The universal silicone range - straight hose, 45 and 90 degree elbows and couplers - along with stainless worm drive clips and T-bolt clamps, aluminium joiners and elbows, and the off-cut mixed boxes. They are the parts that go into almost every job, which is exactly why they sell.

Because they solve a real problem cheaply. Each box is an assortment of short hose or tube sections in mixed diameters and lengths - silicone, fluorosilicone, rubber radiator hose or aluminium. When you need a short piece at short notice, the box usually has something that fits, at a fraction of the price of buying lengths.

Stainless worm drive clips for general coolant and water work, and T-bolt clamps for boost, intercooler and turbo pipework. Most regular customers buy W4 stainless rather than W1 zinc, because a corroded clip seizing somewhere awkward costs far more than the clip did. 10 and 100 packs work out much cheaper per clip.

Rubber is the cheaper like-for-like replacement and is correct for a standard vehicle. Silicone handles far higher temperatures and does not perish or harden with age, so it is the better buy if the hose is hard to reach, the application runs hot, or you simply do not want to do the job twice.

Order hose by internal diameter, matched to the outside diameter of the pipe stub it slides over, and measure the pipe with vernier callipers rather than measuring the old hose - hose stretches in service and reads large. Metal joiners are ordered by outside diameter.

No - it swells and breaks down in contact with petrol, diesel and oil. Use the fluorolined Fuel & Oil range, built to SAE J30 R6 and compatible with E5 and E10 pump fuel. The same applies to breather and catch-can lines, which carry oil mist even though nothing liquid is obviously flowing.