Some time ago we did a list of the 15 most bizarre patents. Fortunately for us, there are millions of them around – so we have put together another list! These are all patented in the US patent office (some of the original list of 15 were international patents) but we don’t mean that to be a reflection on the quality of American inventors! So, without further ado, here are 10 more bizarre (and stupid) patents:
This patent from 1968 is designed to help people who, for some unknown reason, might need to place a lock upon their toilet seat. I have spent a considerable amount of time trying to work out who might use this device – and, frankly, the only thing I can come up with is that perhaps it could be used to punish men who forget to put the toilet seat down. The inventor is a woman – which gives weight to my conclusion. Forgetful men should be thankful that no one has actually tried to build this device!
Sticking to the topic at hand, we have another toilet patent – this one is no more practical than the one above, and is actually quite revolting. This is a patent for a toilet which recycles its water with each flush – via a filter. Yes – it strains out the chunky bits and sends back the yellow! Thanks, but no thanks.
From the patent: “The invention provides a device for conveying a game-animal carcass that has a lightweight, foldable frame. Means are provided for attaching ground-contacting members to the frame; these members may be either runners or wheels. Preferably, the structure is such that the ground-contacting members can be folded inwardly, for the sake of compactness. Attached or attachable to the frame is a harness, enabling it, when folded, to be strapped to a hunter’s back. The structure of the invention further comprises a back member that can be attached to the frame to form a chaise lounge or the like.” Basically, this is a device that can be used to carry a dead animal, and then converted to a sofa for your living room. Handy!
I can think of only one person that might find this patent useful – Maxwell Smart. This patent is for eyeglasses that are fitted with rear-view mirrors – so you can see in front of you – and behind you!
This is a patent for a fluid operated zipper. The image for the patent (it contains no description) does not seem to indicate where the “fluid” comes from – but I sure know where I hope it doesn’t come from.
Here is one for the cheats among us. This is a full power-drive pool cue. I am not a pool player – but how can this help you to improve your game?
This is a patent for a patently ugly hat that not only contains a space to carry your cosmetics, keys, and assorted other things that ladies carry in their purses, but it also has ear muffs. This would be perfect for the young lady who likes nightclubbing in winter but doesn’t want to carry a purse. It may hinder your chances of getting a date, but at least your hands are free to carry extra drinks.
I don’t have a problem with guns – in fact I quite like them, but adding a whisky glass to the top of a rifle is a recipe for disaster. In fact, I can’t help but wonder if Dick Cheney might have been testing one of these out when he was hunting with Harry Whittington in 2006.
Snoring is one of nature’s most annoying gifts to man. If you snore – it can wake you up – if you sleep next to a snorer – it can wake you up. Some people even die of snoring! So, some bright spark came up with this design. It works by shooting electricity in to a person as soon as it detects a snore. The concept is bad enough as it is – but look at where the device sits! Imagine being woken up every 10 minutes by jolts of electricity passing through your neck!
The number one device on the list is a machine which gently pats a baby on the bottom to help it get to sleep (particularly useful for lazy parents or parents who like to lock their kids at home while they go out for a drink of an evening). But – while the idea as presented is not the best, it has potential… If the device could be sped up a little – this would be perfect for the parent of a little brat that needs regular and frequent doses of a good spanking! Tie the kid down, stick on the spanking machine, and you can relax in front of tele!
number 3 and 6 are badass, i would buy them if a company started making them
no not 6, i meant 7
I bet you a redneck made #3, and a pedophile made #1, I’d bet money on it right now
Wow Number 9 and 2 are just wrong.
the glasses are meant to be used with the gun, after your drunk and accidentally shoot someone and the cops are on foot pursuit you can see how close they are to catching you
the glasses with rear view is a good idea!
If the rearview wasn’t obvious for the glasses, like it was somehow built into the lens, then it may be useful… make it seem like you have eyes in the back of your head to the unsuspecting.
Actually, there are toilet locks being sold out there. They’re meant to keep small kids from getting access to the inside of the toilet. Maybe the woman who invented that nr. 10 had something like that in mind.
the glasses are great when you are running from the law
i believe the toilet locks are being sold to people who are afraid of snakes or rats entering their homes through the sewers.i have no idea if that is actually possible but i’ve heard of this before.
Didnt know that Ana, the product sort of makes more sense now. I have a one year old cousin who loves dropping things in the toilet.
wow……. just wow…….
