What strange garden faucet is this?

Question

A friend's house was designed by an architect to be his own house, about

8 years ago, until he sold it last year.

It has all kinds of gadgets, including a generator hard wired in, solar panels in the back yard, alarm installed when the house was built, Rinnai hot water (that I didn't understand), two big breaker boxes, only half full but still with 45 breakers total,

Probably some garden faucets were hiding behind bushes, but the one on the patio was a pipe, almost an inch in diameter that came out of the wall one inch and then turned downwards. That part was 4 or 5 inches long with a ball valve in it. And not the standard garden threads on the end of that. Despite that there was a garden hose not connected to but right next to this spigot. (I wish I had looked at the ends of the hose.)

What was I looking at?

My friend told me she thought she had freeze-proof garden faucets but she must be totally confused. Her pipes didn't burst last winter, but future winters may be colder.

Ed Pawlowski · Accepted Answer

Does the place have fire sprinklers?  If so, that sounds like a test port that is opened to be sure the sprinklers are full and that flow will set the alarm off.

Percival P. Cassidy · Answer

The Rinnai water heaters I encountered in Asia were gas-fired demand  heaters -- pilotless, IIRC. Perce

trader_4 · Answer

Why do you think that this house doesn't have freeze-proof garden faucets? It's been standard in new construction here for decades. Actually they are called frost-proof sillcocks. What the thing you're describing is, I have no idea.

HerHusband · Answer

Did you open the valve to see if water actually came out? Without seeing it in person, it sounds like some kind of drain pipe, or  possibly an incoming pipe for a future gas line? Anthony Watson

Norminn · Answer

Planned to install lawn irrigation or artificial pond?

micky · Answer

Because this is clearly a garden faucet -- as I said, it was right next to a reel of garden hose -- and it's not freeze-proof.

I'm not saying it doesn't have any. Some may have been hidden by the bushes.

Norminn, she also has a lawn sprinker system, I think, and there's 3 or

4 acres but no place for a pond.

Anthony, I didn't think to turn it on. And that might be going too far when she's not there. I don't get out that way very often, so I stopped even though she wasn't there. The next door neighbor had been claiming

4 feet of her land, including a row of 6 foot fir trees!, and she had a survey done, and I wanted to see the wooden sticks with red flags before she took them down. I wanted to see where her boundary was, and I wanted to see how in-your-face the flags were (only 6" high, but very), so she didn't have to be home.

trader_4 · Answer

Well then since it's clealy a garden faucet, and you know what it is wtf, why are are you here? Well that is exactly what you're saying. Micky, you're the village idiot.

What strange garden faucet is this?

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