Flexible stretch hose having hollow reinforcing coils and properties enhanced by annealing

A hose production method comprising:

• concurrently and continuously extruding both a hollow strand-like bead of thermoplastic material, and a relatively wide, relatively thin, tape-like web of thermoplastic material having equidistantly spaced, continuously extending edge regions;
• wrapping the freshly extruded bead around and in engagement with peripheral portions of a rotating mandrel to provide a substantially uniformly spaced array of reinforcing coils for a hose that is being formed so as to extend along an axis of the rotating mandrel;
• helically wrapping the freshly extruded web about an outer surface of the helix that is radially furthest from the axis, with the equidistantly spaced edge regions of the wrapped web continuously contacting and substantially immediately bonding to portions of the outer surface of each adjacent pair of the reinforcing coils of the helix, and with each new helical wrap of the web having a leading one of the equidistantly spaced edge regions overlapping and bonding substantially immediately and continuously to a trailing one of the equidistantly spaced edge regions of a previous wrap of the web;
• and
• annealing the hose while the hose is axially compressed to a minimal axial length to cause central portions of the web that extend between adjacent ones of the reinforcing coils to extend inward toward the central axis when the hose is subsequently axially compressed to the minimum axial length.