Garden Pressure Sprayer - Repair + Improvement

At home we have a garden pressure sprayer, it probably is 20 years old. Earlier today we needed it but there was a problem: the sprayer hose was worn out and had broken near the tank.

Today being Sunday, with most of the stores closed I had to come up with a solution, so it could be used today. I began with disassembling the remaining piece of hose and it's connector to discover a male BSP 1/2" thread. Luckily I had some hardware lying around.

I went searching in my inventory, just to find some parts which could work. What I eventually ended up using were the following parts:

• BSP 1/2" coupling
• BSP 1/2" to BSP 3/4" reduction
• BSP 3/4" hose connector
• hose clamp
• a M6 fender washer
• 3 rubber sealing rings

As a first step I refitted the suction tube (the white tube you can see in the first picture) and I attached the BSP 1/2" coupling, which was too tall, so I shortened it using a hacksaw.

With the coupling shortened all parts could be assembled. The suction tube goes in the original hole in the tank and is fastened with the two orange rubber sealing rings. As these get pressed down they will expand in diameter and clamp the tube. To distribute the pressure evenly the M6 washer was inserted with the third sealing ring on top. To make the assembly complete the BSP 1/2" to BSP 3/4" reduction was added. As the reduction threads in the coupling more pressure will be put on the washer and on the rubber sealings. Teflon tape was added to prevent leakage.

As a last step the BSP 3/4" hose connector was added and the hose fastened on there with a hose clamp.

A few years ago (probably 6 or 7 actually) I was walking around in my local home improvement store and I noticed that newer models of garden pressure sprayers had an extra feature. With the old, basic model you had to put pressure on the fluid by pumping the plunger on top of the tank. But the newer models also have a valve stem, so you can put the pressure on the fluid by using an air compressor.

Since the plunger on our sprayer had some wear, I tried to replicate the improvement which was made on the newer sprayers. Since I couldn't find the right parts at that time, I had to use what was available, so I cut out the valve stem of a bicycle inner tube, as well as some rubber rings to act as sealing rings. A hole was drilled in the top of the tank and the valve stem was inserted and secured. Simple and fast pressurizing since then.