my toilet in rented apartment doesn’t have a lid
You can buy lids at Home Depot/Lowes.
Pro tip; keep an umbrella in the corner, pop it open and set it upside down on the turlet before you flush
Get one of those non-slamming lids and it’s too easy to knock if down while flushing. It’s half closed as you leave the room.
Only downside is when you’re at a friend’s place and realize too late that they don’t have such an awesome amenity. You end up being the toilet slamming asshole, yet again.
I immediately imagined it being a heavy seat that gets slammed too XD
I’m feeling déjà vu reading this comment
Flushing after closing the lid is actually hygienic.
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May I interest you in a (not toilet) paper I skimmed back when Covid was still a bigger issue? https://doi.org/10.1063/5.0013318
In another, newer, paper (again, not the toilet kind of paper) I just found, researchers basically used lasers to see and analyze the spread of aerosol plumes after flushing: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-022-24686-5
I am not interested in your (not toilet) papers. I’ve been doing fine so far and I believe that the health benefit is negligible and does not outweigh the impact on my quality of life.
In other words sometimes ignorance is bliss and knowledge can be a curse, I’m not trying to be a neat freak germaphobe.
Well, you might be doing fine so far. How about others who walk into your poop-plumes? Hygiene is not always only beneficial for yourself. Some easy to implement practises can go a long way. I think it’s a similar story to how we (should) regularly wash our hands, wash vegetables and fruits before eating and so on.
Ignorance won’t save you when that one lucky e coli lands on your toothbrush at just the right time. My parents survived leaded gas just fine, doesn’t mean that shit’s safe.
Seriously. Is this guy just like openly pro-poop? Cause it really sounds like he’s trying to spread some poopraganda.
I’ll see myself out.
Coproganda
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Real pros streamline and take off the seat and lid altogether.
- unhygienic
Look at this plebian making contact with the toilet when shitting. What’s wrong, not enough thigh strength?
/s
What if you need to sit? I’m gonna guess this is a joke
Free kegels!!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Squat_toilet
Especially common for public bathrooms in Asia and parts of Europe, specifically because there is no direct skin contact which reduces risk of infection. There are also claims that you poop easier squatting than sitting.
on your personal toilet that(is) the only way
Best reason to close the lid: The things you do in the toilet smell. Lid keeps the smells from spreading.
I do it to prevent my dog from drinking from the toilet
Plus it hides the nasty stuff you leave behind, when you don’t know how to operate a toilet brush.
Flushing is a thing.
Tell me you haven’t owned a house without telling me you haven’t owned a house
I own two houses and seven toilets and I can’t say that I have ever had my toilets stink unless they are broken or not cleaned regularly.
Also, they might be stinky if I was to get my nose all up in there, but I tend not to do that.
As far as I know, my bathrooms all have working fans as well. That could cause issues if they were broken.
Cleaning regularly is the one, your short comment above insinuated flushing is all you need to do.
The short comment I posted should be classified as a quip.
What it actually insinuated is there is a very short list of operating and maintenance procedures for toilets. If you are to the point of closing the lid to contain odors, some of those basic steps might be getting missed. Hence, the quip.
Actually it doesn’t, flushing with the lid closed can leave the particles in the air for up to around 11minutes longer as they exit the side of the toilet with more velocity and pressure. It’s not a sealed system.
Yeah, I’m aware that toilet lids are not an airtight system, I’ve seen them. It still does slow down airflow enough for most of the poop to settle instead of spreading to your whole house.
No it actually does not, it increases the spread and creates a pressure build up compared to being open, you are initially adding volume into the toilet when you flush with the lid closed this pressure build up is greater and spreada the particles further. You are essentially creating a shit nozzle on the sides of your toilet. All the lid does is help the particles become bigger so there are fewer visible particles but they are bigger and travel further, while remaining airborne longer due to their velocity.
This is how I needed this dilemma explained to me.
ㅤ
Plus, it’s more mysterious and potentially surprising.
Well now I’m going to expect something surprising
Then it’s just gross any way you’d flip the lid.
Yeah that coworker who never removes his stains loves to make people focus on it.
