One of the worst parts of my job is seeing a customer with a huge mess to clean up or thousands of dollars of damage because of an often overlooked problem.
According to State Farm Insurance Statistics, washing machine hose failures cause approximately $170 million in damages to homes in the United States & Canada per year. These are just the floods reported.
A rubber washing machine hose is the weakest point in a homes plumbing system, and almost always the first to fail. The washer hoses are really nothing more than garden hose hooked up to your homes plumbing system.
A burst hose at normal household pressure can pour up to 650 gallons of water per hour into your home. The Ephrata area is known to have much higher water pressure than normal in some areas. Hoses don’t always fail just by bursting, they also wear from the inside where the connections are crimped on to the hose. It’s normally a thin alloy metal that actually wears thinner as water goes through it making the end weak and likely to snap off when the washing machine turns the water on and off with a jolt.
Fortunately, there are some simple, quick and inexpensive steps that homeowners can take to eliminate the problem.
- Regularly inspect your washing machine hoses
- Make sure there are at least 4 inches of clearance between the water connection and the back of the washing machine. This space will help reduce the chances that the hose will kink.
- Make sure your connections are secure.
- Shut off your water supply to the hoses when not using your washing machine.
- Make sure your shut off really does work.
- Never leave your washer on when you are asleep or out of the house
I always recommend the braided stainless steel hoses.
If your hoses are several years old, replace them. Better safe than sorry.