I'll say this upfront: if you came here looking for Eva Gates books in order, pet gates for dogs, or a review of that pet couch your dog keeps claiming—this isn't that article. By "Gates" I mean the industrial rubber company. I'm a quality manager at a manufacturing plant, and for the past four years I've reviewed every hydraulic hose assembly before it reaches our customers. I've seen what works and what leaks. So here's my honest opinion.
My take: a premium hose brand like Gates is worth the money—but only if you nail the crimping process first. Most failures I've inspected aren't because the hose body failed. They happen at the fitting—the exact spot where someone crimped the metal collar onto the hose. And no brand name in the world protects you from a sloppy crimp.
What most people don't realize about crimping hydraulic hose fittings
Let's talk about how to crimp hydraulic hose fittings without inheriting a leak. The first thing I tell every new operator: the crimper's die set isn't universal. It's calibrated for a specific hose brand and series. What most people don't realize is that switching from one hose manufacturer to another changes the wall thickness and rubber compressibility—so the same fitting size may need a different crimp diameter. I've rejected plenty of assemblies where the operator used the old brand's spec, and the result was a fitting that looked tight but wasn't actually biting into the reinforcement layer.
Another overlooked part: the seal. A while back, someone on our line chose a 2mm rubber strip as a sealing shim because it "felt about right." We lost four hours of production to a slow leak that traced back to that strip being the wrong durometer and thickness. That incident still stings—I should have double-checked the drawing before approving the work order. (Note to self: never assume "about right" is a specification.)
Here's the verification habit I've drilled into my team: measure the crimp diameter with a calibrated caliper, compare it to the manufacturer's chart, and log the value. If you don't have the chart, stop and request it. Every time we've skipped this, we've caught the problem later—and always at a worse moment. That's not a criticism of any one brand; it's just the reality of hose assembly.
Where Gates genuinely earns its reputation
Now, why do I recommend Gates for many applications? Consistency. Over the last two years, I've inspected dozens of incoming Gates hoses and fittings across multiple size runs. Their dimensional tolerances are stable, and the branding is legible—which sounds trivial until you need to trace a lot number after a field failure. Their published crimp specs are detailed (gates.com lists dimensional tolerances by fitting series), and we've used them as the basis for our own quality checks. For critical high-pressure lines, I'll spec Gates without a second thought.
That consistency also makes the crimping process more reliable. When the hose's rubber thickness varies by a few thousandths, your crimp diameter has to change. Gates' batch-to-batch variation is low enough that we can set our dies and trust the first assembly—that's huge when you're running 200 assemblies in a day. On a 50,000-unit annual order, our reject rate with Gates stayed under 1%, and most of those rejects were our own die-adjustment issues, not component defects.
The honest follow-up: when Gates is overkill
Here's where I break from the "buy the best" crowd. Gates isn't the right choice for every hose assembly. If you're running a low-pressure water line in a non-critical application, a budget hose will probably perform fine—and anyone who tells you otherwise is selling something. In fact, I've often told our procurement team to save the budget for high-risk lines and use cheaper products for the easy stuff. I once approved a no-name brand for an open-loop drainage line, and it's still running five years later without a single drip.
So no, I don't think every hydraulic system needs Gates. But when the consequences of failure are high—safety risk, downtime, fluid costs—the premium buys you known performance. That's a trade-off worth understanding before you choose.
Your first crimp won't be perfect—and that's okay
If you're learning how to crimp hydraulic hose fittings, expect to make mistakes. I still remember our first batch of fittings—or rather, our first rework, because we had to redo five of them. The important part is to measure every crimp, compare it to the hose manufacturer's spec, and keep records. And if you're using Gates, use Gates' own spec sheet, not a generic chart.
One more thing: don't let anyone convince you that a visual check is enough. I've caught fittings that looked perfect but failed a pull test. The only way to know for sure is to measure the crimp diameter and, ideally, do a pressure test on a sample. Every time we've skipped that step, we've eventually regretted it—though I might be overstating the regret; it's usually more like a twelve-hour rework shift.
So, is Gates worth it?
Here's my final answer: Gates is worth it when the application demands reliability, and the operator follows the crimping spec. If you came expecting me to trash the brand or give it a blanket endorsement, I'm sorry to disappoint. The truth is more nuanced. Buy Gates for the jobs where failure isn't an option. Build your crimping skills first. And when in doubt, measure twice, crimp once.