Awesome list! I had somehow missed the first patents list, so it was a double hilarity whammy for me today! Thanks!
I love this list, really funny. I want nr 1 for myself thanks.
The toilet lid lock would be convenient in keeping the dog from drinking out of it. And #9 might be necessary when we’re all dying from lack of water here in a few decades..
I think 4 is a matter of style. Just like people a century from now will think what we wear is ridiculous, and the way we think people in the past dressed ridiculously. If the only thing you have against this one is style, I think it could be somewhat useful. (Although it might alter people’s growth patterns).
I also don’t think there’s anything wrong with number 1. Haven put to sleep many babies myself, I know how tedious the process is, and how obnoxious children generally are.
Overall, I think this list is a good premise but when carried out didn’t end up very nice.
Csimmons: How cynical of you
Wait I want one and four. Hell I don’t get any dates anyway so…
The toilet lid lock is for parents with young children. The idea is that if a child wanders into the bathroom and opens up the lid, he can drown.
Perhaps ten is so kids don’t play in the toilet?
And the deer thing. . .I assume it serves both as a carrier for the deer and a cot for the hunter out in the bush?
The toilet lock is a safety thing. Kids are top-heavy and when they fall into the toilet, they can’t get out and they drown. This is also how five gallon buckets kill curious toddlers. The toilet lock keeps kids safe and keeps them from flushing matchbox cars down the loo.
#10, besides child safety also good for a deviant practical joke.
Dick Cheney wasn’t drunk, he thought a grown man was a turkey, oh maybe he was drunk
I want #4!!!
I would buy one in a New York minute
Maybe the rearview glasses are for dealing with slake-moths…
Toom: I am about to update the site’s comment FAQ which will cover that
Oh – the new FAQ is here:
http://listverse.com/comment-faq/
Jfrater: Accessing the forums sure would be nice if my registration confirmation *ever* went through. I’ve tried to register at least half a dozen times and have never gotten the activation email. I would like to register as soon as possible. Please tell me what I need to do to make it happen.
And, as outspoken a person as I am, I want to say that straying off-topic in the comments is not necessarily a bad thing, as long as the topic shifts to another engaging dicussion that anyone can enter. It’s when a convo becomes between two or three people to the exclusion of everyone else that it becomes a problem. And no one says you have to read all the comments. A brief skim is sufficient for you to decide whether or not to throw in your two cents.
I knew a guy who had the glasses (#7). He used them while riding his bicycle.
#4 could be made a little cuter. It’s a great idea.
Bicyclists wear glasses with rear view mirrors all the time.
I knew a guy who had the glasses (#7). He used them while riding his bicycle.
#4 could be made a little cuter. It’s a great idea.
Yeah I can see the first one being used for keeping kids from drowning in or drinking from or playing in the toilet, or for owners of dogs (or even cats) who’ve figured out how to open the lid.
The recirculating toilet could prove quite useful in areas with a limited water supply due to there being a prolonged drought or developing countries with limited everything.
OMG the site’s finally back up and I can post what I wrote over two hours ago! *skips*
SlickWilly – I have manually activated your username (slickwilly) – you should be able to login and use it now.
chershey: sorry about the problems – the sysadmins are working on it.
BTW, jokes about Dick Cheney are *so* edgy and hip. . .
Before I looked closer and read # 7 I thought it might be the same thing Steve Martin invented in the movie The Jerk.
I went looking for the terrier carrier and found this
…http://www.joe-ks.com/archives_may2001/CatCarrier.jpg, same premiss different bit.
I think the toilet seat lock one is used these days for baby proofing.
Thanks, Jayfray. How’s about emailing me my password (when you get a free moment)? None of my usual passwords that I use for everything are working.
Slick: I don’t have access to your password – you will need to email me (jamie at frater.com) with the password you want to use.
What’s wrong with no.7?
Great List, some of these are only half stupid. The toilet lock is not such a bad idea, the drowning hazard mentioned by others. Also letting the “yellow mellow” saves a ton of water, again not such a bad idea. And not much different than the idiots I live with who never flush anyway. Now they have an excuse for sloth. “See mom, an invention to do what I do for free”
#7 is pure, unadulterated awesome.
