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Comment by tunesmith | Hacker News Reader

My wife made a joke about a bidet a few years ago, so also as a joke I bought us one for her birthday. The $60 attachment kind where you just plumb in a splitter from the source that fills the toilet tank.

It was a hit, so we bought one for family friends for a birthday - high hilarity as we heard the reports from their kids - and then more for our extended family at Christmas. Shocked reactions around the Christmas tree.

The response has been amazing, people saying things like "How did I do without this my entire life??" and "How was I such a savage before??" On vacation at AirBnBs we are looking forward to going home just so we can have a bidet again.

In most cases, you don't even need the extra features, like fan or warm water. Regular cold water is nowhere near as bad as you'd assume.

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> Regular cold water is nowhere near as bad as you'd assume.

Perhaps not in California. But here in Calgary, Alberta, I assure you it is much worse than you'd assume.

Seattle checking in. Just used a questionably accurate meat thermometer to check the water coming out of our tap. It looks to be about 6C / 42F.

Brisk!

Using the same methodology here, I get 3.7°C or 38.7°F.

Eh, good for hemorrhoids I suppose.

How about the initial water after leaving the taps closed for, say, 20 minutes? :)

Great point. Bum washings would mostly be pretty warm due to unique features of our bathroom and condo heating... mostly. And I guess for the cold times, variety is the spice of life!

I own a bidet which costed about $400 which has a water heater, warm air ventilator, seat warmer, human presence sensor and even a remote control you can put on your wall. It's just a plastic seat I mounted myself on the old toilet.

Summer or winter it's always great to use it.

After trying it in Japan I've got one for my parents for like $200.

You must be animal to use those classy cold ones.

61f/16c here in the Bay Area

I’ve been used to a handheld bidet for a long time. When we bought our house 3 years ago, I installed in all the bathrooms. Our tissue consumption is 10% of what it used to be in the rental apartment.

When we had our baby and she was 1, we started cleaning her by teaching her how to sit on the toilet and washing with a hand held bidet. It was much nicer on her bum, significantly less rashes. We’d wipe off with tissue but it was less friction and sweat would be cleaned off.

Bidets are the right thing to do if you care about your ass and environment. It just feels so freaking good.

Yeah winter could be bad but usually it is tolerable.

I use one in Toronto. Cold in winter.

I am also in Calgary, using a bidet. The cold water gets to you but you need lots of pressure to knock those pesky poops off.

In Toronto here, and I actually want it cold. Nice and refreshing!

I'm not sure how much water a typical cleansing will require; our cold-water one is on its way to the house now. But I reasoned it would probably not require more than a 1-2 second blast.

Given that it's plumbed in at the toilet tap, and that you'd use it before flushing, I would presume the water would be relatively close to room temperature, as the supply line is indoors just below the seat. That should be plenty for 1-2 seconds.

2 seconds is definitely not enough, unless you put pressure on "rectum destroyer" level. You don't need to wash it as clean as your hands, but give it 5 seconds at the least.

try being on lake superior. 2C all year

Ditto Norway. Had some visitors from South Africa once who declared that they had never believed that water from a tap could be so cold.

> In most cases, you don't even need the extra features, like fan or warm water. Regular cold water is nowhere near as bad as you'd assume.

Depends how cold your cold water is. Can be a 10-15C difference between Northern US and Southern US in winter.

Also becomes important if you're sizing a tankless water heater:

https://www.tanklesshotwaterguide.ca/2012/06/ground-water-te...

Finally, warmer water will dissolve whatever it hits better, instead of just suspending.

We have water in NC as cold as you're likely to see anywhere indoors. Our municipality uses water towers to supply pressure so when it below freezing out, the water is definitely in the low 40s (F) if not below.

It's refreshing but you get used to it. My wife hasn't complained either. She rolled her eyes at me when I first ordered the bidets but was an instant convert.

(I just happened to install them in all our bathrooms last fall. Lucky timing. The model I installed was $35 on Amazon but it's now more than double that and not currently available.)

I tell everybody that a $50 sprayer attachment will get you 80% of the benefit of a full-on bidet toilet.

Spray/Jet is best. Required some plumbing and fitting jet between toilet sheet. All you need to do is turn on the knob.

No recurring cost of toilet paper.

Don't you end up using a massive wadge of toilet paper to dry your now dripping wet backside so it doesn't dribble down to your pants/socks?

It is not fountain. Just small stream of jet to wash the target area. No dribble down happens.

I use TP with my bidet. Unless you want swamp butt, you have to. I use LESS, but there's certainly still a hard requirement.

Yep TP is required, but less compared to not using.

You can always use a towel!

