Category: Feasible inventions

In summer, I have to spray myself liberally with bug deterrent chemicals.

These come in an aerosol, which is fine when I’m spraying my head and torso.

The problem comes when applying the agent orange to my lower half. If I hold the can as normal, with my index finger on the button, c, then I have to invert the can. This is an instant spluttering fail…next to no product emerges.

So today’s invention is a simple fix. It’s a plastic shape with its ends joined by an elastic band (red). This allows the V of the shape to fit under the crimped collar of any size of aerosol and be retained there.

Now, you can place index finger under ‘b’, middle finger under ‘a’ and thumb on the button ‘c’.

This allows the bottle to stay in its normal orientation (button uppermost) whilst still giving good control of the direction of the spray.

I spend a few hours a week running; a fair part of which is on suburban pavements. Householders, it seems, don’t take hedge cutting very seriously which means that people in wheelchairs or pushchairs can frequently be forced out onto the road because of bulging masses of privet.

This affects me most when I’m running with our dog on-lead and I therefore have to try to stay right away from traffic.

Today’s invention is a way to deal with bulging hedges, preferably before they make the pavement impassable.

A cycle helmet is fitted with several bladed units on each side. The blades are mounted using zip ties passed through the conduits shown and the vents in the helmet. As you run by a hedge, you can stick your head against it and trim it back rather effectively. The bladed units stand off the helmet surface to allow thin sprigs of hedge to pass into the blade recess and be snipped off

This leaves the hedge in a bit of a mess and the pavement does get covered in clippings. Both of these effects should alert the hedge owner to act on their responsibilities.

I imagine that the bladed units could also be worn on the upper and forearms to add an extra scything action.

Today’s invention is intended to make extra use of the enormous wheelie bins, which householders are now often required to accommodate, as supports for a workshop bench. Each house will usually have three or four of these bins: one for general refuse, one for garden waste and one for materials recycling.

The idea is for each home to make more effective use of the space occupied as well as to help recycle a kitchen worktop, of which there are large numbers currently sent to landfill.

The worktop would have a couple of ports cut through it and these would be positioned over the bins so that waste could still be placed inside them -including any eg sawdust created during the future bench work.

The worktop would have some low cost clamps attached so that it could be held firmly in place over the bins (with their lids open). These bins are surprisingly stable and the clamps would add to that.

On bin days, one bin would be quickly unclamped and a different bin inserted. If you objected to the smell of the rubbish, then the ports could each have a crude plug (made from the extracted section of worktop).