My faulty 420E - update

(update for the following thread:Another faulty Puritan Bennett GoodKnight 420E)

Friday, 2 weeks ago, I got my replacement machine. 12 days of use convinced me that the one I had been using for a year was faulty from day one.

The new machine is:
1. Distincly quieter, and it doesn't whine
2. More mechanically responsive when I push its buttons (the older one had me fighting it)
3. Much more responsive to finding the mask on my face or off it: a 420e defaults to a kind of "null pressure" showing "1n 1" on the screen after a few seconds if not being connected to a face . The old one used to take a long time to get there, and sometime just stuck on the lowest pressure in the range.
4. And, its basic leak rate is lower. I used three 420Es with a Breeze, two of them with the very same one. While my trial machine (no. 1) with the trial mask showed an average of 13.2 Litres pre minute on a range of 4-8 - which is too low if you take into account the Breeze's expected vent flow , my own machine (no. 2), from day one, was at 28.8 for the same range - dramatically higher. Something I noticed and mentioned - even complained about - to the DME at the very beginning. At the time I thought it might be a faulty hose - I even insisted on, and recieved a new one because the first one had bubbles on its sleeve connection. That didn't make any difference to the leak rate.

My replacement machine (no. 3), on a pressure range of 5.5-8.0 reports an average leak rate of 23.4 - which is still higher than the mask's expected vent flow even at 8.0 (21) but at least isn't that wildly off.

5. Another, possible indication of a problem in the original machine is that its clock would gain a few minutes every month or so - its too soon to know if the new does so too, time will tell...

The funny thing is that I brought leak comparison reports to the DME yesterday, and he didn't ever look at them - they're still in my briefcase... I reminded him of the high leak rate, he accepted my statement that the machine was faulty from day one, and agreed I should keep the new one (which is probably really new if I can trust its smell, the DME promised to check) and that was that... We'll leave it to the lab to check the other one, he said.



O.

Been wondering what happened to you......

Glad to hear you got a (new) machine that works better.

Best wishes,

Den