Comments on: Runaway Robot (toilet)

By: beloml

beloml — Fri, 10 Mar 2006 17:33:45 +0000

I’d say the low-flush toilet and the low-flow shower are tied for worst.

By: Jay Manifold

Jay Manifold — Fri, 10 Mar 2006 14:27:04 +0000

You know you’ve been around too many automatic faucets when you wave your hands under a manual one and wonder why nothing happens.

By: pst314

pst314 — Fri, 10 Mar 2006 01:51:10 +0000

“I prefer to keep the water system decoupled from the electrical system”

The men’s room in our office building has one fully-manual sink.

By: LotharBot

LotharBot — Thu, 09 Mar 2006 17:17:25 +0000

Some contractors once accidentally cut the power to the student union building on campus. The toilets flushed manually, but I had to walk over to another building to find a sink where I could wash my hands.

I prefer to keep the water system decoupled from the electrical system as much as possible.

By: Half Sigma

Half Sigma — Thu, 09 Mar 2006 17:10:11 +0000

But the auto-flush urinal is a GREAT invention. Too many people were too lazy to push the button on the manual urinals, and consequently the bathrooms always smelled.

By: Jonathan

Jonathan — Thu, 09 Mar 2006 14:14:28 +0000

I got yer food valve right here, pal.

Actually, MB’s point applies to many automated devices. Unless they are designed well they can be more trouble than they are worth, and sometimes they are not designed well. I think this is really a user-interface issue rather than an issue of automation vs. non-automation.

By: Michael Blowhard

Michael Blowhard — Thu, 09 Mar 2006 07:30:28 +0000

Ooops, make that foot-valves …

By: Michael Blowhard

Michael Blowhard — Thu, 09 Mar 2006 07:29:19 +0000

I agree that it’s nice to be able to get through a public washroom without touching anything. That said, I find it psychologically disorienting when everything is “automatic.” I spend seconds feeling like an idiot, staring at the toilet to make sure it flushes. I wave my hand like an idiot underneath the faucet hoping it’ll start up and trying to decode where it’s reading movement. I’d much rather have a physical connection — I’d feel less like someone being processed through an engineer’s conception. Maybe food-valves are the answer…

By: Keith, Indy

Keith, Indy — Wed, 08 Mar 2006 19:43:45 +0000

All I really want in a public toilet is the ability to flush without touching anything with my hands.

A floor-mounted flusher would be more usefull than auto-flush…

By: Mitch

Mitch — Wed, 08 Mar 2006 11:59:12 +0000

When we had a half bath installed, state plumbing codes (later federal law) required a low-flush toilet. It didn’t work well, but I’ll spare you the details. We named it after the governor of Massachusetts who had the bright idea: the Dukaka.

By: ArtD0dger

ArtD0dger — Wed, 08 Mar 2006 01:55:36 +0000

Automatic urinals, however, are great. At the Denver airport the men’s rooms have no doorknobs, and the urinals and sinks are automatic. One can complete the whole process contacting nothing but himself and the automatically-dispensed paper towel. The latter, at least, comes untouched by human hands.

By: Jay Manifold

Jay Manifold — Tue, 07 Mar 2006 23:09:29 +0000

Such toilets dare take what they want.

By: chel

chel — Tue, 07 Mar 2006 22:30:02 +0000

The best toilets ever are those European models where you can select either powerful flush or light flush given the situation. I think this actually saves more water than our US low flush models because it eliminates the need for all those extra “courtesy” flushes.

I’ve actually even seen Euro toilets with self cleaning seats too. How nice!