We have an older version of one of these attached to the outside tap; the model we have just has a central dial to select left, right or off. One hose serves the back garden and the other reel reaches the front.
This morning my little nest of vipers watered the garden and on completion, I wound the hose back onto the reel and noticed the left side hose connector was cracked. No surprise as it’s been out there in all weathers for a goodly few years.
Anyhoo, a search in the shed resulted in a new connector being found. Seems it miraculously missed one of my I’ll never need that clear-outs.
Back at the two way connector, I was trying to remove the broken one and it just disintegrated in my hands. Easy so far but now I could see no way to connect the new hose connector to the two way body owing to the fact that the pushy onto bit had broken off said body.
After a while I decided on the easy option of going and getting a new two way tap connector.
Getting ready to go get one I thought, ‘Okay, I know I turned the tap off but did I select Off on the body? Just in case?’ Better bob out and check. And this is when it got a tad spooky.
Out I went to check and found myself looking at a fully repaired and ready to go item. New connector and hose all securely secured. I honestly have absolutely no remembrance of doing this. Or how. Last memory being no way to attach a new connector. Get a new one.
Did I experience a close encounter of the third kind? Did I experience an encounter with a greater force wot took pity on my fumbling and lent a helpful hand? Did the contents of my old head have a ten minute plus total time-out during the repair process? All options are a tad scary to dwell on.
Did I strip it down to see how I’d done the seemingly impossible? No, because if it was indeed done by some other worldly kindly force, I didn’t want to upset them/it by appearing to be questioning the quality of their repair.
Let’s give all that no never mind and enjoy the moment as the phrase ‘look to the future’ fails to appeal the older you get...
“My current age is, if I don't write it down within three seconds, I'll forget it.”
Mac,
ReplyDeleteYou'll probably find that the cause of the cracking is through not isolating the outdoor tap before winter. I found out the hard way a few years ago, when concreting the base for my workshop. Thought it curious that the tap was dripping at the hose joint but dismissed it as a leaky rubber. Then the tap itself blew off the wall and flooded the new, still wet concrete. Turns out the tap had been left through winter, frozen up and the expansion of the ice had cracked the brass tap body. Movement on the hose when bike cleaning or mixing concrete eventually extended the fracture and broke the tap off.
Now, when winter is coming on and I have no further use for the outside tap until the following spring, the tap gets isolated at the service valve in the kitchen, the hose disconnected and drained and the tap left turned fully on. There's also a cover you can get which is like a plastic box, fits over the tap, sealing it against the wall, and the box is lined with polystyrene (Aldi, middle isle).
And don't worry buddy, I'm younger than you but when distracted I've had a few Joe Biden moments myself. Learning to multitask at the moment, 5 woodworking jobs + still painting, stair handrail (pig's ear, horrible stuff to mark/cut at angles but looks great when finished). I do a bit on each, according to the weather as I'm getting to the finishing up stage and can't cut wood in the house any more. If you ever need to know anything about paints, grouts or adhesives, Youtube and trade forums have turned me into a pro.
Ripper,
ReplyDeleteBummer flooding wet concrete. As you say, many a lesson learned the hard way then never forgotten.
The brass tap is fine and yes I do what you suggest come winter. What I neglect to do is remove the plastic two way adapter and thus it variously gets over hot and over cold and however good plastic is these days, there’s only so much of that it can take.
Funny you should mention YouTube as I doubt there’s a task I start these days without an evenings Tube search first.
All the best for your continuing projects. I’m probably typing at the converted but I found a flowchart of all intended projects helped me keep it together, the logical flow - possible combination - of various jobs and thus keeping all on target and in order.