Drive Over Garden Hoses: A Big No-No for Gardeners

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You can drive over a garden hose, but it is greatly discouraged. Driving over your garden hose can cause it not to work properly as this can cause holes, flatten the hose, abrasion, and many other damages that may result in you having to buy another one.

Protecting your hoses from cars driving over them or traffic is important, as it not only keeps the hoses safe from abuse and damage but also protects persons and other vehicles that might cross the hose’s path. This post highlights some issues with driving over a garden hose and the steps gardeners may take to prevent them.

Why Protecting Your Garden Hose is Important.

Hoses must be protected from damage and not left in the open. The hose can be worn by traffic from all sorts of vehicles, large and small – cars, dumpster trucks, tractors, and so on.

While the focus of this post is on car traffic, protecting your hose with some of the steps outlined in the post may also prove useful for protecting it from other things that may cause damage, such as harsh weather conditions – high temperatures or UV exposure, extreme cold, and water.

Friction can cause the hose to flatten.

All these elements can cause several things to affect the hose, including abrasion, which happens when the surface of the hose comes in contact with car tires in a way that causes friction.

It can also cause the hose to flatten, reducing the water it can deliver. Holes in your hose are also another thing to take note of.

The weight of the vehicle can cause the hose to break

The hose can also burst if the vehicle’s weight is too much and water is already passing through it. In effect, these can also be dangerous to you and the plants in your garden.

The water coming from the hose can cause leaks and moisture stress in your garden.

Think of a 25-foot, 1/2-inch diameter hose attached to a faucet that supplies water at 40 psi and has a flow rate of 24 gallons per minute. That is a lot of water coming from a garden hose.

If holes were to be made in the hose, or if it were to burst, that could cause water flowing at high pressure, to splash into someone’s face or another part of the body, which can cause harm.

It could also cause water to leak in your garden, giving the plant moisture stress if they get too much water.

Not caring for your hose properly may cause you to repurchase a new hose

Another factor might be the cost of repair. Why must you constantly change or repair your hose and spend money on improving your garden?

How can you Protect your Hose from a drive on

To lessen the risks of repurchasing a hose and spending more money, you can look into the following tips to better protect them from being driven on.

Use a Protective Barrier to protect your hose.

One of the best ways to keep hoses safe from cars is to create a physical barrier against them. Something as simple as a sheet metal guard can protect vulnerable sections against impacts.

You could also use ramps, which could be plastic, metallic, or wooden, to better protect your hose from being run over by vehicles or people.

The idea is to have the hose underneath the protective barrier so the cars don’t run directly over the hose.

Protective barriers you can look into for your garden hose

Several kinds of these barriers exist, but you might want to consider how strong they are and how well they may be able to suit your hose, depending on the size of your hose.

• A Bumble Bee cable protector or hose ramp might be suitable for running a hose through an area with light foot traffic. It is usually lower to the ground than others and not as strong as others, but it works great for slow-moving light vehicles like wheelchairs, bikes, or motorscooters. It also works well for foot traffic.

• Protecting your hoses from more heavy-duty traffic might be necessary, and a Yellow Jacket cable protector will do. These are weight-enduring protectors that can keep hoses safe from larger vehicles. They are available in different sizes and strengths to meet the requirements of any setting. They can withstand pressure from forklifts, tractors, and heavy vehicles.

• Asides from protecting your hose from passing cars, which might not happen so often, there might be instances where there are high-traffic events such as a carnival, county fair, sports event, or outdoor convention. You will then need to get barriers that can handle the frequency of passing cars instead of only the weight. The Linebacker General Purpose cord protectors are helpful in this regard, as they have a 21,000-pound load capacity and can handle crowded spaces.

These are very effective in protecting your hoses as they shield certain parts from coming in contact with car traffic, but they can often be expensive.

They cost about 70 – 200 dollars on average, depending on which quantity you want to get. So, you might want to consider cheaper options, which are provided below:

Look into using Spring Guards to protect your garden hose better

This is like enclosing the hose. It provides some backbone that prevents external devices from reaching the hose directly.

Spring guards are wound steel springs that are typically zinc-plated for corrosion resistance.

They support several hoses and help prevent damage. They’re commonly used on construction equipment but are suitable for any application that needs protection against abrasion, cuts, deep gouges, impact, and accidental compression.

Spring guards and their many variations

They come in various sizes, slightly larger than the outer diameter of the hose, and are available in standard lengths or in bulk coils that can be cut to fit.

You slide it over the hose, much like a sleeve. They’re also much cheaper and cost about 1-2 dollars per foot.

Pipes can protect your garden hose.

You could also use protective steel or other kinds of pipe. It’s more or less like a spring guard, except it has fewer openings. Depending on the length of the hose, you can even cover the entire hose.

Look into using Protective sleeves to protect your garden hose

These provide amazing resistance to external abrasion.

Protective sleeves are textile tubes that slide over a hose, usually woven nylon or polyester.

They are made in such a way as to protect the exterior and the interior by making for a smooth interior wall that lets the hose move freely inside the sleeve and prevent internal abrasion. You can also get the point-of-contact sleeve, which, rather than covering an entire assembly, can cover only the parts that may face abrasion more often.

Plastic Cones can also be used to protect your garden hose

Sometimes, depending on the location and how much traffic you experience, some people may not notice a hose on the ground.

You may use traffic cones to alert them that something is on the ground and prevent them from crossing it. This is usually more effective for smaller traffic like bikes, scooters, or wheelchairs, but it can also help move larger vehicles.

You can move the hose or keep it when not in use.

You may consider these options to protect your hoses, but you can also take manual steps to ensure they are better protected.

Many gardeners tend to leave their hoses outside even when not being used. This increases the chances of being driven over.

So, to prevent this, you can move your hose when you’re done with it. It would help if you also studied your environment to know when car traffic is most frequent and when it might be more suitable to leave your hose out.

If you have to get your garden wet at certain times, you will know how to manage better to reduce hose damage if you know when cars might pass. This also includes passing it through your garage.

Conclusion on whether you can drive over garden hoses

We’ve seen why cars should not go over your garden hose and the damage that can occur when that happens. You could take several steps to help prevent this or reduce the damage the hose takes, as highlighted in the post. While they may be effective to different degrees, they all require money to be spent.

Sure, you might be able to spare a small amount to protect your hoses, and in some cases, they are unavoidable. Still, it would be best if you always tried to minimize how much you have to spend on fixing or protecting your hoses by doing easier things to take care of them, like simply putting them away, which many gardeners don’t.

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