What is an aqua stop hose and do you have to use it?
The words aqua, and stop, are used by a variety of companies covering different products. They all try to “stop” damage from leaking water in various situations. So-called “aqua stop” systems in appliances can combine more than one leak detection system including float switch detectors in the base of the appliance.
However, this article deals with questions about the actual aqua stop fill hose supplied with several brands of washing machines and dishwashers (including AEG, Neff, Bosch & Siemens).
How does the Aqua-stop hose work?
It’s a hose within a hose. The outer hose is made of corrugated plastic designed to contain any water if the inner hose leaks. There is also a plastic housing at the end where it connects to the water tap.
If the inner hose ever leaks, then a device inside this housing is able to detect the incident and prevent further water getting into it. If this happens, the hose will no longer let any water through to the appliance and will commonly indicate it has “tripped” via a red dot in a small window in the housing.
If this happens the hose is now useless and cannot be repaired.
Problems associated with the aqua-stop hose
1: Their bulk and relative inflexibility can make them difficult to use depending on the set-up and plumbing
2: They can’t be extended if they are too short. (You can still connect one to a normal hose but that would of course introduce a normal unprotected hose partially defeating the point of using an aqua stop hose)
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3: The size of the bulky plastic housing at the end connecting to the water tap is especially difficult to accommodate for many people (especially with taps fitted under the sink) where there may not be room for it. So in many situations it can be impossible to connect this hose to existing plumbing
4: Many people’s taps point out horizontally and some of these hoses should only be fitted pointing down as shown in the photo below. Check your instruction manual for fitting instructions)
This photo was sent to me by Mark. He had to fit a new cold tap with a 90 degree angle pointing down to accommodate the aqua-stop hose.
His original tap had extended horizontally like the (no longer required) hot tap behind it. Before changing the tap there was no room to connect the new aqua stop hose.
This demonstrates the type of problem many people have when confronted with these larger bulky hoses with specific fitting instructions as described in the main article on the left.
Can you replace an aqua stop hose with a normal fill hose?
Many aqua stop hoses do nothing different except protect against leaks from itself with a mechanical stop mechanism activated by leaking water inside the hose.
You can usually replace them with a normal fill hose if you are prepared to remove this flood protection.
However, some aqua stop hoses actually have an electrical solenoid inside them, with wires running through the hose from the washing machine. In this case the aqua stop hose acts like a remote fill valve which would be missing in a normal hose.
If the washing machine also has a regular fill solenoid with power running to it, and the aqua stop hose just piggy backs of its electrical power being energised when the main valve is energised, then a normal hose should still work OK.
I’ve seen cases where some manufacturers bizarrely threaten to void your guarantee if you don’t use their hose. This makes no sense at all.
The hose protects only against the fill hose bursting or corroding, which is in fact a pretty rare event these days anyway. No one would dispute they have every right to refuse any repairs to the replacement hose you have used instead, and if by any freak chance the split hose sprayed water onto the appliance and caused damage they have no need to fix that either – but it’s not really on to refuse to repair a faulty motor or any other fault on the washing machine unrelated to the fill hose.
Having said that, all guarantees are in addition to our statutory rights, and in law, no one has to provide any guarantee whatsoever. Our rights extend only to the Sale of Goods Act. The only reason they give any guarantee is because everyone does, and it’s an important – nay essential – sales tool. No one is likely to buy any appliance with no guarantee. But as it is an addition they are able to try to impose certain restrictions. If we think the restrictions are unreasonable or restrict our “statutory rights” then we can challenge them, and if necessary seek consumer advice or take them to the small claims court.
It’s hard to imagine a manufacturer seriously trying to convince a customer with a 3 month old washing machine that they must pay £200 or more to have a new motor fitted simply because the washing machine is connected by a normal fill hose instead of their aqua stop hose, how ridiculous.
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Comments transferred
This article was originally published on Washerhelp.co.uk and had attracted some comments which you may find very useful to read. Therefore the first dozen or so comments under this article are the comments I’ve transferred across.
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Hi,
Stumbled across your site looking for answers.
