It was way past time to replace my rubber washer hoses. The reason for the delay was that my shutoffs were too far away from the washer for a single hose. I had been using a 5? hose and a 3? hose connected with a M-M hose fitting so I was in double-danger of a rubber hose bursting. I told myself a while ago that before I replaced the hoses, I would move the shutoffs.
Well, I decided it was time to bite the bullet and move the shutoffs within
6? and use braided hoses. I went to Home Depot, bought the plumbing fittings and grabbed a pair of braided hoses.When I was done with the plumbing, I attached the hoses to the closed shutoffs and turned the water on to test the system. The open ends of the hoses were in the utility sink just in case the shutoffs didn't do what they were supposed to do.
OK...good...no leaks in my plumbing and the shutoffs work fine. Now I'll open the shutoffs and flush the hoses. I moved the cold water ball valve handle from horizontal to vertical, got a burst of water from the hose, then nothing. WTF? Closed the shutoff, turned it back on, nothing. Tried the hot water. Burst of water, then nothing. Huh? Tried the utility sink faucets and they worked fine. Ok, I'm seriously confused now.
That's when I grabbed the bag that the hoses came in and realized what was going in. They were FloodSafe hoses. I didn't even notice that when I bought them. The full flow rate from the plumbing system was higher than the setting in hoses, so they shut down. I had to remove the hoses from the shutoffs to reset them. Once they were reset, I opened the shutoffs just little and water came out of the hoses. I hooked them up to the washer and started a load. The washer filled just like it was supposed to. It's good to know that the FloodSafe hoses do what they are designed to do - shut off when the flow rate exceeds that of the typical washing machine.
I should probably replace all my supply hoses with FloodSafe hoses.