Drip hose coupling fitting 1/2” (13-16mm)

While making a drip system for the garden I noticed that I needed a couple more 180° degree joints, and so I thought, why not try to print them and see how they hold.

I would not recommend using them for high-pressure applications, in the range of 1-3 bar they are perfect; although at ~3 bar you can start to see some small droplets of water that pass between the layers (see image).

I've been using a few of them for a couple of months at 1-1.5 bar and they seem to work just fine.

I initially designed it for 13mm-16mm (internal-external diameter) or 1/2" hoses; anyway, it should be straightforward to scale up and adapt it to different hose diameters. 

Installation

Use a lighter to heat up the inside of the hose's end, quickly insert the coupling and then apply pressure on both ends at the same time. It may be necessary to jiggle a little bit the hoses, but be careful to not apply too much shear force - since the layers are parallel to the hoses it may break in case of poor layer adhesion.

Print settings

I printed it in PETG, vertically without supports, 0.25mm layer height, and 4 perimeters. I suggest increasing by 5/15 °C the hotend temperature (and/or decreasing the fan speed) for better adhesion of the layers.