According to Joe Fabeitz :
It's a CPAPs machine for God's sake! Tape it up and get on with it. It's
not much more than a scaled down, toned down, shop-vac. As has been
suggested, it has seen it's better days if it's that old.

Of course.

BUT, taking an obviously "unofficially repaired" device into a hospital
is just asking for trouble. These things will have "only repaired
by qualified and certified technician" warnings ALL over them. Any
problems with it whatsoever in a place choca-bloc with lawyers on
call, and you're toast.

No "repair" described so far is invisible. Even cutting off the plug,
sliding on some heat shrink tubing, and then putting on a new plug
will be abundantly obvious it's not an official repair (because it
won't be a molded-on plug).

A hospital is likely to refuse it if they see it first, and have
a fit if they detect it later.

The guy is in between a rock and a hard place. The manufacturer _may_
charge something ridiculous to fix it. Anything the OP
does without opening the case will be "obvious".

Frankly, I wouldn't trust any glue, and electrical tape wouldn't do much
good in this situation.

In the OP's situation, I personally would open the thing and shorten
the cord, as long as I could make sure I could do the repair invisibly
(both inside and out, unit doesn't have anti-tamper indicators etc).

Here, tho, the hospital issue wouldn't arise, because they'd
supply one as necessary, so I could leave a slightly more obviously
butchered unit at home. I'm not so bad off that a few days without
one will be a problem.

Fortunately, my CPAP doesn't have a hard-wired cord. It has
a replaceable standard appliance cord (like a PC). Get cut?
Dig through my odds-and-ends box for another complete cord, no
"repair" required.

Unfortunately, I do have the same problem with a submersible sump
pump. Given that the line HAS to be water proof, I'm going to have
to do surgery on the unit and put a brand new cord on it to avoid
problems with the cord cracking again.

I'm with Joe. Ask the manufacturer. A regular TV or appliance
tech might well be able to fix it "legally" too. I should hope
you could get it repaired for $50.
--
Chris Lewis, Una confibula non set est
It's not just anyone who gets a Starship Cruiser class named after them.