Talk about a screw up my part. I got a little to close with the lawn mower next to the garden hose, and I ended up chopping off part of the male treads on the end of the garden hose. Call it an accidental circumcision on my part.

But having remembered seeing a reader tip in either Fine Homebuilding or Fine Woodworking recently about repairing an air hose using PEX fittings, I thought why not try it on the garden hose. And seeing how I already own a set of PEX tools, it was time to see if the reader’s tip would hold water for my problem.

And sure enough, after cutting off the end of the hose and inserting a barbed PEX fitting, the repair worked like a charm and I was back in business.

Side notes and tips:
1) My garden hose has a 3/4” OD, but a 5/8” ID. At first I got the 3/4” barbed fitting, only to realize that it didn’t fit. Talk about a classic mistake on my part. So the fitting I ended up with was a solid brass 5/8” Male barb x 3/4” garden hose. This is Watts part #A-491
2) The reader’s tip in the magazine mentioned something about using petroleum jelly to ease assembly, and this tip is critical. Since I cut up my hand big time on the brass trying to put this together, since the PEX ring is a very tight fit pre-crimped. So do yourself a favor, and use some jelly on both the inside and outside of the hose.