Hi PE’rs,
Here’s a piece of a post I made on another thread about how I modified my penimaster to make it more “user friendly”. What I’ve done may or may not help others but here goes …
. . . I use pumping in combination with heat and at least 4-6 hours a day in a stretcher. Reference the stretcher, I am experimenting with a Penimaster, too, and I have come up with a really comfortable strapping method that works better for me than anything I’ve seen or tried here-to-fore including the rubber straps supplied by the Penimaster folks. I use the Penimaster plastic head piece but, instead of their rubber straps which do not really fit the contour and shape of my glans and circ scar area very well, I came up with a replacement strap that is very comfortable and extremely easy to use, too. Here are the details (I suppose this ought to be in a different thread but what the heck …):
I took two pieces of 3/4-inch wide adhesive-backed Velcro about 15 inches in length, peeled the paper backing, and stuck them together back-to-back so I had the rough, Velcro nylon “hooks” on one side and the soft Velcro mating pad on the reverse side. You see, 3/4 inch wide Velcro in this double-backed fashion fits nicely into the strap grooves of the Penimaster headpiece. Before threading the Velcro into the headpiece, I first threaded one end of the Velcro strap about 6 inches through the center opening of a jelly tips big toe guard. This makes a wonderful cushion for the strap. Now, since I am right-handed, I threaded about 5 inches of the Velcro (soft-side facing down) cushioned end through the left slot of the Penimaster headpiece with the headpiece oriented in the same direction relative to the body as if it were fully mounted and in use. Then I doubled the Velcro back onto itself and onto about 3/4 inch of the upper exposed surface of the jellytip sleeve thus fully securing the Velcro strap to the headpiece and trapping the jellytip cushion. Then I threaded the loose end of the Velcro strap through the right slot of the head piece and left a loop large enough to slip my wrapped unit into the head piece and then tightened the strap untill the jellytip cushion made solid contact. Then I wrapped the velcro onto itself thus capturing the entire contact area of the head piece. This amount of Velcro wrapped onto itself does not interfere with the Penimaster bars just clearing them. It is much, much easier to put on and take off and the comfort difference is just remarkable owing to the use of the jelly tip toe cushion. BTW, I use J&J 2-inch wide surgical gauze for a modest circ scar wrap.
Bottom Line - NOW I have a very comfortable stretcher to use in concert with my pumping program. I can go up to 3 hours with the stretcher at a stretch (pun intended) but normally I disconnect after an hour or so just to make sure about circulation . . . , etc.
Hope this helps somone,
MrTiPS