- Take the deepest breath you can
- Inflate a balloon with a single breath (if you have already completed step 1 and haven’t got a balloon yet, release your breath, go and buy one, and repeat step 1)
- Tie it off
- Get a large, deep oven tray and put it on the floor
- Fill an empty bucket and put it in the centre of the oven tray
- Top up the bucket of water with extra water until it is full to the very top (don’t let any slosh into the oven tray)
- Gently dunk your balloon in the water. The water will start pouring out of the bucket and into the oven tray. Fully submerge the balloon (try not to slosh extra water out of the bucket when doing so)
- Take the balloon and bucket away
- Either:
- Poor the water from the oven tray into a measuring jug, or
- Weigh the oven tray with the water in it, empty the oven tray and weigh it, the difference in weight is your lung capacity in litres (because 1 litre of water weighs exactly 1 kg)
How many litres of water did you collect? That is your lung capacity.
Why would you want to do this?
I don’t know.
Seems like a lot of work for just a number to brag to your friends about…
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{ 7 comments… read them below or add one }
AWESOME idea!
Nice Job on bringing this idea to the public eye.
As for reason to measure?
I plan on doing this for my kids yearly as an incentive to stay away from smoking. Just the thought of losing what you’ve achieved,…
It will also serve as a reference for my own lung function loss as I continue live near smoke (Smog, whatever) excersize less and age,….
Cool! Thanks for your comment Nate
i have a question, if i do this procedure between a non smoker and a smoker, who are both around 20 to 23 old, would there be really much difference when it comes to the results?
I’m not a doctor but I suspect the smokers ability to retain oxygen is diminished. That would be a good experiment, let me know the results.
Thanks a lot man, i have searched this in hours, and i’ve finally found it… it’s from a chemistry proejct, greetings from Mexico
wouldn’t the water pressure compress the air in the balloon and make your lung capacity seem smaller?
hmmm damn good point James