cpap losing pressure

My cPap seems to be losing pressure. It sounds like air is leaking out of the water holder in the humidifier. I may have transported it with water in it, which I just learned was wrong. It says 13 pressure but it is not blowing out as much air as it used to. What is wrong with it?

take it into a DME and ask them to hook up a manometer to it and check the pressure

I don't know what a DME is.

durable medical equipment place

where did you get the machine? some outfit sell / rent it to you ? - ask them to check it

There's an easy way to check your pressure at home. Get a deep bowl and fill the bowl or a deep sink with water, at least 15 cm or more deep.

Take a ruler and strap it to your hose in some way, with the ruler's zero right at the edge of the hose, the end not connected to your machine. Somehow you need to keep the hose/ruler rigid, in a straight line and connected to each other. Maybe tie them or tape them together.

Turn on the machine connected to the hose. Vertically lower the hose and ruler combo into the water gradually. You should see air bubbles coming out of the hose. Lower the hose/ruler slowly, until the air bubbles first cease.

At that point, get a reading, if you can, from the ruler of how much of the hose is submerged. If 13 cm of hose is submerged (in a straight vertical line), then your pressure is 13 cm.

I think this should work. Watch for posts below, though, with corrections.

On second thought, it is probably better to submerge the hose way past the point where you expect the pressure to be, then gradually raise it until you first see a bubble emerge from the end of the hose. The other way I described, I think you have to worry about the machine responding to leaks.

LoQ wrote:There's an easy way to check your pressure at home. Get a deep bowl and fill the bowl or a deep sink with water, at least 15 cm or more deep.

Take a ruler and strap it to your hose in some way, with the ruler's zero right at the edge of the hose, the end not connected to your machine. Somehow you need to keep the hose/ruler rigid, in a straight line and connected to each other. Maybe tie them or tape them together.

Turn on the machine connected to the hose. Vertically lower the hose and ruler combo into the water gradually. You should see air bubbles coming out of the hose. Lower the hose/ruler slowly, until the air bubbles first cease.

At that point, get a reading, if you can, from the ruler of how much of the hose is submerged. If 13 cm of hose is submerged (in a straight vertical line), then your pressure is 13 cm.

That's a neat way to do it! Wonder why I never thought of that, and I'm an engineer! That method will work to test the pressure of any machine that puts out air at low pressure, such as a furnace. Just punch a hole in a duct, stick a tygon tube in there, tape it tight to the duct, and put the end in a pot of water. If you're careful you can even measure vacuum this way.

Well I'm not an engineer, but I did sleep in a Holiday Inn, er, make a C in physical chemistry in college, heh. Should have paid more attention -- one of the most valuable courses I ever took.

Unlike quantative analysis--now there's a class that has been of much less benefit, and I made an A or a B in that one. But don't tell the teacher, please. I know he would be disappointed, given how many times he asked someone to wake me up so I could pay better attention. "Would somebody wake up LoQ, please?" Just about every class he had to get someone to wake me up at least once.

LoQ wrote:Well I'm not an engineer, but I did sleep in a Holiday Inn, er, make a C in physical chemistry in college, heh. Should have paid more attention -- one of the most valuable courses I ever took.

Unlike quantative analysis--now there's a class that has been of much less benefit, and I made an A or a B in that one. But don't tell the teacher, please. I know he would be disappointed, given how many times he asked someone to wake me up so I could pay better attention. "Would somebody wake up LoQ, please?" Just about every class he had to get someone to wake me up at least once.

LOL 8:00 am class?

LoQ wrote:Well I'm not an engineer, but I did sleep in a Holiday Inn, er, make a C in physical chemistry in college, heh. Should have paid more attention -- one of the most valuable courses I ever took.

I took one semester of chemistry. The only thing I remember clearly is a simple way to convert °F to °C and reverse. Take either temp, add 40, multiply by 9/5 to convert C to F or 5/9 to convert F to C, and subtract 40. Beats the old high school plus 32, minus 32 method!

howkim wrote:LOL 8:00 am class?

I don't remember if it was early morning class or not. The teacher, whom I really liked, actually, tended to drone a bit, but worse, he just put up boards and boards of algebra as his lecture method. I was way past algebra before I ever got to college, so it was really boring.

Now the lab was interesting, and I learned a lot from that and enjoyed it quite a bit more. It required measuring things by weight very precisely, and we had these magnificent scales for doing that. It was cool. I bet the technology for quant labs has improved immensely since then.