Toilest in other countries?

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total myth, the 3 toilets in my house flush the opposite way then they "should" and im from america, not the southern hemisphere. it all depends on who makes the toilet i guess.

the_coffee_fairy

In Australia, you push the button and the contents disappear...

i know the theory is that the water swirls one way or the other, but frankly the water in my toilet doesn't swirl at all.

I do recall while travelling in the USA being aware that there was a difference in the toliet flushing process, but for the life of me i can't remember exactly how.

What does stand out in my mind is the toilets in The Netherlands, which seemed to have a little shelf for your deposits to sit on, with the water level somewaht below it, and upon flushing the water rose up and took it away... it really was fascinating, and has obviously scarred me for life :)

cheers, caz

kr_afol

The design of toilets in Australia is somewhat different to North America. In Australia the water dumps down from the sides rather than swirls down. If Australia used the same kind of toilets as North America, yes, they would swirl the other way.

Water going out of a sink certainly swirls the other way.

tentofield

The coriolis effect is caused by the rotation of the earth about its axis, This gives a rotation of 360Â° per day - which is much slower than water down a plughole/toilet. The coriolis effect affects weather systems and ocean currents and even thunderstorms and seabreezes but on things as small as water down plugholes it is infinitessimally small compared with other things like the shape of the basin and the direction of flow of the water. On top of that, coriolis is proportional to the sine of the latitude which means it is zero at the equator and greatest at the poles. Most of Australia is much closer to the equator than the USA and all of it is closer than Canada so water goes down plugholes whichever way it wants to.

Ken E

The Coriolis effect at the scale of sinks, basins, baths and toilets is far, far, far too small to affect the way water goes down a drain. The direction is entirely random and is controlled by residual currents in the container left over from filling it. This is true even if the water is left to stand several minutes after filling. It is also affected by the shape of the container and by thermal currents due to temperature differences whose effects are far stronger than the Coriolis effect. But probably the greatest effect is the motion of the hand pulling the plug.

Anyone who says otherwise is repeating a myth perpetuated by ignorant teachers and even more ignorant pupils. In short, they don't actually know what they are talking about.

Toilets bowls and cisterns in Australia, even the old single flush ones are a more advanced design than that used in north America and have always used a different system which consumes about a quarter the amount of water. The water does not swirl on flushing, if there is an axis of rotation at all it wold be horizontal, not vertical and therefore unaffected by the Coriolis effect.

Andrea H

Toilets flush one way in the northern hemisphere and the opposite way in the southern hemisphere. England would be flushing the same as Canada and US, but Australia the opposite. Have you been watching 'that' Simpson episode? Which, by the way is such a load of BS.

tuppenybitz

in australia the water turns the oposite way to canada and same when water runs down the sink

meowâ„¢

I agree with the previous answer. Our toilets are way different to those in Canada/US... I know while I was in the US I was freaked out as the toilet water sits fairly high in the bowl and when you flush, the water starts swirling around like crazy, empties then refills very loudly!

In the southern hemisphere the water does go down the sink or the bath the opposite way to the northern hemisphere, but because our toilets are designed different, you can't really tell which way it flushes. The toilet water tends to sit fairly low in the bowl and when you flush the water surges from all sides so it doesn't really go clockwise or anticlockwise...

Hope this helps! Oh and England would flush the same way as the US and Canada since its in the northern hemisphere also....

friedach

like, upsidedown?? c'mon, grow up. chorrolis effect nothwithstanding, and dual flush with #1's (4L) on left and #2's (11L)on right, what else is there?

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