The agony of death...R.I.P.

We all know it is going to happen but when you are thrown into the midst of it, reality sets in.

My friend and companion of 9 years is struggling to stay alive and it doesn't look good. I would think that around 30000 hours isn't too much to expect but it started with the On/Off button failing to work, followed by a slight whistle that was intermittent.

I travel a lot and my ResMed S8 Autoset has been my faithful companion. Bounced around, dropped, shoved into overhead bins, dropped out of overhead bins, loaded into a backpack, multiple examinations by TSA, and so on and it just faithfully kept my airway open all night.

At 3a I woke up to a whistle sound and decided to check it out. It had nothing to do with the humidifier. I puffed backwards on the air outlet to see if that would settle things down and that didn't help. A few taps didn't help either.

When my On/Off button stopped working I set the machine to Auto On/Off. After my early morning efforts I am unable to enter the menu and when I plug the machine in it starts blowing. To shut it off I unplug the machine.

I am traveling now with 2 weeks to go. If worse comes to worse I can have my backup machine sent to me, but I am going to try to nurse my old friend through the rest of this trip.

When I get home I will bury my friend and continue with a new machine. While change is difficult it is also a new beginning that I am looking forward to.

This mode of failure is graceful. At least I have a chance of using it to the end of this trip. This is much better than simply not turning on when you hit the switch.

Lesson learned... retire the machine at 28000 hours, enjoy a graceful retirement, and avoid the agonies of death.

I know talking about replacements so soon is hard ......... but ....... the new ones are so nice. Young, no wrinkles .....quiet ....... you will love the replacement.

Condolences ... it's nice to know that you never took this relationship for granted, the future is bright! Trust me

Life is short.
Mourn quickly, and get on with life.
It is what the old companion would have wanted.
Honor its memory; and keep fighting the darkness.

Good God... I didn't know WHAT to expect. Glad it's only your machine!

Yeah, I clicked too.

Thanks for the bit of humor from everyone when I was expecting a tear jerker.

Lucyhere wrote: ↑

Sun Apr 01, 2018 4:26 pm

Good God... I didn't know WHAT to expect. Glad it's only your machine!

It provided his wants and needs longer than a lot of relationships, and he won't have to give it the better half of his worldly goods. He was also smart enough to have another waiting to take over. Sounds like a plan. Jim

Giving new meaning to the phrase "rest in peace". . .

Jean

I have a brick cpap machine I just replaced after 20 years (only because I found out there are now data capable ones now), and it's still going strong with over 60,000 hours on it... It's an Puritin & Bennent Goodknight 318.

It's now in the closet as a backup, and there's nothing wrong with it at all. I don't think it'll ever fail...

Thanks, HoseCrusher.

Based on this, I let my wife know that she should be sure to let a doc know right away if my on/off button ever starts to go, especially if she hears me whistling intermittently.

I feel your pain, last year my trusty cordless drill started growing tired and finally died. He was 10 years old, 85 in power tool years. I wrapped him in a blue tarp with his favorite 18 volt battery. I buried him next to then garage, overlooking the fence we spent so many hours building, so many years ago. On my good days I smile at the thought of him joyfully screwing in Black and Decker heaven, on my bad days, well, Sigh.....

Now the truth. I was building my new deck last July in 100 degree plus weather. The damn thing wouldn't hold a charge, and then it wouldn't go in reverse.
I screamed "YOU EFFIN POS", and tossed it into the recycle bin. Went to Home Depot and got a sweet DeWalt with a 20v lithium battery and havn't really thought about it till i read this post

Glad to know that no one here in this thread is actually burying toxic waste. Just sayin'.

Good news, and bad news...

My good friend survived the night and seems ready to go another night.

The bad news is it appears I have lost the ability to download my data. I was curious how the large leaks would show up, but I am not going to fiddle in an effort to get that information.

One down, eleven nights to go...

jnk... wrote: ↑

Mon Apr 02, 2018 9:08 am

Thanks, HoseCrusher.

Based on this, I let my wife know that she should be sure to let a doc know right away if my on/off button ever starts to go, especially if she hears me whistling intermittently.

I thought about it, and I've decided that I don't want to know where your on/off button is...

Mind you, I didn't think about it very long.