gas fitting.

In my job I sometime need cooling water. This is to cool cryo equipment worth new half a million plus $, servicing instruments often worth more than 2 or 3 mio. The water requirements could be met with a 19mm Gardena hose and fittings. But its a mission critical application, and we use 19mm quick connect LeGris couplers. When once a set of couplers was missing during an installation, I went to buy a male and female coupler at a local Melbourne pneumatics shop. I paid $ 140. I stick with Gardena for my garden.

Originally Posted by Master Splinter

On a similar(ish) topic, has anyone found a garden hose type fitting that won't leak or let go of the hose? I swear, if hydraulic or air lines joined with the same leak-prone-ness as garden hose, industry would have ground to a halt decades ago!

Hear hear! Usually once I finish the colourful language, I am heard to yell, "they can put a man on the moon, but they can't make a decent garden hose." The hoses are usually poor and so are the fittings. It cannot possibly be so hard.

Originally Posted by Master Splinter

..... has anyone found a garden hose type fitting that won't leak or let go of the hose? I swear, if hydraulic or air lines joined with the same leak-prone-ness as garden hose, industry would have ground to a halt decades ago!

The brand that is advertised on TV, just can not think of the name, has to be the best I've seen.
They have a bayonet fitting with an O ring seal, much like the Storz fitting fire fighters use.
A friend has them and I was impressed and in time I'll be swapping to them.

Originally Posted by Karl Robbers

Hear hear! Usually once I finish the colourful language, I am heard to yell, "they can put a man on the moon, but they can't make a decent garden hose." The hoses are usually poor and so are the fittings. It cannot possibly be so hard.

Consumers generally will not buy quality because of the cost, as such quality hose cannot be bought from the usual consumer orientated shops...

I use the Jamec fittings. No particular reason I just had a lot of them and kept buying more.

Originally Posted by Master Splinter

SuperCheap usually have a few "20% off everything" sales each year....I take advantage of that to buy things that don't usually come on special. So you could save a bit more on your (genuine) Nitto fittings at sale time!

On a similar(ish) topic, has anyone found a garden hose type fitting that won't leak or let go of the hose? I swear, if hydraulic or air lines joined with the same leak-prone-ness as garden hose, industry would have ground to a halt decades ago!

Nylex Gardena are the only fittings I will use. They last for many years in the open. All other I have used have perished within a year or so. They are hard to find now, and expensive compared to the others. I have started replacing the tap fittings with brass one tho. We use 18mm hose with 12mm connectors. The full 18mm ones are very expensive.

Dean

Originally Posted by Karl Robbers

Hear hear! Usually once I finish the colourful language, I am heard to yell, "they can put a man on the moon, but they can't make a decent garden hose." The hoses are usually poor and so are the fittings. It cannot possibly be so hard.

The white 18mm hose as used by dairies (and wineries) last for a long time. We have a few of them. I think one cost about $100, but I also think it was worth it. It was about 35m long from memory. As I mentioned before, the 18mm hose attachment with 12mm tap connection fittings are not overly expensive, unlike the 18mm hose/18mm tap fittings. I bought the 18mm hose from an irrigation supplier.

Gardena or quality brass fittings.

Dean

Originally Posted by GSRocket

The brand that is advertised on TV, just can not think of the name, has to be the best I've seen.
They have a bayonet fitting with an O ring seal, much like the Storz fitting fire fighters use.
A friend has them and I was impressed and in time I'll be swapping to them.

That would be Hoselink. Good stuff.

The quick connect fittings I have have a little button the side of the female coupler, when pushed it releases the male part. I bought these 20 years ago and at the time most hardwares stocked them. Anybody have an idea what this type is called? I need some more but can't find a supplier.

Originally Posted by garryhatty

The quick connect fittings I have have a little button the side of the female coupler, when pushed it releases the male part. I bought these 20 years ago and at the time most hardwares stocked them. Anybody have an idea what this type is called? I need some more but can't find a supplier.

When I adopted my Dad's old automotive spray painting system he has those fittings with the push button (Chrysler Australia used them at the time in their factory in S.Aust.), however I couldn't find replacements anywhere (maybe obsolete?) so I converted all the couplings to Nitto which appears to be the defacto standard these days. Haven't had a problem with Nitto.

Originally Posted by SurfinNev

That would be Hoselink. Good stuff.

Hoselink appear to be good quality. However my main irrigation is 19mm hoses from high pressure bore water....Hoselink don't make them for 19mm only 12mm common garden variety uses.

Originally Posted by garryhatty

The quick connect fittings I have have a little button the side of the female coupler, when pushed it releases the male part. I bought these 20 years ago and at the time most hardwares stocked them. Anybody have an idea what this type is called? I need some more but can't find a supplier.

Jamec-pem perhaps?

Michael

I just looked up Jamec's site, that's them. I also found some on ebay but I think I might swap to Nito when the time comes, they seem a lot easier to get and the small compressor I use in the garage for inflating bicycle and car tyres has Nito fittings, so might as well make them all the same. More expense!

Originally Posted by Master Splinter

SuperCheap usually have a few "20% off everything" sales each year....I take advantage of that to buy things that don't usually come on special. So you could save a bit more on your (genuine) Nitto fittings at sale time!

That is quite a good move, if they have the item you really want. By that, I mean the item which will do the job, not the item which is supposed to do the job, but which is a real PITA, because it performs so poorly, and then goes on to fail prematurely. There is a lot to like about stores like SuperCheap Auto and Bunnings, and the following comments are more about Bunnings than SCA, but there are many similarities too. They have helpful staff, big range of similar items, and lots of stuff, all under the one roof as well as their community activities, but one of their biggest failings, IMO is the way they concentrate too much at the bottom of the market at the expense of the middle and professional end, I'm thinking tools here. They may sell Makita at the green shed, but it is home handyman Makita, generally not tradies Makita for example.

Originally Posted by Master Splinter

On a similar(ish) topic, has anyone found a garden hose type fitting that won't leak or let go of the hose? I swear, if hydraulic or air lines joined with the same leak-prone-ness as garden hose, industry would have ground to a halt decades ago!

This is a case in point and one of my most frustrating experiences at Bunnings. WHile I agree with the other posters extolling the virtues of Nylex Gardenia fittings to a point, if you've seen goats eat plastic fittings for some dietary variety like I have, you tend to steer clear of them. This leaves brass fittings with the front running position. The trouble is some leak, and many are not compatible with each other. You actually have to try them together, as it is quite easy to pick up a male fitting from one box which wont mate with a female part from the box alongside. These are usually unbranded, just with a commodity code and bar code for the cash register. Some are 12 TPI and some 14TPI, and the length behind the head of the male fitting is a little longer on one variant than the other, so one is too short to be inserted until the retaining mechanism can lock it.
I am amazed that a store like Bunnings hasn't demanded conformity to a standard, they are certainly big enough to do so, and even if no Australian Standard exists, they have the market clout to establish their own, which would likely become the de-facto standard anyway. It would certainly decrease the agro felt when you finally got home to discover the new watering wand or sprinkler wont go on the hose
I am tempted to go with these claw fittings of similar, they are unisex, so less inventory to carry, they are very rugged, but a bit too cumbersome I expect for some situations.http://www.brierleyhose.com.au/clawCouplingsSG.php and you certainly wouldn't want to drag it over the new car
Rob