Heavy rubber water hose, air lines, mill and contractor hose and general service tubing, cut to length at both Long Island counters. The everyday stuff that gets dragged across gravel, left out all winter and expected to work anyway.
Why Rubber
The case for the heavier option
Every general purpose hose comes in a rubber version and a plastic version, and the plastic one is cheaper and lighter every time. For plenty of jobs that is the right answer, and we will say so.
What rubber buys you is tolerance. It stays flexible when the temperature drops, where PVC goes stiff and awkward and eventually splits if you try to coil it frozen. It takes abrasion far better, which matters on anything dragged across concrete or gravel daily. It resists kinking, and a kinked hose is a restricted hose whether or not it ever fails outright.
The trade is real. Rubber is heavier to carry, heavier to coil and costs more up front. On a fifty foot run somebody moves twenty times a day, that weight is not nothing, and there are jobs where the lighter hose is genuinely the better tool.
Which is why the honest answer depends on what you are optimising for. Pick your priority below and the comparison sorts itself out.
Rubber Or Plastic
Which one suits your job?
Pick what matters most on the run you are buying for. On two of these, plastic genuinely wins, and we would rather tell you that than sell you the wrong thing.
Stays workable in the cold
Rubber keeps its flexibility as the temperature drops, so it still coils and uncoils on a January morning. That matters more than most people expect on a yard where hose gets handled before anything has warmed up.
Goes stiff and can split
Plastic hose hardens noticeably in cold weather. It becomes difficult to handle, holds the shape of the reel it was on, and forcing a frozen coil straight is a reliable way to crack it.
Most decisions are a mix of these. If several of them matter at once, say so at the counter and somebody will weigh them against each other rather than defaulting to whichever is on the nearest reel.
What We Stock
Six general service lines
Engineered application hose for suction, chemical, steam and ducting sits on the industrial page. This is the everyday range that gets bought by the foot and used hard.
Heavy rubber water hose
The contractor standard. Thick walled, tough covered and built to be dragged, run over and left outside. Where a garden hose lasts a season on a job site, this lasts years.
- Typical use
- Site water, washdown, general transfer
- Ends
- Threaded, camlock, bare
Rubber air hose
Compressed air lines for benches, reels and site work. Rubber stays supple in cold shops and coils properly at the end of a shift, which is the difference people notice most.
- Typical use
- Shop air, tools, site compressors
- Ends
- Quick disconnect or threaded
Mill and contractor hose
Thicker walls and heavier covers again, for plant, quarry and construction work where hose takes real punishment. Larger bores and the toughest cover in the general service range.
- Typical use
- Plant, quarry, heavy construction
- Ends
- Banded or cam and groove
Rock drill and breaker hose
Built for the pressure and the abuse that comes with pneumatic breakers. Heavier construction than shop air hose, and normally terminated with claw couplings and a safety cable.
- Typical use
- Breakers, rock drills, site tools
- Ends
- Air king with safety cable
Rubber tubing
General purpose tubing for drains, overflows, vents and the hundred small runs that are not worth a specification. Sold by the foot in the common bores.
- Typical use
- Drains, vents, low pressure runs
- Ends
- Barbs and clamps
Twin welding hose
Bonded twin line carrying oxygen and fuel gas to a torch, colour coded and built for the job. Sold by the foot or made up with the fittings your rig uses.
- Typical use
- Cutting and welding rigs
- Ends
- Crimped, torch specific
Covers
The outside decides how long it lasts
Smooth cover
Wipes clean, slides over surfaces without catching and looks tidy on a reel. The usual choice indoors, on finished surfaces and anywhere the hose gets pulled through gaps.
Wrapped cover
Carries the textile impression from manufacture and takes noticeably more abrasion than a smooth cover. The right choice on anything dragged over concrete, gravel or steel every day.
Non-marking
Leaves no black line across a customer's driveway or a showroom floor. Costs a little more and saves an argument, which is why wash contractors ask for it by name.
Buying It
Bare length or finished line
Cut off the reel
Tell us the bore, the service and the footage. No fixed coil lengths and no minimum, which matters when a job needs eighteen feet rather than a fifty foot coil and a coil of leftover.
If you are replacing something, bring a marked offcut. The layline identifies the exact hose and matching it beats describing it from memory.
Or with the ends on
Threaded, camlock, air king or crimped ferrules fitted at the counter and matched to the wall construction. Most assemblies are finished the same visit.
The ends themselves sit on industrial fittings and adapters, and the clamps and sleeving on hose accessories.
Before You Buy
Common questions
It depends entirely on the job, and we will say so rather than pushing the dearer option. Rubber wins on cold weather handling, abrasion resistance, kink resistance and service life. PVC wins on weight and on price. If somebody is carrying the hose all day and it lives indoors, plastic is a perfectly sensible choice.
That is usually a plastic hose reaching the low end of its temperature range. It hardens, holds the shape of whatever it was coiled on, and cracks if you force it straight. Rubber compounds stay flexible considerably lower, which is why yards working through the winter tend to standardise on them.
Wrapped cover carries a textile impression from the way it is made and takes more abrasion before wearing through. Smooth cover wipes clean, slides better and looks tidier. Pick wrapped for anything dragged across rough ground and smooth for anything pulled through gaps or used indoors.
Yes. Plenty of customers buy bare hose by the foot and fit their own ends, and plenty have it made up here. Both are normal. If you are fitting it yourself, take the right clamps at the same time rather than using whatever is in the truck.
Yes, that is a separate range. Suction and discharge, chemical transfer, steam, ducting and material handling all live on industrial hoses, up to 18 inch. This page is the general service side, where the hose is picked for how it gets treated rather than what it carries.
Yes. General service hose is a consumable on most sites, and we set stocking levels around what you actually go through so the replacement is here when a line gets run over. Ask at either counter or through the contact page.
Get It Cut
Tell us the bore and the footage
Then tell us how it gets treated, because that is what decides the cover and the wall. Either counter, cut while you wait.