#4 may give you a sore neck
MUMMY!!!! I WANT ONE!!!! I WANT ONE NOW!!!! I’M GUNNA HOLD MY BWEAF UNTIL YOU BUY ME ONE!!!! WAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!
Alright, resume normal transmission.
We all use recirculated water in our toilets (and for drinking, too). It just normally takes a lot longer than that for the water to pass through the water cycle.
Many Korean high school girls, and some of the boys, carry mirrors and spend way too much of each lesson looking at themselves. A few weeks ago I noticed one girl with her back to me, looking at me in her mirror. I suppose I should be flattered!
In the early 1900s, the head of the US Patent Office said something like: “Everything that can possibly be invented already has been”.
jfrater: in the updated faqs, under text styles, you have i=bold.
lol those were great. #10 might be for child safety or something
Great list, as per usual. Makes me want to invent something bizarre (and stupid) and get a patent.
Toilet locker is so babies don’t fall in.
Even though I do where glasses, I’m pretty sure the whole ‘seeing whats behind me’ thing would drive me crazy after a while.
Call me lazy but boy there was many a time I could’ve used one of those Baby Patting machines. And yes, even now the boys are older it wouldn’t go amiss.
As for the Toilet Lid Lock – mmmm I see revenge the next time sometime has wee’d (sp?) on the seat and leaves it for me to clean. Lets see how long he can hold on next time before begging for mercy…hehe!
Catriona: I don’t know what is meaner – wanting to use the smacking – oops, I mean patting – machine or the toilet lock!
I could only think of one fellow human that could benifit from Eyeglasses With Built-In Rear-View Mirrors, and it wasn’t Maxwell Smart…(what is this?! sortabliminal advertising for Get Smart, the movie: starring Steve Carrell as Maxwell, Anne Hathaway as Agent 99,
Dwayne Johnson (awe come’on!) as Agent 23, Alan Arkin as The Chief and our man, the great, Terence Stamp as Siegfried.)?
And who knew Mel Brooks and Buck Henry started the whole shabang? Awe Buck Henry. Who luvz yah baby?Oh, Don Adamns, the original. It doesn’t take much to picture his mannerisms and hear his voice from memory!
The guy who is currently walking backwards around the world. I forget his name…and maybe it was the U.S. and not The World, that he was walking backwards across/around?.. Or maybe it was just across the room to the bathroom and we all thought it was funny because we were all high and Gregorian chants were playing at 45rpm.
Although a quick search did come up with Anthony Thornton at 95.4 miles. and Plennie L. Wingo who walked backwards from Santa Monica, California to Istanbul, Turkey in 92
Num.1 is a gas, by the way.
heres an addition, The Club. The only people who used it were the one with the cars nobody wanted
By the way, snoring doesn’t kill people. It’s technically sleep apnea that can kill.
No one’s said anything about the electric pool cue yet…..
I love pool, and I’m epically bad at it (my former room-mate still likes to tell the stories). I would totally buy that.
Call me heartless, but I haven’t heard many stories about kids drowning in toilets, though from a convenience standpoint, I’ve heard many stories of kids throwing things/playing with toys in toilets, and if it’s annoying enough to the parents, the lock might be an idea.
I had a roommate with sleep apnea. It was scary to hear her breathe, or try to when it happened. And snoring can kill people. The person next to then will kill if sleep deprived.
HM.
I’ve always wanted number 7. Did not know such a thing existed.
And for number 10, it’s a safety mechanism to keep babies from crawling into the bathroom and drowning or perhaps to keep animals from drinking from the toilet.
Hey, some of these are not actually bizarre or stupid. The rear-view mirror glasses could have some serious applications in the military. Maybe they could be modified to include night-vision and infra-red sensors. That would come handy in a combat situation.
The toilet lock is obviously useful for houses with kids and pets.
Not exactly the same as #5, but years ago I knew a regular at a bar where I worked who had made his own pool cue complete with a red laser light that shone through a pinhole in the end of the stick, placing a small red dot on the cue ball where the stick would strike the ball. I’m not sure how useful such a device would be, as he was a good player with or without the laser, but I can recall him getting many, many offers to purchase the cue or to build another.
Yeah number ten is for keep young children from open the toilet lid. If they were to fall in they could drown in the water or even having have the lid fall over on top the child can be dangerous. They also have similar locks for refrigerates to prevent children from open them. My parents put one on ours when me and my sisters were younger.