7 Things to Know When Choosing Hydraulic Hose

You need to know seven basic pieces of information make up your need to know when looking for a hose assembly. In fact, these 7 questions have become a standard in the industry and are denoted by the acronym S.T.A.M.P.E.D.
STAMPED stands for:
Size
Temperature
Application
Media
Pressure
Ends
Duplication
Here’s how it works.

Size:
Before you can determine which assembly you need, you have to know what size hose you need and how long the overall assembly needs to be.
The size of the hose is determined by the inner diameter and outer diameters and is usually noted as I.D. and O.D.
Make sure to take note if your hose assembly will have to bend at various angles. The fewer angles the better but if they are necessary you’ll want to account for that length.

Temperature:
Not knowing the temperature range that the hose will be exposed to can lead to a quickly failing hose assembly at best, and a catastrophic failure at worst.
When looking at temperature ranges, it’s important to consider the temperature of the material flowing through the hose, as well as the temperature around the outside of the hose.
Both the high and low temperatures are significant because that goes a long way in determining what material your hose assembly should be constructed from.

Application:
What exactly is the hose being used for? The kind of hose you’ll need will vary based on its purpose.
Therefore, it’s important to know if your hose will be used for suction, venting, hydraulic fluids, etc.
Different applications require different types of hoses constructed from different materials.

Media:
Media refers to the substance or material that will be flowing through the hose. This can be anything from air to chemical fluids and even various gases.
Because some substances react with materials differently than others, it’s important to understand exactly what media you are working with. You would hate to install a new assembly and then have the chemicals you are moving cause deterioration to the hose.

Pressure:
Understand the pressure that will be flowing through the hose assembly helps determine not only what type of hose you need, but also help determine the pressure ratings you need to have on your fittings.
Extremely high pressure flows for long periods of time, or even in bursts, can create an extreme amount of wear and tear on your hose if it’s not designed to handle that kind of pressure.
It can also cause leaks in fittings that are not designed to stand up to fluctuations in flow.


Ends:
Getting the right fittings for the hose assembly is a very important part of the process. If the fittings aren’t designed to go on the hose you have, the assembly will quickly fail.
Other important factors are the angles you need the fittings to be at, the pipe thread you need, and if you need male or female fittings.
The size it important too. Does your assembly require a metric or JIC fitting? These two are not always interchangeable as the angle of the threads is not the same. The wrong fitting could lead to leaky hoses if not much worse.


Delivery/Details
When does your customer need the hose assembly? Are there more details? Sometimes you may not have the components to mmAake exactly what the customer needs, but if it is an emergency be creative. Use a higher pressure (NEVER lower) hose. if need be use adapters and swivels to get the end fitting configurations necessary. Does the hose need spring guard? Armor guard? Fire sleeve? Make sure you get all the details before making the hose assembly.


Choosing a hose assembly won’t feel like rocket science as long as you can answer the basic STAMPED questions. Each question plays a determining factor in making sure the hose is constructed of the right material, that it fits properly, that it will seamlessly connect to the equipment, and no leaking or other negative reactions take place.
Once you’ve got STAMPED answered, the rest falls into place.