On a ship, the flexible hose is the smallest part in the system and the first place a commodity choice fails. It sits exactly where the movement, the heat and the shock are. Rigid pipework corrodes, cracks and carries every vibration into the compartment. A metallic flexible needs a fire guard and restraining rings, and still adds weight. An industrial hose has no naval type approval and cannot go on a warship.
Jetpac® is built for all six, and qualified before it goes on board. Start with the one you are dealing with.
A machinery-space fire does not wait for the system to be isolated. A fuel, lube-oil or hydraulic line that lets go in the first minutes feeds the fire and takes the system with it. On a metallic flexible the answer is a fire guard: one more part to fit, inspect, strip off for maintenance and refit afterwards, and one more part to forget. What you want is a line that keeps carrying fluid through the fire with nothing bolted on.
The fire resistance is in the rubber, not in a guard. A Jetpac® assembly carries fluid under pressure through the fire test on its own, so there is no guard to fit and no restraining rings to hold it. Nothing to add, nothing to inspect, nothing to strip off when the system is opened. The hose is its own fire protection.
Built to UK MOD Def Stan 02-345: 15 minutes at 1,100°C while pressurised and vibrated. Type approved by Lloyd's Register, DNV and ABS. Fire tested in our own test house, at high and low pressure. Smoke and toxicity verified independently through RAPRA.
A warship's pipework is built to a shock specification a plant room never meets. A rigid run carries every vibration from the machinery into the structure, and cracks at the joints under shock. On a submarine, the noise a rigid run transmits is a problem of its own. The joint at the machinery has to absorb what the machinery produces, not pass it on.
A flexible joint at the machinery isolates the pipework from the plant. The high-shock, high-vibration construction absorbs movement instead of transmitting it, takes the shock loads that break a rigid run, and cuts the structure-borne noise that, on a submarine, counts as much as the shock. The 180° dog-leg configuration gives movement in all three planes within one assembly.
Shock and vibration tested to MIL and NATO standards, by our customers and by UK MOD(N) in their own facilities. Pressure-pulsing combined with flexibility and deflection tested in-house.
Machinery spaces are tight and pipework is rarely aligned. Equipment moves on its mounts, the run grows with temperature, and the installation never matches the drawing exactly. A catalogue hose forces the layout around the part. A fabricated elbow adds a joint, a weld and a place to leak. The hose should be built to the installation, not the installation around the hose.
The geometry is set by your layout, not by a stock list. A 90° or 180° preformed assembly is built to the leg lengths of the installation, with movement in all three planes, so the hose fits the run instead of the run fitting the hose. Where the run turns back on itself, the 180° dog-leg takes the reversal in one piece. Designed in 2D and 3D CAD from your drawing. Manufacturing tolerances advised per installation, in writing.
1" to 14" (25 to 350 mm) bore on preformed assemblies. ¼" to 23" nominal bore across the range on bespoke assemblies. Around 7,000 to 8,000 straight-hose configurations and about 100 bellows variants, so the standard answer usually already exists. Fittings machined in-house in copper-nickel 70/30 and 90/10, nickel aluminium bronze, phosphor bronze or super-austenitic stainless.
A metallic expansion joint does the job, with help. It needs restraining rings to hold it, a fire guard to protect it, and the hours to strip all of it off when the system needs work. Every one of those parts is weight the ship carries for thirty years. In sea water, the metal corrodes and cracks as well. A metallic joint arrives as a kit. The alternative arrives as one part.
A Jetpac® assembly is its own fire protection and its own restraint. No restraining rings. No fire guards. One part to fit, one part to open, and lighter than the metallic joint plus its hardware. The rubber does not corrode in sea water, and the fittings are machined in the alloy the fluid demands. On in-service vessels, Jetpac® assemblies have replaced metallic pipework that had corroded and cracked.
What can be counted today: the metallic kit is the joint, its restraining rings, its fire guard, and the hours to strip and refit them. The Jetpac® assembly is one part.
