Clamp for push-on couplings

A clamping assembly for securing the sealing connection between a push-on fitting having a flared end fitted into a cage and surrounded by a garter-type coil spring housed within the cage of a pipe with a resilient O-ring sealing the connection between the push-on fitting and the pipe comprising

• a rigid clamp having a semi-annular recess aligned about the central axis of the clamp and sized to snugly fit over the cage of the pipe,
• the clamp also having an axially aligned rigid cylindrical surface with a diameter sized to encircle but not touch the outer surface of the push-on fitting adjacent the cage of the pipe,
• the clamp also having a pair of holes whose axes lie transverse to the axis of the clamp and lying on opposite sides of the clamp's cylindrical surface,
• the clamp being axially split into two mirror-image halves,
• each clamp half having in its semi-cylindrical surface a flat edged semi-cylindrical groove, the depth of the groove being about one thirty-second of an inch,
• a ribbon-like strip of resilient material inserted into the semi-cylindrical groove in each clamp half, the thickness of the strip being about one sixteenth of an inch to thereby accommodate oversize push-on fittings with out deforming the oversize push-on fittings, and
• a pair of screws sized to fit into the holes in both clamp halves and designed to draw the two clamp halves together around a coupled pipe and push-on fitting,
• whereby a strong, inwardly directed substantially 360.degree. pressure is applied to the outer surface of the push-on fitting by the two strips of resilient material without deforming the push-on fitting thereby locking the pipe and push-on fitting in strict axial alignment, preventing back and forth movement of the fitting and the pipe transverse to their common axis, and preventing the rupture of the O-ring seal between the fitting and the pipe.