Article 1019901 of alt.home.repair: Path: news.misty.com!not-for-mail From: nicksanspam@ece.villanova.edu Newsgroups: alt.home.repair Subject: Re: Electrically conductive garden hose Date: 18 May 2008 06:53:02 -0400 Organization: Villanova University Lines: 35 Message-ID: References: NNTP-Posting-Host: acadia.ece.villanova.edu X-Trace: max.inside.misty.com 1211104340 9198 153.104.44.130 (18 May 2008 09:52:20 GMT) X-Complaints-To: abuse@misty.com NNTP-Posting-Date: Sun, 18 May 2008 09:52:20 +0000 (UTC) Xref: news.misty.com alt.home.repair:1019901 wrote: >Of all the strange things that can happen, this one I would have never >expected. I run a farm, I have livestock in electric fences. I am >around these fences daily, and you learn not to touch them, or touch a >weed that is contacting the fence. Every so often I touch the fence. >For some reason touching the fence automatically triggers my mouth to >utter a about 5 to 10 cus words and then I continue what I was doing. > >When you have livestock, they still need water, and that means >dragging out a hose and fighting the weather and the ice on the spigot >threads. > >During the coldest part of last winter, I was fighting with stiff and >frozen hoses (as always), and I decided to go shopping and see if >there was a hose that would not get stiff when it was cold. I found a >black rubber hose, which claimed to stay soft and pliable in even the >coldest weather. It was costly, but I decided to give it a try. > >The good news, it did remain relatively soft and pliable even when the >temps dropped below zero. The bad news, I quickly learned this hose >is electrically conductive. I learned the hard way when the hose >touched the electric fence, and nearly knocked me on my ass... Learning can be painful :-) >All I can figure is that the rubber contains a high amount of carbon >and is acting like a resistor... You might try running current through it in wintertime (from the fence controller?) to keep the water inside from freezing instead of draining it every day. Don't forget to shut off the power when using it :-) Nick