Rubber ages. Every hose on board has a service life, and the one that reaches it before its replacement is ordered becomes a concession with a name on it. Today the register is a spreadsheet that disagrees with what is actually fitted, the survey takes days out of a refit window, and stock is over-ordered to cover the gap.
The survey ends with a date against every hose. Jetrac, Oldham Seals' field division, puts engineers on board. They survey every flexible hose, other manufacturers' included, tag each one with an RFID chip, record its condition and criticality in a web-accessible register, forecast replacement, supply just in time and install. The people who made the hose are the people who fit it.
Ten-year service life on Jetpac® assemblies, established by UK MOD(N) under Def Stan 02-345. Every assembly hydrostatically tested and released with full certification, so the register starts from a known date and a known condition.
On a naval platform the part is not the cost. The qualification is. A hose without type approval and Def Stan evidence cannot be fitted, and a part that fails at test late in a programme costs the schedule, not the part. Testing done elsewhere happens late, and the schedule pays for it. The proof has to exist before the part ships, and the file has to arrive with it.
Every Jetpac® assembly is hydrostatically pressure tested before it leaves Chichester, and every one is released with full release certification. Behind that sits our own test house: fire test rigs at high and low pressure; endurance, vacuum and pressure testing; pressure-pulsing combined with flexibility and deflection; impulse testing; all on rigs built to the standards our customers specify. Material ageing, fluid resistance, smoke and toxicity are verified independently through RAPRA. Independent chemical and mechanical certification of non-ferrous fittings is available. Connectors to BS, ISO, ASTM or ANSI as specified.
If you need a part qualified to a naval or customer standard, ours or yours, we can test it.
Small bore tested to 200 bar (2,900 psi). Large bore to 50 bar (725 psi). Def Stan 02-345 fire test: 15 minutes at 1,100°C, pressurised and vibrated.
One material family across sea water, Dieso F-76, AVCAT F-44, OX30, OX33 and OX40, OM100, OMD113 and OEP80, fresh, potable and chilled water. 200°C continuous, 250°C intermittent. In service with UK MOD(N) for more than forty years.
Send the envelope and a drawing. We confirm feasibility and the standard to qualify to.
Preform geometry and leg lengths modelled to your pipework. Fittings machined in-house.
Built in Chichester, hydrostatically tested, qualified in our own test house, released with certification.
Jetrac surveys, tags, registers, forecasts, supplies and installs.
No. The material is integrally fire-resistant and is tested to Def Stan 02-345 while pressurised and vibrated, so no guard is fitted. The same applies to restraining rings on Jetpac® bellows.
Yes. Send the drawing, or the envelope: fluid, pressure, temperature, bore, movement and the space available. Preform geometry and leg lengths are modelled in 2D and 3D CAD to the installation, and tolerances are advised in writing.
Fire-resistant. That is the term Def Stan 02-345 and the type approvals use: the assembly keeps carrying fluid under pressure through the fire test. Fire-retardant describes a material that resists ignition. Jetpac® is specified and tested as fire-resistant.
Yes. Jetrac tags, registers and manages other manufacturers' hoses alongside Jetpac®, and acts as first-tier supplier for the replacements.
Ten years, the service life established by UK MOD(N) under Def Stan 02-345. Jetrac's register records the installation date and forecasts the replacement before it falls due.
We do not publish programme detail, and we will not publish yours. What we can say: Jetpac® assemblies are in service on Royal Navy ships and submarines, and we supply the navies of Canada, France, the United States, Australia and Spain.
You are responsible for systems that cannot fail at sea. The flexible hose should be the last thing you have to think about. Send us the fluid, pressure, temperature, movement and space you are working with, and a drawing if you have one. Our sales team routes it to the right engineer. You get feasibility and the standard we would qualify to within one working day. Your platform stays confidential: we do not publish what we build for you.