5/8" OD Silicone Tubing Question/Problem

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aredling

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So I purchased about 20' of silicone tubing a few years back and cheaped out and went with 5/8" OD from US Plastics. It's worked perfectly with the occasional kinking. This was only with gravity fed systems.

Last night I hooked up my chugger pump for the first time since i built my stand. The hose was getting sucked together at the inlet of the chugger pump, and I really noticed some kinking issues with the connections to the cam locks. (even with the 90 deg fittings)

I'm ready to bite the bullet and buy new heavier duty tubing but wanted to make sure this was my problem first. Does anyone else have this happen with the 3/4" OD silicone tubing? Has anyone else experience the same problem I have with the 5/8" OD?

thanks,
 
Not sure how your system is set up.. but it sounds like you may need to put a throttling valve on the output side of the pump. It sounds like it's trying to deliver more than the pump is able to get. It's likely that even with a harder tubing you will cavitate the pump if it's not getting enough liquid. The pumps are not designed to suck.. rather designed to push/pump.
 
The thinner wall silicone is prone to collapsing even with normal use of the pumps. The 1/8" wall (1/2 x 3/4) is alot less prone to collapse and kinking when pumping.
 
^^^ This.

When that thin wall stuff gets toasty it's gonna collapse. Throttling a pump to "fix" that seems counterproductive in the long run...

Cheers!
 
Thanks for all the responses.

I was able to get this tuned a little bit better by throttling the output of the pump as suggested. I'm going to try this with very hot water tomorrow to see what kind of impact I see. If the kinking is too annoying i'll upgrade to the thicker wall stuff.

thanks again,
 
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