Garden Water Hose

[Coop]

I recall this being mentioned before, a couple of years ago, but can’t find it. Any suggestions based on longevity, kink free ish and durability? 

[Mark J]

I have no specific make to recommend, but I bought inexpensive hose last spring and it's been disappointing. 

Next time around I will look for something "kink free ish", with brass fittings.  But I'll also be looking at the strain relief stiffener at the female end. If the hose is going on a reel the strain relief can get in the way.  Also it's got to be flexible enough that the hose will lay down on the reel.  I had to find a way to cut the stiffener off the hose I bought. 

[drzaius]

I've been very pleased with the Flexzilla air hoses. They also make garden hoses, which should be pretty good.

[legenddc]

I imagine the Flexzilla hoses are quite nice. I have a ZeroG hose on our deck that I bought thinking it was one of those hoses that shrinks down to almost nothing. Sadly it's not but it doesn't seem to kink and has withstood a few years of direct sunlight as I often don't coil it back up and put it in the shade.

[Chet]

On 8/28/2024 at 8:58 AM, legenddc said:

I have a ZeroG hose on our deck

I have one of these also I think it is about 7 years old now and has held up real well. Its construction is sort of a miniature version of a fire hose.  If I had to replace it, I would buy the same thing.  They come in 50 and 100 legnths.

Zero-G 50 ft hose

[Tom King]

The best hoses ever made are no longer available.  Gatorhyde.  We have a half dozen or so of them and I wish I'd bought more.  They all still look new after something over a decade.  The hose is some sort of tough but flexible polyurethane and the ends stainless steel.

We also have several of the Flexilla ones.   They're pretty good, but they will kink.  The worst thing I don't like about them is the glaringly yellow color that not only is pretty offensive when it's new, but gets worse as they age and get dirty and ugly looking.   

We had one of the Flexilla ones that I leave on at the shop all the time blow the end off after a couple of years.  The replacement ends are a great design being easy to use and maybe even better than the ones that come on them to start with.  I keep a male and female replacement end on hand after that first blow out.

They also come in a good selection of lengths and diameters.

[Tom King]

I took a couple of pictures.  I forget the guy's name who started the Gatorhyde hose business with his Dad in their garage.  He posts on Sawmillcreek.  They sold some thousands of them but even with a premium price, they couldn't make a profit, so quit.  This one might be 20 years old on the hydrant.  They set out to produce the best water hose possible, and I believe they succeeded in that.

The other picture is a two year old Flexilla.

 

[wtnhighlander]

All I can add is you should remember to pack your nice, new hose away before inviting any home improvement contractor to work on your property. My good 100' hose found a new home with either the painters or the roofers last summer. Too easy to 'forget' how many hoses they brought with them, don't you know...

[Coop]

Thanks guys. I might add that I found that my favorite brand aluminum nozzle and wand mate for life to brass hose fittings if you do separate them with Teflon tape.

[Mark J]

Same thing could happen between the hose and spigot, if the hose fitting is aluminum.   

[tperson]

we've got several FatMax hoses and have been very happy with them. They almost never kink and seem to take being left outside...not cheap though.

[Tom King]

I had looked at those, but if only they'd used stainless steel ends instead of aluminum.  The Flexilla ones seem like they're aluminum too, but there is some sort of really hard black coating on them.  The replacement ends are so lightweight that I really don't know exactly what they are. 

The stainless steel ends are the ones I like the best, like on the Gatorhyde hoses.

I did buy one white drinking water one called Smartflex, supposedly made by Flexilla.  It has stainless ends.  The white doesn't stay white though.  It is a really high quallity hose.

I also have several Flexogen 3/4" hoses that I use with the big pressure washer.  They're close to 20 years old and still good too.  Those supposedly didn't kink, but they do since they've gotten some age on them.  I wouldn't buy any more of those though since there are better hoses now.

[Beechwood Chip]

Project Farm did one of their comparison videos on garden hoses: