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I'd like to shorten a Hansgrohe Techniflex hose. The spot that the pipe nipple comes out of the wall is too low and the handshower can hit the tile.

Here's a pic. I already broke one hand shower this way.

hose too long

The Techniflex hose is a silver flexible hose that has been great, no kinks, flexible, no uneven surfaces to gunk up.

The fitting on the end is shown in the attached pics. It's clearly a brass piece that fits into the cut hose end, with a collar crimped to hold it in place. The od of the hose is a hair under 5/8 inch (I don't know the id). The crimped collar is 35/64 final dimension (aka 0.546 decimal inches).

Anyone recognize this setup? I think I can get the brass insert out by cutting the crimped collar, and I'm wondering whether a PEX crimper could secure it (after cutting the hose). Looks like it is a stainless steel ring.

I'm thinking maybe it is a "stainless steel press sleeve" like Viega or Apollo make? I guess this might be the 1/2 nominal size?

Techniflex crimped collar show crimped size

Techniflex crimper collar

Threaded end

Maybe this:

Apollo sleave crimped

isherwood
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jameshowison
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2 Answers2

4

Thanks to all for the questions and comments.

All sorted!

Showing reinstalled handshower now not touching the floor.

I was able to do this with the Apollo 1/2 inch Stainless Steel sleeves ($8 for a 10 pack) and the matching crimper sold at Home Depot (~$60) e.g.:

https://www.homedepot.com/p/Apollo-1-2-in-Stainless-Steel-PEX-B-Crimp-Sleeve-10-Pack-PXSS1210PK/301921350

https://www.homedepot.com/p/Apollo-1-2-in-and-3-4-in-PEX-B-SS-Sleeve-Tool-69PTKH0014SS/301921148

I don't have confidence that this would hold under real pressure, but for a hand-shower the joint is never under real pressure. But, no sign of leaks, even with the higher pressure button setting on the hand shower.

Unnecessary details below

I bought an Amazon Warehouse version of the techniflex 63" to experiment and one fortuitously came with the hand-shower end entirely off. Otherwise it's a long, awkward process of hacksaw work that destroys the factory sleeve entirely.

The Apollo sleeve is quite a bit bigger than the factory one.

Apollo 1/2 uncrimped compared with factory sleeve crimped

The factory sleeve is much more like the Viega 3/8 stainless steel sleeve (~14.7mm), the od of the barbed insert is exactly the same as Viega 3/8, so I ordered some of those. But no way the 3/8 viega slips over the OD of the technifex tube (which is way thicker than pex-b), and in any case I could not find a reasonably priced crimper for 3/8 Viega pex crimping.

Uncrimped Viega 3/8 sleeve compared with crimped factory sleeve

FWIW, I also tried the copper rings in the 3/8 size but those also wouldn't slip over the end. I tried compressing the end in a few ways but that was hopeless. Eventually I decided just to try the stainless steel Apollo 1/2" sleeves.

I had to crimp in a few different places down the sleeve, including the flare at the hose end of the crimp, because the female threaded end (chrome) won't fit over that flare otherwise.

Apollo 1/2 primed sleeve with flare flattened

In the end the longer sleeve shows more than the factory one, and there is a little waviness from crimping the flare of the sleeve, but it doesn't look bad.

Showing crimp coming further down techniflex

jameshowison
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Instead of trying to re-crimp an end, remove as much as you want from the middle and reconnect the two pieces with a barbed connector.

enter image description here

They come in various materials and colors, and with or without a central flange as in this picture.

jay613
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