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I almost lost my hearing from the lid on the tank of a toilet

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Re: I almost lost my hearing from the lid on the tank of a toilet

#71

Post by jjoonathan »

nemo1618 wrote: post #50
asfasgasg wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given the choice between losing my hearing and a slightly unpleasant interaction with a service professional, I would typically choose the latter.

That's a bit uncharitable. The choice is rarely as clear as that. It's often hard to know whether an affliction is serious enough to warrant immediate attention. So the person must weigh the risk of delaying immediate treatment against the inconvenience and embarrassment of an unnecessary ER visit. It will be really nice when everyone has access to a medical AI that can assess these things instantly wherever you are.

> inconvenience and embarrassment

And cost, now that insurance is playing the "we only cover ER visits that were necessary in hindsight" game.

For those of us at the top of the pleb pyramid it's not so bad, but for the average person, a single mistake can be ruinous.

Re: I almost lost my hearing from the lid on the tank of a toilet

#72

Post by slhck »

inferiorhuman wrote: post #60
maj0rhn wrote: post #54

An unmentioned physiological consideration, remembered from a lecture long ago... The rapid onset of the sound is an important factor. The ear has muscular reflexes that lessen the damage of loud sounds, but only if the onset of the sound takes longer than the time it takes the reflex to kick in. The toilet tank sound probably had onset approaching that of a square wave, so this neatly evaded the reflex. Evolutionari…

To that end, Mercedes-Benz is playing around with technology to create a loud noise before the airbags deploy in a crash. The ideas is that by triggering this loud noise reflex, the ear will protect itself from the louder noises of airbag deployments.

Link for those interested: https://www.mercedes-benz.com/en/mercedes-benz/next/connecti...

> If an impending collision is detected, the vehicle’s sound system plays a short interference signal, which can trigger a reflex, whereby the stapedius muscle in the ears contracts, which alters the link between the eardrum and the inner ear for a split second and better protects the inner ear against high acoustic pressures, which can result from a loud crash.

Re: I almost lost my hearing from the lid on the tank of a toilet

#75

Post by sah2ed »

tnorthcutt wrote: post #65

Tank lid, or bowl lid? The author repeatedly switches between the two.

Tank lid:

> "I was fixing the mechanism inside the tank of the toilet. The only thing left to do was to put the ceramic lid back on the tank. Unfortunately it slipped out of my hands and banged on the ceramic of the toilet rim."

I'm guessing every other occurrence of "toilet bowl lid" is a typo due to the medium being Twitter.

Re: I almost lost my hearing from the lid on the tank of a toilet

#76

Post by weinzierl »

Daniel_sk wrote: post #30
krupan wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That looks much harder to get into the tank to fix things. Is it?

They can be completely serviced from the button cutout - you can remove any parts through it (it was designed this way). I think almost all newer toilets in Europe are wall mounted. It looks better, it's very quiet (refill), saves space and works exactly the same... Here is an example video how to take it apart https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=es8SJ-1CFcU

This and they are basically maintenance-free. I think most people don't know that these things are serviceable at all. They also often have two buttons that release a different amount of water. Good for the environment and saves you money.

Re: I almost lost my hearing from the lid on the tank of a toilet

#77

Post by simooooo »

acjohnson55 wrote: post #39

I wonder if another issue is that the hard surfaces of the typical bathroom would make the energy reflect more before dissipating. Even worse if the dimensions of the bathroom lead to resonances with 3.5kHz. Bathrooms are famously reflective, producing the reverberation that makes shower singing sound palatable.

Wonder if that applies to kitchens too.. Last time a thick mug bounced off a casserole dish and was left holding my ears wondering how the F it could be so loud

Re: I almost lost my hearing from the lid on the tank of a toilet

#78

Post by abakker »

I work a lot in a wood shop/metal shop. I’ve always been a big proponent of ear protection. Recently, I’ve been using shure in ear monitors for blocking small sounds and supplementing with ear muffs when real tools are on. However, I’ve started to just wear those in ear monitors around even without listening to anything. The ear plug feature is actually really great. I can get on muni or bart in the Bay Area with them and listen to a book at 3-4 clicks of iPhone volume. It’s pretty great to get used to things being quiet.

Re: I almost lost my hearing from the lid on the tank of a toilet

#79

Post by trott »

> This predicts 138 dB of sound.

I doubt that one can calculate the sound amplitude accurately without doing experiments or complex simulations here. It's possible that the toilet bowl or lid focused the sound like a satellite dish, and the protagonist's ear was in the exact wrong place at the wrong time.

Visual aid: https://blueandgreentomorrow.com/energy/in-pictures-new-wave...

Re: I almost lost my hearing from the lid on the tank of a toilet

#80

Post by [deleted] »

fwdpropaganda wrote: post #56
LukeShu wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dr. Philip Metzger is a planetary physicist who recently retired from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center, where he co-founded the KSC Swamp Works. He now is now at the University of Central Florida -- but still a part of the Swamp Works team -- his website

Jesus Christ, so they don't pay him enough and he's fixing toilets on the side?

[deleted]
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