Vinegar to clean hose and tank

How much vinegar do i mix with water ( 5% that you get in the store) to clean my tank and hose 1 time a week. I use baby wipes to clean mask and cusions daily. Then im concerned of the vinegar smell when i hook it up that night to go to sleep. DO i let it soak? How long?

Im in the heath field and know Vinegar has alot of goood uses and ive opted to use it instead of the Control III on Cpap.com.

your thoughts. Dont want to catch any nasty bugs by not properly cleaning.

Normally I just use a little soap and water once a week. Swish it around in the water tank and shake it up and down in the hose. Run fresh water thru it and shake dry. On occassion (bi-weekly) I might put a teaspoon of peroxide in with the water. 6years and no bugs.

Vinegar, if used too much will certainly leave a smell in your hose, if not thoroughly rinsed.

I use the vinegar about every 6 months. Glad you brought that up. After this cold passes, may be a good idea to disinfect.
How long? When I've done (probably twice since I've been on cpap) about 30 - 45 minutes then airdry. With the hose, I'll rinse it out while in shower to further get rid of the vinegar smell before bedtime.

Starlette

I don't like the smell of vinegar. I used it one time. Stuff still smelled like vinegar for 2 days and I rinsed and rinsed. It was a weak solution also. Ever since then I use just plain liquid hand soap and warm water.

Vinegar solution might help with mineral build up in the plastic humidifier tank but if you use distilled water there won't be any build up and so no need to use vinegar.

If you don't like the smell of vinegar you don't have to use it. It is not a critical issue.

Will the soap its self disinfect the tank and masks. I was told not to use bleach and avoid antibacterial soap. I have no problem only using a mild soap, just want to make sure im killing any germs.

I started to buy the Control III from Cpap but it seems expensive ( maybe its not) I already have a bucket and a lid to let the hose soak. My tank is dishwater safe. My dishwater gets the water at 180 which will sanitize it. ( along with the soap tablets).

I appreciate all the advise. Im learning all about having sleep apena. I dont feel alone here.

I soak, then wash in Dawn/Method dish soap, rinse, then while everything's wet, spray with vinegar & let sit 3-5 mins, then rinse, rinse, rinse. Then, everything sits on a clean towel to dry under the nightlight on my nightstand before bed. For me, the cleaner my skin and silicon mask parts, the better seal I get and since my leak is 0 at least 98% of the time, I'm sticking to this routine. My current set of pillows and oral cushion are now 10 months old, no signs of deterioration.

I have used either J & J Baby liquid baby cleanser or simple liquid hand soap (which I think is antibacterial) for the entire 2 1/2 years I have been on the machine. I have washed the hose maybe 3 times and that was a long time ago.
Humidifier tank gets topped off nightly with distilled water and maybe dumped once a month, quick rinse and use it again. Nasal pillows washed in the liquid hand soap about once a week.

So you see I am obviously very, very lax in my routine.. though when I first started therapy I had to go by "the schedule"..that quickly got old.

Germs..they are everywhere anyway. I have had 2 minor colds since starting cpap therapy and both those were brought home by my husband.

If I was to worry about killing germs... I would use hydrogen peroxide before I would use vinegar. Easy to use, rinses off easily and doesn't stink.

Do what you feel comfortable doing in regards to your cleaning schedule. You will find there are about as many opinions on what to do and how to do it as there are members here.

I agree with the germs being everywhere. I guess its just new to me so i want to make sure I'm doing things right. I want to keep it as simple as i can.....
just like my wife use to dust our new home when we moved in weekly. Now after 10 years it gets done once a month. We survive. I do know i don't want to smell vinegar all night. ( and i love pickles) I've cleaned once and only used dawn soap and soaked the hose and tank, rinsed and let them dry. I hung the hose over the shower to drip dry. I turned the CPAP on and let it run about 15 min to void any left over droplets of H20.

Thanks again

What you did for cleaning is fine. Keep it simple.
I love pickles too but I hate vinegar smell. It's not like vinegar sterilizes anything to a complete germ free status anyway. Now if you happen to catch a cold then you might want to do some extra washing on the mask but that would be about all or if you develop health issues where your immune system is compromised..then maybe add a little more germ killing thoughts.

I may be in a minority, but the smell of vinegar doesn't bother me, but the residual smell of things like Dawn and baby shampoo really does bother me.

I use a 1 part vinegar to about 10 parts water for washing my hoses and nasal pillows. I do tend to let them soak for several hours out of laziness mainly. (I get them in the water, go do something else and forget about it until several hours pass.) When rinsing, I can manage to hook my main hose directly to the water faucet in my bathroom and run the water full force for several minutes. This is also how I test for small leaks in the hose, by the way. And then I hang the hose to dry for a week since I have a pair of hoses that I swap out each week.

Personally (yes, I know, use gentle soap without anti-bacterial) I use a Steris soap that I can get through the hospital that I work at. Yes, I know that it may cause my mask cushions to breakdown quicker, etc, but I like the soap and it leaves everything feeling "like new" clean.

For the hose, I am lucky that we have two sinks in our master bath, so I will fill one up with warm soapy water and let the hose sit in there. After a while, I will then slip it over the one nozzle on the sink, and let the other end sit in the other sink and then just run cold water through it for about a minute or two.

Wonder if I'm the only one that only cleans his stuff once or twice a year I use alcohol? I found that it doesn't really get dirty unless it gets very wet from having the humidifier too high?

JaVelin wrote:Wonder if I'm the only one that only cleans his stuff once or twice a year

Nope. You're not the only one.

Links to Cleaning mask, hose, humidifier
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JaVelin wrote:Wonder if I'm the only one that only cleans his stuff once or twice a year I use alcohol? I found that it doesn't really get dirty unless it gets very wet from having the humidifier too high?

I'm with you on this JaVelin. I'm not rigid about this anymore. When I first got my cpap, I was right there every Saturday cleaning everything. Now? It's more when the mood strikes me or I think to myself, "Starlette, why don't you clean your cpap stuff today?"

Starlette

wm:
> How much vinegar do i mix with water

A tank or a hose hold such a relatively little amount that I just use 100% vinegar. A 50-50 mix with water would be fine too.

> Then im concerned of the vinegar smell when i hook it up that night

For both of those items, this is what I do.
1) In the kitchen sink, which has a "spray" nozzle (for the tank), I rinse well with _hot_ water.
2) I fill with vinegar, let it soak for a short while (2-3 min), then empty.
3) I rinse well with hot water.
4) I put in some _mild_ dish soap and let it soak for a while. e.g., 7th Generation Free and Clear, or other
5) I rinse well with hot water.

This gets it clean and eliminates all but a trace of the smell of vinegar.


P:
> if you use distilled water there won't be any build up and so no need to use vinegar.

For the buildup, maybe.
For germs, wrong-o.