Boy Invents a Foot-Powered Toilet Lid Lifter

By Alex in Home & Garden on Nov 5, 2007 at 1:27 pm

Jake Wulf is a gifted 9-year-old boy from Odebolt, Iowa who has but one weakness: he can’t remember to lower the toilet seat after he’s done.

Tired of his mom getting mad at him, he decided to invent the Privy Prop, a foot-powered lever sort of like the one you see for trash cans:

It was during a visit to a doctor’s office that Jake’s idea for the "Privy Prop" began to take shape.

He noticed the lid to a small trash can, which opened and closed with a foot-powered lever. He went home and told his parents that he wanted to design a similar device for the toilet. [...]

Jake built plywood base and then cut thin pieces of steel and fashioned a teeter-totter at the bottom. You step on it and the seats raises. You step off and it closes.

Link – via The Misfit

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Sid Morrison
Nov 5th, 2007 at 4:16 pm
I’m not sure why it is world news, but the kid did a decent job. Fair enough.

That granted, why it is his job to lower the seat when finished? Why doesn’t his lazy mother raise it WHEN SHE IS DONE? Why is the optimum default position “down” ? Who made that rule up?

Each person should set it however they like and leave it however they like. Freedom, man!
PapaTango
Nov 5th, 2007 at 5:02 pm
Lazy much?
Vonskippy
Nov 5th, 2007 at 5:11 pm
Ummmm….no!

US Patent 5829068 (11-03-1998)
Steve
Nov 5th, 2007 at 7:34 pm
Come on – This is brilliant! kudos to the kid.
ted
Nov 5th, 2007 at 8:55 pm
Kinda inane.
S-r-ex
Nov 6th, 2007 at 2:11 am
I rarely put down the seat and my mother just puts it down and doesn’t put it back up and I don’t care and neither does she.
I may be 17, but I too would easily be able to fix this up home, but it would be useless as none of us at home cares. And if this boy hasn’t noticed these trash-can lids before now, no wonder he forgets the seat…
Neil
Nov 6th, 2007 at 12:13 pm
He may have seen Harvey Denton’s self-lowering toilet seat in British tv series The League of Gentlemen. Or maybe this is a purely local idea.
ugh
Nov 6th, 2007 at 8:49 pm
So tired of parents (and then the media ) fawning all over stupid kid ideas. Like this is something that hasn’t been done a million times already.

If an adult came up with this, people would go *eh*, not want to pay money for it, and move on.

BUT SINCE ITS A KID…
fish
Nov 6th, 2007 at 9:52 pm
seen this on a show called life support, old idea
Chris
Nov 7th, 2007 at 10:08 pm
Sid:
Lower the seat :
- avoids dropped objects to be wet
- avoids projections when flushing (European toilets even more)
- avoids particules to be sent airborne
- avoids mom to be mad at you. you love ur mom, don;t u?

Just for the 1st 1 I lower it. Cluttered bathroom and clumsy people don’t go together
Angry Lab Rat
Nov 10th, 2007 at 2:19 am
Yay! It took an innovative 9-year old to give a “fair shake” to men everywhere. No more grabbing of nasty toilet seats, or harrassment from women who seem to embrace equality of the genders in every other way than the stupid “toilet seat rule”. Good for him. I hope the family changes their mind and opts to patent this little invention.

For more comments, please visit my blog post on this at:
http://angrylabrat.blogspot.com/2007/11/privy-prop.html
stefano
Dec 7th, 2007 at 1:50 am
Why didn’t I think of it!! That solves so many domestic arguments.

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