Got myself a 2nd hand Hotpoint Smart FDFSM3111p and the seller chopped of the water inlet along with the wires for the “new aqua stop” l. The seller is kindly ignoring me know so I assume bad faith.
The hose dissapears into the bottom and it would seem I need to remove the side cover to reach the end of it.
My question is if I can run it with the chopped wire with an adapted waterhose which I already fit at least to know if it runs before pursuing the right part. (bought one in ebay claiming to be original and for my model but the hose is corrugated and smaller in diameter than the one I had.
The manual explicitly said the hose should not be chopped as an electrical hazard.
Any tips highly appreciated.
Hello Iggy. There are two types of Aqua stop hose. One is an autonomous hose that just replaces a normal hose and they are interchangeable although obviously if you exchange one of these aqua stop hoses with a normal hose you will lose the leak protection. Unfortunately there are some Aqua stop hoses that have electrical connections inside that go inside the washing machine. You cannot swap one of those for a normal hose. I’m not overly familiar with this latter type but I assume the electrical connections are to energise a valve inside the hose. So you would need to buy a replacement hose and wire it into the washing machine.
Hi,
Just found your site while trying to research Aqua Stop hoses. what a great resource – many thanks!
I’ve just ordered a new Siemens dishwasher but went low down the range (IQ300) as I really do not want internet connectivity. One other difference between this machine and the more expensive ones is that it doesn’t come with Aqua Stop, so I had been wondering whether I could / should acquire this separately.
I’ve owned a lot of dishwashers and washing machines in my lifetime and I’ve only ever had leaks when the washer at one end of the supply hose has failed. My question is: does AquaStop avoid this problem? Or would I really just be protecting myself against the supply pipe itself failing?
Hello Jo. The basic Aquastop hose just protects against the fill hose splitting but as far as I’ve never known it doesn’t really happen. Some Aqua stop hoses may have wires running through them that connect somewhere in the appliance but any aquastop hose you would fit will just protect against an extremely unlikely event.
They don’t protect against leaking from the connections on either end.
I have an old Miele W916 washing machine with an Aquastop hose incorporating a powered end solenoid valve and recently experienced the PC flashing fault. I proved by trial and error that it was due to the end solenoid valve not fully opening thus restricting flowrate and causing the system to fault and trip as the required water fill level wasn’t being reached. As a temporary solution I swapped out the Aquahose for a conventional long hose thinking the washing machine should work OK as there was still the triple solenoid valves inline to regulate flowrate. This didn’t work however as the triple inlet valves failed to operate. I then plugged the discarded Aquahose back onto the electrical supply cables and the programmes seem to be working fine albeit that the Aquahose isn’t connected to the water supply. There is clearly an internal sensor stopping the triple valves from working unless the end solenoid is open. I have the Aquahose coiled up on the outside of the washing machine. The one slight issue is you can hear minor water bypass occurring across the triple solenoid valves possibly due to their age. Untill the Aquahose is replaced I close off the quarter turn isolating valve after completing each wash cycle to stop the washing machine filling up with water.
Hello Kevin. Yes the Miele Aqua stop hose clearly opens and closes the water supply electrically through the large plastic contraption at the end. So if the hose fails, either because of a leak in the inner hose, or maybe the device goes faulty, then you cannot replace the fill hose with a normal hose like you can with most other Aquastop hoses.
Unfortunately as with many Miele spares the prices are ridiculous. I just checked online and found one on Amazon for just under £200. You can literally buy a brand-new entire washing machine for that. However, one problem that Miele have is that a lot of people seem to try selling on their spares with inflated prices because I don’t think they allow third parties to sell their spares. As I said before in some of my articles this, like the protection on repairs, only serves to greatly inflate their prices to a massive percentage of the public.
Anyway on the official Miele site I can see an aqua hose for about £150. But that is still insanely expensive. I don’t understand how anyone in their right mind would pay that amount of money just for a hose.
Have you tried undoing the plastic contraption at the top of the hose to try and work out what it does electrically? Have you searched Google and YouTube to see if anyone has come up with a way to effectively bypass one?