Newbie: the distilled water issue for Intellipap humidifier

[balaram]

I only occasionally use my Intellipap Humidifier. Only the 14 days a year when I'm traveling to dry, arid climates, and only sometimes during the one month of very mild winter down-under, in Australia and New Zealand (night outside temperature never below 37F).
For such light usage, how much do I need to worry about using only distilled water (it's a pain in the neck for a constant air traveler)? If a problem does develop from my not worrying about distilled water, where and how would I see that problem manifest?
And is there a class-two alternative to distilled water—say, something not as bad as tap water, but not as ideal as distilled?
Or, a few nights of tap water won't do me in, anyway?
Please enlighten me.

[bdp522]

I would use bottled water before tap water, hoping it would be filtered better. I would also empty the humidifier every morning and allow it to dry out as much as possible. If you see any crud in the water or tank itself, give it a good wash to be sure all the crud is gone before refilling.

Brenda

[Pugsy]

Even more than a few nights of tap water won't do you in.
The suggestion for distilled is more for the tank than anything else. Distilled water lacks the minerals that will build up on the plastic tank walls and bottom. Lack of build up means a cleaner looking tank and less need for extra time spent later scrubbing the build up off. Amount of build up from tap water will depend on the amount of minerals in the water where you are going. Where I live we have "hard" water and that means lots of limestone and iron in our water. It doesn't take long for there to be a build up if water has lots of minerals in it....ever boil a pot dry by accident and see the white crud left in the pan?

If you do get a bit of mineral build up...vinegar solution will dissolve it easily.

I have used tap water when I travel and even at home here when I have forgotten to go to the store and get distilled water. When I do use tap water I don't let any left over unused water sit in the tank during the day. I dump it and let the tank air dry to limit the chance of minerals sticking to the insides of the tank. This is done mainly because I am lazy and it means less need for potential extra cleaning work later.

[Bluecat]

I use tap water every night in my humidifier.
In the morning, I empty what's left and leave it to dry.
About once a week, I wash it in the dish washer.
My humidifier is now 421 nights old and still looking good!

[msla]

I would prefer bottled over tap. Tap water is often chlorinated and the smell of chlorine is a bit over powering for me.

[chunkyfrog]

When traveling, I would opt for a bottled water that does not contain minerals.
Luckily, that's usually the cheap stuff.

[IndyDave]

I actually talked to a Devilbiss tech person before I bought mine, and he told me what everyone else has summarized. The distilled water requirement is to prevent mineralization (hard water scale) from building up not just in the humidifier chamber, but also in the hose and the part of the pap between the humidity chamber and the hose. Said a few nights of tap water isn't going to cause a problem, be sure to empty and wipe the chamber dry each morning. He added if you go more than a few nights at a time, or the water seems particularly hard, do the white vinegar rinse of the chamber afterwards, and also rinse some through your hose, then wash both well. You might even want to put a 10% vinegar/di water solution in the chamber, turn the humidity up, and let the machine run on its own for an hour or two, then repeat with just distilled water, to completely clean out the parts of the machine itself that were exposed to the hard water (those two steps without actually using it of course).