Plus if you drop anything in the bathroom and the lid is up it’s ending up in the toilet, learned that one morning when I was about to brush my teeth, that’s when I became a dedicated kid closer
My braces single elastic band one time landed perfectly in the toilet bowl. At work, lol.
What did you do next?
No pressure, but your answer may dictate whether I sleep
tonightever again.
dedicated kid closer
“Listen, I just know you’re going to love this play set; and what a deal you’re getting on it, too!”
I’m in sales myself and have always admired people that can close with such young markets. Your TEDx “Never Speak First” on power dynamic sales with preverbal toddlers was riveting, what other tricks have you learned to adapt with new generations?
“By the way, I’m not too sure if this deal will last until after your afternoon nappies, so you should probably think about when you’re gonna pick this up! I mean, what a waste it would be, right? Remember Mr. Sprinklemuffins?”
Juice boxes are for closers.
I have a solution to our hygiene problems, everyone: poop hoses. Dropping a spooky dookie into a bowl of water is outdated and gross. We can just attach a poop hose to our bee hinds and wham! Hygiene.
I always flush with the lid down. Keeps less in the air.
Hate to break it to you, toilets aren’t airtight. The particles go right out the side and tend to last longer in the air when the lid is down. It’s creates a reduction in visible particles as it seems the lid causes bigger particles to form so ergo less “visible particles” but they are just bigger and last longer for some reason versus the smaller ones. As has been demonstrated by the Mythbusters and many other studies, the biggest factor is having proper ventilation otherwise your gonna find shit particles everywhere regardless of if you close the lid or not.
The reduced airspeed of the shit particles thanks to the closed lid slows the buildup of shit particles on bathroom surfaces enough for my regular cleaning to be sufficient
The closed lid increases air speed, not decreases it as you create a higher build up of pressure 🤦♂️
How does flushing water create air pressure? Are you using a steam toilet? Are you acoustic?
How does flushing water create air pressure? Are you using a steam toilet? Are you acoustic?
Did you just try to call me dumb when you don’t understand physics?
Here’s a little science experiment and explanation for you:
Water in a toilet bowl first rises as the flush begins before it over comes the pressure in the drain trap. Close the lid, more air is squeezed out the sides of the toilet for a moment as that happens, leave the lid up and you have a larger volume for the air to be offset in. Don’t believe me, flush the toilet with the lid down, wet a finger with water slightly and put it near the opening between the lid and the bowl, you will feel it cool down from the air escaping. Do the same now with the lid open and you will notice this effect less. Obviously do this with a clean toilet and wash your hands afterwards but you will notice the pressure difference in the beginning.
I just did this experiment with a lighter held next to the seat gap, which is a simple but sensitive test of boundary air displacement, and there was zero movement. This is complete nonsense.
Sosca the Science Guy!
This would be a good experiment for Myth busters. I’d imagine that with the lid closed the increase in pressure would not be significant and the air particles would be accelerated more horizontally as opposed to vertically. This would, theoretically, cause them to accumulate more on surfaces below countertop level than above.
But I have no data to support this hypothesis.
They did test it years ago lol and confirmed that closing the lid did not have a benefit.
☹️ thanks for letting me know
Honestly don’t worry, as Mythbusters pointed out that neither are a health concern due to the low concentration relatively speaking and if anything it helps your immune system build up defenses against E coli and the like. Just know lid up during your flush means the sent lingers less. Then after the flush I would advise closing the lid to keep any lingering sent in the air of the toilet bowl and less likely to be disturbed by any airflow in the room. Just don’t like seeing misleading info spread around as honestly the science behind it is pretty interesting.
Yeah, but now I’ve lost an argument with my wife… She remembered too…
Not necessarily. See my discussion in the same comment level.
Just don’t like seeing misleading info spread around as honestly the science behind it is pretty interesting.
I don’t want to step on your toes, so hopefully this doesn’t come across that way:
You mentioned Myth Busters and an article from 2019 on microbiologyresearch.com in another comment .
Let’s just say without further elaboration, that Myth Busters are not a solid scientific source.
