Faster water fill

[Rayburn]

I have always been frustrated by how long it takes to fill our water tank. Part of the problem seems to have been the hose. Like many others I see at water points I was using a standard 1/2 inch hose on a 30m reel.
 

However in the last couple of seasons I have been trying a short (5m), 3/4 inch diameter hose. The difference seems to be significant - perhaps cutting our fill time by 3 times.

 

Sorry if this is obvious or has been covered loads of times but I don’t see many others using short fat hoses. 

Is this a useful thing or am I just fooling myself?

[IanD]

4 minutes ago, Rayburn said:

I have always been frustrated by how long it takes to fill our water tank. Part of the problem seems to have been the hose. Like many others I see at water points I was using a standard 1/2 inch hose on a 30m reel.
 

However in the last couple of seasons I have been trying a short (5m), 3/4 inch diameter hose. The difference seems to be significant - perhaps cutting our fill time by 3 times.

 

Sorry if this is obvious or has been covered loads of times but I don’t see many others using short fat hoses. 

Is this a useful thing or am I just fooling myself?

It's certainly useful so long as the water point is no more than 5m from your filler... 😉

[magnetman]

Another option is a bucket with a decent bilge pump in it. Place bucket under tap and lead large bore hose to boat. Switch on pump and tap. 

I have considered the large funnel option using one of those old big satellite dishes where you send the water in an arc from the tap to the collection dish which then drains into the tank. 

 

or use less water. 

[Rob-M]

I find pulling all the hose out from the reel speeds up filling as usually, somewhere in the coiled up hose, is a kink that significantly reduces flow.

[magnetman]

Buckets can work. 15 litres walk it from tap to boat. Good exercise. 

[Tonka]

35 minutes ago, Rayburn said:

I have always been frustrated by how long it takes to fill our water tank. Part of the problem seems to have been the hose. Like many others I see at water points I was using a standard 1/2 inch hose on a 30m reel.
 

However in the last couple of seasons I have been trying a short (5m), 3/4 inch diameter hose. The difference seems to be significant - perhaps cutting our fill time by 3 times.

 

Sorry if this is obvious or has been covered loads of times but I don’t see many others using short fat hoses. 

Is this a useful thing or am I just fooling myself?

Is the hose of food grade ?

[magnetman]

Does food pass quicker through a hose than non food? Does this include used food?

[Rayburn]

1 hour ago, IanD said:

It's certainly useful so long as the water point is no more than 5m from your filler... 😉

It is surprising how often you can get within 5m of the tap if you are determined - only had to get the long back up hose out 3 or 4 times. 

1 hour ago, Tonka said:

Is the hose of food grade ?

Garden rather than food grade but we only use the water for washing. Should I be worried?

1 hour ago, magnetman said:

Buckets can work. 15 litres walk it from tap to boat. Good exercise. 

A much less dull solution! Would you also tie yourself to the tap with elastic and grease the towpath to give it the full It’s a Knockout feel?

(I would)

[Jen-in-Wellies]

38 minutes ago, Rayburn said:

Garden rather than food grade but we only use the water for washing. Should I be worried?

People who sell food grade hoses say "yes you should"!

[Mike Hurley]

13 minutes ago, Jen-in-Wellies said:

People who sell food grade hoses say "yes you should"!

While the rest of the world dont care.😀

[Ken X]

1 hour ago, Rayburn said:

A much less dull solution! Would you also tie yourself to the tap with elastic and grease the towpath to give it the full It’s a Knockout feel?

(I would)

Now that has legs 😀.

 

Wonder if I can convince OC Domestic to give it a go.

 

[magnetman]

I once bought a hose from a DIY store which ended up depositing some terrible chemical into my water tank which took ages to get rid of. 

 

It was some sort of disinfectant. I suppose if I had rtfm and flushed the hose properly before use it would have been helpful. Curiously it was at the time of the foot and mouth closures and we were stuck on the towpath below Boxmoor lock opposite the Kodak building. 

 

Whatever was in that hose was strong stuff. Maybe they thought the cows had got into it or something. 

 

 

 

[Ronaldo47]

If it was brand new and cheap, it's probably the plasiciser leaching out. The hoses provided with the  boats we used to hire only seemed to be good quality garden hoses, but they must have had lots of water passed through them by previous hirers. We never had any experience of tainted water when using them.

[Chewbacka]

On 05/12/2023 at 17:17, Rayburn said:

I have always been frustrated by how long it takes to fill our water tank. Part of the problem seems to have been the hose. Like many others I see at water points I was using a standard 1/2 inch hose on a 30m reel.
 

However in the last couple of seasons I have been trying a short (5m), 3/4 inch diameter hose. The difference seems to be significant - perhaps cutting our fill time by 3 times.

 

Sorry if this is obvious or has been covered loads of times but I don’t see many others using short fat hoses. 

Is this a useful thing or am I just fooling myself?

