I’ve upgraded to the Dash pods and am wondering how best to store the Eros PDM in case I need to use it with old style pods as a backup. Any suggestions? Thanks!
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Remove the cells (sometimes called “batteries”). Use them in something else. That is sufficient; electronics only degrades if it is supplied with power.
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Thank you!
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@CatLady Lol… How many back up pods are you keeping?
Since I will have only the one Dash PDM, I want the back up of the old Eros PDM too. I suppose eventually I will try to get a Dash back up, but until then?? So I am wondering how many pods to keep with the PDM. I’m thinking somewhere between 5-15! Five because most issues would be solved by that, 10 would be just in case and because we won’t be able to get them, and there might be an issue more than once.
Thanks for the answer @jbowler I know the pods last after the expiration date, but they probably have some kind of internal battery? Do you have a best guess on the pods or is it, we will have to find out if we try to use them? Anyone out there have an idea of how long pods last after expiration?
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I only have 4 extra plus 5 from an old batch that was iffy.
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Pods and the PDM are completely different. The pods have six (IRC) internal lithium metal cells. I’ve never had a pod fail on me in a way that suggests a battery failure and I have had pods supplied by WalMart that will be close to the use-by (timer-running-out-of-sand) time when I use them. I’m fairly confident of Insulet’s competence in this regard. I don’t trust Dexcom at all but I do trust Insulet; that battery looks like there might be some redundancy in the cells (I don’t know, I’m just guessing) and Insulet have always struck me as infinitely more trustworthy than Dexcom.
All the same those cells will die. I wouldn’t want to use one after the actual expiration date; up to but not beyond. Trust goes both ways.
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I took apart a used pod (probably an Eros) to see if it would be practical to recycle the components (it isn’t; too difficult to get it apart) and it was powered by 3 LR44 button cells. Alkaline, not lithium.
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@bkh and @jbowler I took apart a Dash pod to see what made it tick, might have the pics I took still. I recall the same setup as @bkh with 3 LR44 button batteries. I’m assuming as there’s no “pull tab to activate,” they batteries are already supplying what I assume is a minimal power so the pod will respond for pairing. If that’s the case, there has to be finite life expectancy for the batteries. While I don’t “trust” Insulet apparently as much as @jbowler, unless someone’s got more definitive experience, I’d say Insulet’s stated life-expectancy is probably 2/3’s to 1/2 what can actually be expected, giving them a cushion of 1/3 to 1/2 what it probably is in real life for “most” pods. But, that’s a WAG at best, and not a very educated one! Looks like @CatLady will be the gunea pig to see! @CatLady, you up for that task?
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There might be; filling the pod with insulin physically pushes the plunger back and, so far as I have been able to determine, the “full” switch is, indeed, physical (pretty much it’s difficult to see how it could be anything else). So there is an “on” switch in there.
Well… all cells have a finite life but they are LR44s and, yes, the current implementation is a “0% Hg” “alkaline” cell by Murata, one of these: LR44|Micro Batteries|Batteries|Murata Manufacturing Co., Ltd.
(There may be other suppliers; I just took a sledge to one of my recent 'pods.) The Murata spec sheet does not give a shelf life, other sources suggest 5 years which is well within the Insulet use-or-die-by date.
It may be the case that Insulet don’t use a physical switch on the cells (the battery); if they do not they have to deal with the quiescent current of whatever is switched on, but this is well understood electronics. It may be worth noting that Dexcom apparently did this with the G6 transmitter; it had to be “plugged in” to a sensor to turn on but that was just the sensor contacts themselves. Elsewhere in the G6 was some non-physical (so to speak) circuitry that switched the whole G6 on. The G7 is different; there is that enormous neodymium magnet in the G7 inserter that, surely, can be considered as a physical (in the sense that I am using it) switch.
Great Agatha Christie BTW; diabetic kills hated whatever by putting G7 magnets into their food over a period of decades. I’m sure they’ll be banned before it becomes possible.
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Good pts all! I hadn’t thought the filling of the reservoir could act to make the batteries go “live.” That’s probably it and, possibly, why they extended the Dash lifetime…
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Unrelated to the conversation, but happy birthday @TomH !
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Happy birthday!
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Well, darn it, The kittens coming out of the cake gif won’t load. I guess imagination is needed.
Happy birthday @TomH from a fellow cat Dad
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Thanks to all for B-day wishes!
Regarding the PDM, the biggest concern is separating the battery from the case and putting it in the original wrapper/box if you have it, alternately someplace where the contacts won’t be active! THEN, put it someplace where you’re sure to remember (yeah, right, like that thing I was looking for yesterday…what was it…??). You know…us old folks are always forgetting where we put stuff!!
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