How To Loosen A Hose Clamp

Learning how to loosen a hose clamp is fast and easy once you determine what type of hose clamp you have. There are two different styles of hose clamps. One style is the more common than the other and that one you will see used on many plumbing applications and the other type of hose clamp is the type that is spring loaded and works in a completely different way.

Loosening The Hose Clamp

To loosen the type of hose clamp that has a slot for a flat head screw driver ad also looks like a solid metal band you will want to take your screwdriver and turn the screw counter clockwise to loosen the clamp. To tighten the same kind of hose clamp you simply just do the reverse and turn the hose clamp screw clockwise. Just so you know, Clockwise is turning something to the right, Counter clockwise is turning something to the left.

There Are Two Different Types Of Hose Clamps

The second kind of hose clamp has no screw drive but has two ears or tabs on the clamp. These types of hose clamps are also called wire hose clamps and can be very nice to use and also have some benefits compared to the more traditional style hose clamps. To loosen this type of hose clamp you will need a pair of channel lock pliers or a regular pair of pliers depending on where your clamp is located. To loosed the clamp take you pliers and squeeze the ears of the clamp together so they move towards each other. This will loosen the wire and then you can simply slide the clamp off. You might be wondering at this pint what the difference is between the two types of hose clamps is anyway and the answer to that is basically the way that the tighten and loosen. There are many places that you will need to install or remove a hose clamp but there will not be enough room in that area for a traditional hose clamp so you can use the spring loaded kind since its easy to loosen in tight spaces.

Tightening The Hose Clamps

The thread types of hose clamps can also be tightened and adjusted to the tightness that you want easily with a screwdriver , the spring loaded hose clamp only has one degree of tightness. The spring loaded hose clamps also have no moving parts like the traditional hose clamps and that means the clamp will last a lot longer.