There's an urban legend (or at least a rumor from my elementary school playground days) that toilets swirl the other way in the Southern Hemisphere due to gravity or earth spin or magic toilet elves or something. I've been advised by many people on how exactly to prove or disprove this theory. Some have said it's impossible to do with toilets in general because they are engineered to have a specific swirl pattern, and that engineered swirl over-rides environmental conditions. Some have said that toilets in Oz/NZ are so high-powered that it's almost as if they have jet propulsion, so there's no swirl at all. So I was advised to try the experiment with a sink or a bath tub. Well, those pictures aren't very compelling, I've decided. So for our current purposes, we'll stick with toilet pictures until I am stumped down under (lol). Here, I present a Northern Hemisphere toilet swirling counter-clockwise.
Friday, November 24, 2006
Which way to swirl?
There's an urban legend (or at least a rumor from my elementary school playground days) that toilets swirl the other way in the Southern Hemisphere due to gravity or earth spin or magic toilet elves or something. I've been advised by many people on how exactly to prove or disprove this theory. Some have said it's impossible to do with toilets in general because they are engineered to have a specific swirl pattern, and that engineered swirl over-rides environmental conditions. Some have said that toilets in Oz/NZ are so high-powered that it's almost as if they have jet propulsion, so there's no swirl at all. So I was advised to try the experiment with a sink or a bath tub. Well, those pictures aren't very compelling, I've decided. So for our current purposes, we'll stick with toilet pictures until I am stumped down under (lol). Here, I present a Northern Hemisphere toilet swirling counter-clockwise.
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3 comments:
Hola! Glad to hear you guys got there safely!
Anyway, I don't know about toilets specifically, but the "swirling" part is true. I witnessed it firsthand when I was on the equator line during my Kenya trip. I think they called it the Coriolis/Coreolis effect. For our test, they used a bowl of water with a tiny hole in the bottom.
Anyway, I'm still anxious to see your toilet bowl research! :P
HAVE FUN!
- Audrey
I am glad there was nothing in it when the picture was shot.
So far, what people have said is true. The NZ toilets all have some issue or another preventing a pure comparison. Still working on it.
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