Giraffe Tools Hose Reel 1/2‘’ 78 ft, Heavy Duty Retractable Garden Hose Reel with Any Length Lock, Slow Return System, Wall Mounted and 180 Deg Swivel Bracket

Love this item. I previously purchased the 1/2" x 100' last year and it has worked flawlessly. So I purchased this 1/2" x 78' model for my back yard. Same great quality and easy of installation. I will say that the nozzle that's included isn't of the highest quality. My first started leaking badly within the year! The only other thing is the bracket. For this price, they could make it of metal and not that plastic. Overall, it's a must have!

We had been looking for a retractable hose with the swivel capability and wanted one that would be easy to install. This one is it! Quick installation, well built and it even locks the hose in place where I want. With an intentional pull the hose rolls back in and retracts into the case. We had an issue with one of the devices (we bought 2) and the customer service resolution was top notch. I highly recommend this Giraffe retractable hose

The product was packaged nicely. The installation was was easy. Literally the first time I used it retracted to fast and I was unable to grab the hose to slow it down. The part that stops the hose from retracting all the way into the unit went right into the unit. This made the white alignment part to come off. It was not broken. I fixed the white part by loosening the front of the unit and putting it back in place. The hose never worked the same after that. It did retract slower and the hose was more controllable. If you used the hose 110 feet out I would often have to assist the hose to go back into the unit. It didn’t matter if the hose was full or empty. I would have to feed the hose into the unit. Then at one point the hose got tangled in the unit housing. The only way to fix this was unfortunately to take the unit apart. This was somewhat of a tedious task due to all the screws. I was able to untangle it and put it back together. After that the hose will only retract into the housing maybe 30 feet when extended to 100 ft. I now have those hose just laying in the middle of the yard. So in all to much work for me to coat that much money. The product broke the first day. I did give it a chance by trying to make the product work. I am past the return date. One star merely for packaging and ease of installation.Update: the company sent me a new one with little no no hassle. Quality customer service! It seems that the original one I got was in fact unlucky. The new one works great. The only observation I can can make Is is that my old hose box (the broken one) is in heavy sun and the grey color did fade to a lighter grey but I wouldn’t really say that’s an issue.

Let's face it, this is for lazy people who couldn't be bothered to hand-crank the hose, so they rather spend an extra $100 or more to get this thing, safe in the knowledge that the hose will always be neatly put away at the end of the day, because it takes no effort.To unreel the hose, you simply pull on it. When you stop pulling, it will pull back about a foot or so and then "lock", so there's not a constant tension on the hose. To reel it back in, pull the hose out for a foot or two, then release the tension and it will reel it back in. I suggest you "walk it back", otherwise it will slam the ball at the end of the hose against the unit. The spring inside this reel is quite strong, you also notice that as you pull it out to its full extent.The instructions have a full-size drill template on the back, that makes the installation a little easier. HOWEVER, you'll have a hard time finding the correct concrete drill bit for the included screws / anchors, because they're for metric drill sizes, so I went to the hardware store and bought a "beginners kit" that had screws, plastic anchors, and the correct bit. This made the installation more painful than it needed to be. If you're mounting this into wood, then you don't have that issue.To make the installation a little easier, you can loosen the small screw on the swivel base, then lift the unit from the base. Once the base is screwed to the wall, just lift the reel in and tighten that little screw.Once mounted, the entire reel can swivel roughly 180 degrees.The package includes a leader hose to hook it up to the faucet, however the connecting port is mounted horizontally, which is a bad idea. To reduce the stress on the port, and to avoid kinking the hose, I bought the following 3 items which make it a "better" installation, and also makes it easier to follow the instruction manual suggestion to shut off the water before reeling in the hose:- 90 Degree Hose Elbow CAMCO 22505, search for: B003BZD03K- Kink-Protector Hose, search for: B07N6Q141P- Inline shutoff with long lever, search for: B089QXNJNFIn my view, the elbow should be part of the package, particularly at this price. Anyhow, I mounted the elbow to the reel to make it a vertical connection. Then I mounted the kink-protector hose to the elbow and attached the shut-off to the kink protector hose. Finally hooked up the (included) leader hose. This prevents any kinks in the supply hoses, and it allows me to shut off the water right at the reel, without putting physical stress on the water inlet connection, which did not look too sturdy to me, and it certainly wouldn't be fixable if you broke it.

We installed are reel in about 15mins. Super easy and looks very neat and clean. Started watering flowers right away. Works perfect great price.

Updated:Our hose reel was replaced and all is well! I was very impressed about the diligence that took place to make sure we knew the reel would be replaced!Not even a full year and something broke inside and now the hose just spews water all over. Hose isn’t cracked. Will try calling customer support during business hours and fingers crossed they will be able to help us, as this item wasn’t cheap and I would like to continue to have it!

So far so good! I ordered two, the 1/2 inch is a bit to small and slow to fill water troughs but I ordered a 5/8 that is due in tomorrow.I did give reduced stars because neither one came with lag bolts or hardware to mount them and neither one came with the spray nozzle as advertised. But the functionality and ease of use is otherwise great.