I couldn’t really find a paper from the article you linked in another comment. Just this: https://www.microbiologyresearch.org/content/journal/acmi/10.1099/acmi.fis2019.po0192I don’t know whether it’s an issue with the website, but currently I can’t see much else besides some text which sounds like an abstract. This makes it currently difficult to see this as a good source or estimate the quality of the work. Judging on this abstract alone, although it mentions that the time particles are detectable is about 10 minutes longer with the lid down, it also reports a 30 to 50 % decreased amount of particles. It also states a lack of research regarding smaller particles.
As far as I can see we could safely say, that this issue, whether it’s better to keep the lid up or down, is still debated and a final verdict is still out:
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhin.2011.08.010
https://doi.org/10.1063/5.0040310
https://doi.org/10.1063/5.0013318
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-022-24686-5
However, to me it seems that there are indications that a combination of proper ventilation and closing the lid might be better than an open lid.
Disclaimer: Not my field of expertise. Feel free to correct, where necessary.
Every source I can find says that closing the lid is better.
For reducing visible particles, not the nano particles which have a higher concentration. Regardless it’s all kinda moot as neither produce levels of bacteria that could realistically get you sick unless you stick your face above the bowl or to the side openings by the lid while flushing and that person has an infecfion. Just wanted to clarify the science behind it.
The highlighted section of that link reads as follows:
The research found that putting the toilet lid down reduced the number of both visible and smaller droplets during and after flushing by 30-60%. However, use of the lid also increased the diameter and concentration of the bacteria in these droplets.
The article doesn’t indicate whether the total bacteria contained in the now larger and more concentrated droplets is thought to be comparable to that contained in the full spray of open-lid droplets, which means a precise comparison isn’t available, so technically I guess it could go either way. However, common sense tells us that many of those microorganisms will either get stuck to the underside of the lid or fall back into the water, so it seems nearly impossible that closed-lid flushing could spray 100% of the microorganisms that open-lid flushing does, right? So if the best (seemingly unlikely) scenario for open-lid flushing is that maybe it only sprays the exact same number of farticles into the air, then what’s the appeal?
Hmh, what do we make of that?
Simulation from 2020: https://doi.org/10.1063/5.0013318
Laser supported analysis from 2022: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-022-24686-5
But that applies to most commercial toilets with high flow rate. Most home toilets don’t do much more than let gravity do the work. There’s no aerosolized particles, just a few splashes or droplets that may escape
Home toilets use the bowl filling up to create a siphon through the drain trap. For that to work your toilet must first raise the water level above the top of the trap to create the pressure with its weight to start the siphon. I.e with the lid closed you are forcing more air to compress in a smaller volume generating a pressure difference outside the bowl and internally. Leave the lid open and that volume of air goes directly into the room without much resistance creating less pressure in the bowl compared to the surrounding air in the room. Hence with the lid open the distance, the spray travels is lower as it has a lower velocity.
That air pressure doesn’t mean anything without aerosolized particles. High rate commercial toilets create those particles and spew them out at like 6 ft/sec. Draining the tank into the bowl does not create much except maybe a few larger droplets once the drain takes most of the contents that can’t go as far, and that is mitigated by closing the lid.
Correct which is why in addition studies show that having the lid down increases the concentration of those aerosolized bacteria and increases the distanced traveled while also allowing them to linger in the air for up to 11minutes longer. The lid down causes the particles to break up into nano particles which are not visible, but linger longer and spread farther.
It appears they studied a shared university toilet, likely not a common household unit. The further study that it references I found here
This is referencing hospitals, again not home toilets. I’ve yet to see any actual info on standard low pressure toilets.
A shared university toilet can still be part of a house or low pressure system. I’ve yet to see public restrooms which had a lid for the toilet itself, outside of low pressure toilets in communal housing. If you can link to where they clarified the shared university toilet was high pressure, I will stand corrected.
That’s not making sense to me. Would you be willing to find your sources? Larger particles would not spend more time in the air as far as I know. It’s almost like you’re claiming it’s better to sneeze wild straight out everywhere instead of into your elbow, handkerchief, or tissue.
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Yes I always leave it closed if it has a tank
I close the lid because otherwise my cat will drink out of the toilet
They don’t have Washlets (bidet seats) so they’re all a fail from me :P
Though 100% on closing the lid.
Just automate it and get a Japanese Bidet that opens and closes automatically. Problem solved.
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