The TP doesn't come out just wet always, a towel would be nasty soon.

Keep several small towels and wash and reuse.

I thought the goal was to be more hygienic. I can see this maybe working if you live by yourself but anything beyond that is: no thanks.

> I thought the goal was to be more hygienic. I can see this maybe working if you live by yourself but anything beyond that is: no thanks.

I'm not trying to dissuade you from holding that opinion, just pointing out that there are many, many people who regularly use cloth diapers for newborns. While many people choose not to use them, I don't think most people consider them a less sanitary option.

True, I guess I just live in a small place and the thought of having to maintain a shitty rag basket next to the toilet isn't very appealing. But I probably shouldn't talk without experience in either (bidets included).

You don't have to. If you use an electronic bidet, while it's true that drying is not so efficient, if you sit a couple of extra minutes on it you will get up dry.

I keep a stack of about twenty small, thin wash cloths (each one is about 8 inches by 8 inches) in a container on the shelf next to the toilet, and after using the bidet, I just use a single cloth to pat everything dry.

I then drop the cloth into a small bathroom trash can with a lid that is marked, "dirty wash cloths only". This small trash can sits down on the floor next to the toilet, and once a week I just wash the cloths along with the other towels. The cloths aren't even really dirty, since your butt is clean by the time you use them. I don't like the idea of re-using them without washing them though.

And just like that, my toilet paper usage has dropped to nearly zero.

How does one use a sprayer attachment? It seems like positioning would be awkward.

You position yourself; the water stream stays where it is. You get used to it very quickly and know where to expect it to be based on where you’re sitting.

Ah, I thought you were talking about the handheld gun versions.

Even with that, it's only slightly more difficult than knowing where to aim the toilet paper.

only in Texas, where they use a pressure-washer ;)

I've owned both, I agree.

The other "big" feature of a plugged in biden is meant to be the blower/dryer, but at least in my one (TOTO branded) it is a waste of time. If the blower actually worked (e.g. Dyson Airblade), it would be a significant benefit, but as it stands I agree you get 80% with a simple spray toilet seat (other 20% is heated water, maybe the moving head a little, although you still have to shift your body for good coverage).

how do u know when ur running clear if u know what i mean? I've never used one before

typically use a few sheets of tp to dry off afterwards, so you'll know if you're done or not

this almost defeats the purpose for me lol, i thought it was going to be paper free

How well does it work if your backside could be mistaken for a Yeti?

I dunno, but I imagine whapping Bigfoot with a newspaper doesn't exactly clean his face either. Water's just better, relatively speaking.

I've had zero success with a dryer -- I end up just drying with toilet paper...

Get a beard trimmer, set to lowest height and cut back the thatch. Only takes a few minutes, once or twice a week.

If it's a considerable issue you could consider laser removal. I think it's very well worth it for hygienic reasons.

I've been to Japan 3 times now and the toilets are amazing. You can have things like motorized up/down seat + cover. Water heater, seat heater, drying. And, something I never tried but there is also a music thing to cover up the sounds too.

Jacuzzi left the washlet market about a decade ago and I was able to get one of their closeout models. It was one of my best buys of my life. Sadly it died about five years ago and I've been living in rental houses since around that time and haven't bothered to ask any of the landlords if they'd be willing to install a power outlet behind the toilet.

Some of the Google campuses have those Japanese toilets installed.

Serious question: we are very soon running out of toilet paper. Because of the panic from the virus, our nearby stores have all been out of toilet papers for a couple of weeks now and we've been unable to restock so far, so it was a golden opportunity for me to bring back up the idea to try out a bidet (SO is reticent but it beats having no toilet paper to wipe with)

My problem is that I don't know how to "hang" the handle when it's not in use. The bathroom is all tile from floor to ceiling and we're tenants so we can't drill to hang an attachment. I've also seen systems that hook over the tank's wall, but our toilet has the tank in the wall (it's a German style toilet for those who know what I mean: tank in the wall and toilet seat hanging from the wall rather than the floor)

I'm also not convinced with the little arms that install under the seat which reaches out when water flows, because I'm very concerned about back splashing on it when using the toilet and being unable to thoroughly clean the arm. This would spray soiled water where we don't want it.

I'm hoping someone in a similar situation figured something out: what system do you use?

Suction cups or some special adhesive that does not leave residues?

Disclaimer, never tried those myself.

That's what we (I'm italian, wife too) keep asking ourselves when we moved to Canada.

There is a whole set of pains involved in not washing with water after the fact.

We used the shower for a while, but it's a huge timesink.

We kind of solved with squirt bottles currently.

In Europe, I only see the ones that attach to the inputs from the bathroom sink. That way you can control the temperature.

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