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Best High-Tech Toilet?
shellac writes "For a number of years now, Japan has had incredibly high-tech toilets, complete with a funky electronic control panel that controls a water jet for cleaning the posterior, a hot air blow dryer, a fake flushing sound to cover up those noisy "Dumb & Dumber" style sessions, a seat warmer, and other nice features, not to mention the occasional amusing gaijin encounter. Prototype models can also chemically analyze urine using lasers. The manufacturer, Toto, has made these available in the US and in other countries, but they have failed to largely fulfill their promised potential, despite their popularity in Japan. There is some evidence Kohler toilets is keeping these out of American markets. The toilets also appear to be a victim of poor marketing on Toto's part, which in all fairness may be due to Western advertising taboos that do not exist in Japan. I know I would love to have one of these, and I suspect many others would as well. What does that /. community think of these toilets? Can anyone post a personal review?"
Just what we need, a nation full of toilets blinking 12:00.
That's nifty and all but I'm still trying to figure out the three sea shells.
I have a few simple requests to toilet makers:
- Odor detection and removal.
- Gender detection and ajustment (regarding this whole toilet seat issue...)
- Self-cleaning
- Methane detection and recycling
- Portability
- Stability
- Scalability
- Modularity
... Oh man, never work on software design when you need to take a dump...
I guess this also means, no more masturbating into the toilet.
"Honey, the toilet log says there has been an unusual ammount of semen in the bowl lately..."
"shit® happens"?
Beer, now there's a temporary solution -- Homer Jay S.
I've seen the innards of the things when they're opened up for maintenance. They're built out of components from the Telemechanique industrial automation catalog. There are motors, valves, pumps, tanks, lights, and a computer with a rack of interface cards in a stainless steel box. That works, but it's an expensive way to go. You don't make a mass-produced product that way. You could build a washing machine, say, from industrial automation components, and it would work fine, but cost upwards of $10,000.
Some units from Japan designed for mass-production would help.
...is that if I'm expected to spend that much time/effort/money for/on a toilet, there better be a button on that there control panel for "blow^h^h^h^h oral gratification".
$0.02 (CDN)
At Matsushita's research center in Tokyo, scientists explain how they are working on embedding technology in the porcelain that will catch a urine sample, shoot it full of lasers and in short order test it for glucose, kidney disease and eventually even cancer. One of the researchers, Tatsuro Kawamura, says future smart toilets will compile and compare medical results day by day, allowing doctors to spot important changes.
I'd be interested in hearing more about this. Will it store the information locally or be hooked up to a network? How will it know who's using the toilet? Who's to say they won't test for drugs or something in the future? This could get pretty invasive.
Your post may have been the only time in history where the tag would have made something cooler.
"Study your math, kids. Key to the universe." -The Archangel Gabriel
Everyone seems to have a pretty negative opinion but these toilets are pretty nice. The have one of the newer Toto models installed in my office in Yokohama.
The first impression you get of the shining white porcelain gadget is the motion sensor activated seat. (Obiviously designed with all those people who are too crippled to lift the seat cover on their own but still miraculously find their way into the bathroom) Swing open the door and you will be greeted by a soothing mechanical whirr as the seat cover goes up. After wiping down the seat with provided disinfectant from the design coordinated dispenser (also a product of toto) You are greeted by a fairly quick change in tempurature from icy cold (Insulation in Japan sucks and central heat does not seem to be of interest in bathrooms here [read: DAMN COLD]) to a pleasant or shall we say encouraging warm tempurature. Not a bad touch. Very good contour to cradle you poor senstive ass after being abused by an office chair everyday. I don't think I need to mention that actual process of 'making a deposit in the bank' as it would seem rather independant of the technology.
And now on to the real fun. I had always assumed that all sorts of water jets and blowers and stuff were for some kind of euro-hippy freak but one terribly hung-over morning at the office I decided to take the challege and 'test' the water jet. I was very impressed by the nice features incorporated into the jet alone. The water tempurature angle and water pressure are all independantly adjustable to suit all body sizes and 'consistancies' (for lack of a better word). I felt rather clean, refreshed and not unpleasant at all, after all it saved me the trouble of wiping!
Being a curious, I have experimented with the jet mechanism at a later date and discovered that at maximum pressure activting the jet while not being seated results in an entertaining water jet that easily crosses to the far side of the stall with little loss of angle or tradjectory. Then by adjusting the angle mechanism I realized that the jet could easily reach tie or even face levels of the average male and realized the potential for an excellent prank hack. (It would really be a shame if someone rigged a trigger to the stall door, wouldn't it...).
Following the encounter with the water jet anyone would realize the need for a drying mechanism as toilet paper does not respond well to moisture. As with the water jet the dryer/blower also has adjustments for angle tempurate and air pressure making for a quick and pleasant drying experience. After multiple test runs timing revealed that the dryer could generally complete its task in 25-35sec with no discomfort. (When placed under time constraints the dryer could produce sufficient lack of moisture in a record time of roughly 12.6 seconds but would not be classified as in the 'comfort zone'.)
Due to being of the male variety and forseeable sloppiness, I could not test but give due note to a full set of water jets and dryers located in the front of the toilet to satisfy the needs of our geek friends who do not a twig and berries nor wedding tackle. The frontal jets were also adjustable for tempurature, angle and pressure leading me to the assumption that they would provide appropriate customization to satify most body shapes and preferences. (Unfortunately no ladies were willing to comment on the functionality of the frontal jets)
From an overall view-point I was very pleased with the performance of this toto model (sorry no model number available at this time) however in the office environment one problem was noticable. Often a venture to the 'techo-head', as I affectionately refer to it, revealed that the settings were often adjusted to preferences other than my own and would require some fine tuning before use to provide the optimal bathroom experience. I realized that it lacked the ability to create presets for individual 'users'. This model lacks the ability to present controls and the small number of analog controls would allow one to assume that presets would not be feasible with out a major redesign of the interface and circuitry. In the event that presets did become a option it would be very convenient to register these settings in a directory server. All in all I would give it 4 out of 5 Johns because of the lack of a presets and still some room in the concept to mature but all together a very pleasant dump.
As I cannot afford to be slashdotted, pictures of the jet mechanisms and control panels as well as model numbers and information will be available by email. Send mail to SCE(at)SUBDIMENSION(dot)COM with 'techno-head' in the subject line and I will send you the photos etc.
This post was enhanced by BEER technology! 'Karaoke' is Japanese for drunken loser. -Craig Kilborne
I prefer to drop all my deuces right here in the comments section of slashdot.
I haven't used anything else as a toilet in years.
- A.P.
"Remember when the U.S. had a drug problem, and then we declared a War On Drugs, and now you can't buy drugs anymore?"
No shit. Living in california has forced my colon to evolve to point of being able to partition my fecal droppings into portions that will flush. I'm not some fucking vegan soybean eating tweeked out southern california heroin addict, when I take a dump it is a glorious and reveling thing, I'm not some herbivore in the woods walking in the woods with pellets shooting out of my ass I'm the big bear farting big stinky brown torpedos into the water, fuck I'm ranting but why the fuck should I have to keep my frigging plunger near the toilet at all times because you have a better frigging chance to hit the jackpot than to flush the turd, 5 gallon flushes with a woosh sound, a fucking vacuum, I don't care if it sucks so hard my anus is inside out I just my god damn shit to go on happily to wherever it needs to be.
An Education is the Font of All Liberty