It’s what I do, the main benefit for me is I can get plenty of water in less than 20mins on a busy water point.  Don’t thing it’s good manners to stay much longer than that when others are queuing.

[IanD]

1 hour ago, Chewbacka said:

It’s what I do, the main benefit for me is I can get plenty of water in less than 20mins on a busy water point.  Don’t thing it’s good manners to stay much longer than that when others are queuing.

It's a good idea, I might give it a go too -- a 900l tank takes a *long* time to fill... 🙂

Edited December 8, 2023 by IanD

[magnetman]

Until fairly recently on the Thames the water supply points were Chubb fire hoses with a very high discharge rate.

 

Excellent for speed but one had to be careful. I was once filling a poplyprop tank and went to have a cup of tea with the lock keeper. I tend to talk too much so forgot about the water.

 

The vent was not big enough and the hose plugged the filler hole so it tore upen a seam on the tank and put about 6 inches of water in the bilge. Bad design the boat did not have a proper bulkhead so water ended up under the floor.

 

I heard of someone breaking a stainless steel tank on the same water point and some time later restrictors were fitted in the supply then the whole idea was scrapped and now you use your own hose which is much slower.

 

 

[Rayburn]

1 hour ago, Chewbacka said:

It’s what I do, the main benefit for me is I can get plenty of water in less than 20mins on a busy water point.  Don’t thing it’s good manners to stay much longer than that when others are queuing.

Excellent - I knew that there must be other people doing it. As you say 20mins is usually enough.

24 minutes ago, IanD said:

It's a good idea, I might give it a go too -- a 900l tank takes a *long* time to fill... 🙂

You definitely should try it. Our tank is a similar size and with our old hose I often gave up before it was full.

[Sea Dog]

See, I'm a glass half full man myself. I just fill my water tank at Fradley Junction now and again and everywhere else seems really quick! 

[Rayburn]

11 minutes ago, magnetman said:

Until fairly recently on the Thames the water supply points were Chubb fire hoses with a very high discharge rate.

 

Excellent for speed but one had to be careful. I was once filling a poplyprop tank and went to have a cup of tea with the lock keeper. I tend to talk too much so forgot about the water.

 

The vent was not big enough and the hose plugged the filler hole so it tore upen a seam on the tank and put about 6 inches of water in the bilge. Bad design the boat did not have a proper bulkhead so water ended up under the floor.

 

I heard of someone breaking a stainless steel tank on the same water point and some time later restrictors were fitted in the supply then the whole idea was scrapped and now you use your own hose which is much slower.

 

 

Good point. I think that a 19mm hose allows sufficient flow out of the tank once it is filled, but I do take the precaution of only putting 3 inches of the hose in the filler hole so any pressure can push it out easily.  

 

I wouldn't have minded having a cautious go on a fire hose water point - sounds exciting.

[magnetman]

2 minutes ago, Rayburn said:

Good point. I think that a 19mm hose allows sufficient flow out of the tank once it is filled, but I do take the precaution of only putting 3 inches of the hose in the filler hole so any pressure can push it out easily.  

 

I wouldn't have minded having a cautious go on a fire hose water point - sounds exciting.

They did shift a lot of water and a very convenient format actually.

 

I had done it loads of times before no problems it was just the cup of tea with the lock keeper which caused the problem.

 

The other thing we used to do yars ago was if there were two taps use both and two hoses. It depends on the supply to the tap but this can speed things up if they are plumbed to a larger feed.

[LadyG]

2 hours ago, Chewbacka said:

It’s what I do, the main benefit for me is I can get plenty of water in less than 20mins on a busy water point.  Don’t thing it’s good manners to stay much longer than that when others are queuing.

Try Bramwith waterpoint, it's a two hour waterpoint.

[IanD]

9 minutes ago, LadyG said:

Try Bramwith waterpoint, it's a two hour waterpoint.

The old one at Marple... 😞

[Machpoint005]

43 minutes ago, IanD said:

The old one at Marple... 😞

 

"Are you going to be long?"

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"About 58 feet".

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Naughty Cal]

We were shy of storage for a full sized hose on NC so we used the Hozelock Pico reels which have a tiny 9mm diameter pipe. Luckily NC didn't have a huge water tank, it was only 20 gallons but it could still take a while to fill.

 

We have a pair of them now on the van. We just accept it takes a while to fill up.

[Hudds Lad]

10 minutes ago, Naughty Cal said:

We were shy of storage for a full sized hose on NC so we used the Hozelock Pico reels which have a tiny 9mm diameter pipe. Luckily NC didn't have a huge water tank, it was only 20 gallons but it could still take a while to fill.

 

We have a pair of them now on the van. We just accept it takes a while to fill up.

We use the same for when out and about, it's about 10m i think so reaches wherever it needs to, but takes up way less room onboard.

We have a coil of standard size hose that's just long enough to tank up at the mooring, then when out and about we'll use the Pico to chuck 20mins worth of water in if necessary. Probably not a good solution for a liveaboard but fine for leisure use.