Distilled Water vs Boiled Water - Humidifier

NightTrain · Post by **NightTrain** » Fri Mar 10, 2006 9:05 pm

Is there a downside to using boiled water rather than distilled water in a heated humidifier? I was told early on by the DME to just boil water which I have been doing... is that not a good thing?

Thanks!

Wulfman · Post by **Wulfman** » Fri Mar 10, 2006 9:18 pm

My opinion is that it's NOT a good thing.

Item 1 on page 5 of the humidifier manual says "Use only distilled water in chamber".

Distilled water is cheap.

Best wishes,

Den

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Fri Mar 10, 2006 9:24 pm

Thanks Den! Unfortunately, the DME failed to pass on the manual. I have seen distilled water mentioned here several times and started to wonder about it. Is there any need to boil distilled water or is it good to go right out of the jug? Thanks again!

Goofproof · Post by **Goofproof** » Fri Mar 10, 2006 9:35 pm

Straight up out of the jug, no twist of lemon.

Wulfman · Post by **Wulfman** » Fri Mar 10, 2006 10:02 pm

Anonymous wrote:Unfortunately, the DME failed to pass on the manual.

Aaaaaah, another fine example of customer education and support......

Best wishes,

Den

NightHawkeye · Post by **NightHawkeye** » Fri Mar 10, 2006 10:09 pm

It's that free flow of information thing again (NOT).

Regards,
Bill

Gidgie · Post by **Gidgie** » Fri Mar 10, 2006 10:12 pm

The difference is, and it's an IMPORTANT difference! is that boiled water still has disolved minerals in it, which build up scale on the inside of your humidifier, and the distilled water does is completly free of anything but pure, demineralized water, which is much better for your humidifier.

krousseau · Post by **krousseau** » Fri Mar 10, 2006 10:26 pm

Yes-I ran out of distilled water one night and used bottled water to drink-just one night and there was grit on the bottom when I washed it tne next AM.

Guest · Post by **Guest** » Fri Mar 10, 2006 10:39 pm

I use Reverse Osmosis water for my heated humidifier, I have a salt water aquarium and so plenty of RO water is available, slightly better than distilled(as far as a heated humidifier goes.) not sure of any other benefits but is free if you have a RO water unit.

Brian

Brent Hutto · Post by **Brent Hutto** » Sat Mar 11, 2006 6:21 am

It you boil tap wter you will accomplish two things. You will kill any bacteria that may be there (hopefully not a problem with tap water) and you will drive off a fair bit of any excess chlorine that was left there from its treatment at the water plant. At times our municipal water just reeks of chlorine and can't stand to drink the stuff, much less breathe it all night.

But the main reason you use distilled water is to avoid mineral buildup in the humidifier. Boiling does nothing to help that and if you boil it very much you'll actually slightly concentrate the minerals by evaporating part of the water but leaving all the dissolved solids behind. Use distilled (or reverse osmosis filtered) water.

tomjax · Post by **tomjax** » Sat Mar 11, 2006 6:38 am

Using boiled water accomplishes absolutely nothing beyond perhaps removing a bit of chlorine or other aromatic chemicals.

There is no reason to sterilize the water since bacteria cannot be transmitted in the vapor anyway. This myth will likely persist among the uninformed.

I would also think the electricity used in boiling it negates much of the savings over the distilled water.

Buy distilled water. Ain't that expensive.
Stay in touch with yourself.

jonfb · Post by **jonfb** » Sat Mar 11, 2006 9:19 am

There is no reason to sterilize the water since bacteria cannot be transmitted in the vapor anyway.

Do you have an explanation for this ?

krousseau · Post by **krousseau** » Sat Mar 11, 2006 11:44 am

It may however be possible to blow bacteria in the air going through the humidifier-as it does in water droplets from sneezing...

Wulfman · Post by **Wulfman** » Sat Mar 11, 2006 2:15 pm

jonfb wrote:
There is no reason to sterilize the water since bacteria cannot be transmitted in the vapor anyway.
Do you have an explanation for this ?

Do some searches....there were some huge discussions on this subject last year.

Den

Fenway · Post by **Fenway** » Sat Mar 11, 2006 6:56 pm

I too use Reverse Osmosis water in my machine. RO water is the purest water currently known to mankind. Even more pure than distilled. RO removes 99.9% of minerals & bacteria. There is no known way of purifying water better than Reverse Osmosis. I have an undersink model (GE) that filters up to 10 gallons a day, we use it for all of our drinking, cooking and it makes the best coffee in the world. Been using it in my CPAP humidifier since Day1 (May 2005) with no noticeable problems. Each night I simply go to the sink with my humidifier tank and fill up to the line. Of course there is a small amount of maintainance for the RO System, I replace the 2 prefilters each year and flush the system with a bleach and water mix as per the GE instructions. Highly reccommended if you drink lots of water!

Steve @ Fenway

Distilled Water vs Boiled Water - Humidifier

Distilled Water vs Boiled Water - Humidifier

distilled water

boiled water

No bacteria ?

Re: No bacteria ?

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