Winter and hoses and freezing, Oh My.

[TrotTrotPumpkn]

Well my first hose experience was an epic fail. I mentioned I have a super short distance and cut the hose off to drain faster. I hooked it back up to the frost-free and turned it on and the hose must have froze, despite my careful draining, because I got a trickle at the end and it was trying to shoot off the hydrant at the connection. That’s $25 I could have put towards a heated hose! GRRRR. I brought it in the house last night to thaw. I was really hoping to avoid bringing it up to the house…

I will check out the Gatorlock connectors!

Not knowing if I will live here very long has me hesitating to install a Ritchie, etc. beau159. I spent quite a bit running the water line out to the fence and installing the frost free! But yes, that would be the way to go!

Honestly taking 15-20 gallons of water 10 feet in bucket trips really wasn’t that hard. And I’m in a walking boot.

[CrowneDragon]

[QUOTE=jenbrin;7853313]
…Two days into winter and I’m already over it :no:![/QUOTE]

Winter doesn’t officially start for another month-and-a-half. This is autumn.

[TrotTrotPumpkn]

[QUOTE=CrowneDragon;7853466]
Winter doesn’t officially start for another month-and-a-half. This is autumn. [/QUOTE]

The wind chill was 0 degrees yesterday!!

I just looked at the 10 day forecast. I would like to undo that peek.

[HungarianHippo]

I keep a hairdryer in the barn for warming bits, but also use it to fix slightly frozen hoses. I wouldn’t bother if the thing’s frozen solid, but in your case since you had mostly drained it, and you were getting a trickle of water, I am sure blowing a hairdryer inside and along the outside for 5 min would have done the trick.
Do you have a trough there with a heater/de-icer, or are you only filling buckets from the hydrant? Assuming trough-- I just drop frozen hoses into my water trough, and they are ice free within a couple hours. Dragging hoses inside is just that-- a total drag.

[TrotTrotPumpkn]

[QUOTE=HungarianHippo;7853591]
I keep a hairdryer in the barn for warming bits, but also use it to fix slightly frozen hoses. I wouldn’t bother if the thing’s frozen solid, but in your case since you had mostly drained it, and you were getting a trickle of water, I am sure blowing a hairdryer inside and along the outside for 5 min would have done the trick.
Do you have a trough there with a heater/de-icer, or are you only filling buckets from the hydrant? Assuming trough-- I just drop frozen hoses into my water trough, and they are ice free within a couple hours. Dragging hoses inside is just that-- a total drag.[/QUOTE]

Thank you…good idea. I’m just filling the big trough. I had wondered about that–dropping the hose in the trough. I was a little worried about it touching the heater. But the water in the trough is a very nice temperature.

[Simkie]

How long is your hose, TTP? Short enough so you can hang it so the ends point down with no loops?

[TrotTrotPumpkn]

[QUOTE=Simkie;7855078]
How long is your hose, TTP? Short enough so you can hang it so the ends point down with no loops?[/QUOTE]

Not quite short enough. I think the loops aren’t helping. It would have been nice if I had bought it when it was still sunny/warm and I could have gotten the initial spirals out.

[Plainandtall]

I don’t have an easy answer, and I also don’t have a heated tackroom yet. Last winter (which was brutally cold) I got by by manually draining the hoses and was THRILLED that my frost free hydrants never froze up- so that uncoupling the dang hose was the biggest part of the chore. I guess it’s a case of being thankful for what you have- because in the past I didn’t have any outdoor winter water sources and had to haul buckets from the kitchen. I was very proud of myself that I never forgot to drain the hoses and never had to haul the stiff long ungainly monsters inside to a bathtub to thaw. There is a portion of the floor joists of my hayloft that allows me to thread the hose through overhead and get an extra 9 feet of elevation for quick draining. I was thinking that I’d like to rig up a supported arc (like the rim of a bicycle wheel) which could lift the hose at it’s center without kinking it- and install a pulley way up under the eave of the barn to allow me to hang the hose to dry without festooning the whole frontage with rubber ugliness like I am doing now.

[Simkie]

[QUOTE=TrotTrotPumpkn;7855099]
Not quite short enough. I think the loops aren’t helping. It would have been nice if I had bought it when it was still sunny/warm and I could have gotten the initial spirals out.[/QUOTE]

Hmmmm. Stick it in a pillowcase and toss it in the dryer to warm it up and get it straight? :lol:

[Plainandtall]

http://www.brooklineconnection.com/history/Gallery/images/Fire20.JPG

Just to add to my idea of hanging hoses to drain- a lot of old firehouses had towers in their design in order to dry the firehoses before putting them back on the trucks.