"Did you hear that?"
When you pull up the plug to empty your kitchen sink, just before the usual gurgling noises, there is a single cry of horror emited from somewhere in the waste pipe.
Not sure if you heard it correctly you might fill and empty the sink again and hear nothing, but it wasn't your imagination because your sink has been fitted with the "Sink Plug Of Doom"
It's a simple two part device. The first part is a sensor built into the plug. The second part is contained within a new "S" bend and consists of a waterproof speaker, power supply, signal receiver and randomising chip.
When the plug is pulled to release the water, the plug sends a message to the S bend receiver. The randomiser then decides on whether to make a noise or not and what noise to make, and for how long etc.
This might be a simple "help me" such as featured at the end of the first version of The Fly, or it could be a sharp scream. In all cases, the sound is short, to present doubt if it was even there at all. Repeated pulling up and down of the plug does nothing as the device is programmed to ignore this. Days may pass before the next sink horror sound is emitted.
Sink Plug Of Doom is most suitable to be fitted to properties rented out on platforms like Airbnb to help create a "haunted house" myth.
[as mentioned in The Compression Maze Of Doom annotation]-- xenzag, Nov 05 2021 “Help Me!” https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=saM-qxSI5vQfamous ending scene from The Fly [xenzag, Nov 19 2021] ET in vacation photos II ET_20in_20vacation_20photos_20II [Voice, Nov 22 2021] https://xkcd.com/516/ [pertinax, Nov 22 2021] [+] A suitably short wavelength that won't become ensnared in hair and grease buildup, and the regular soapings should ensure a clean signal.-- whatrock, Nov 05 2021 Love the Airbnb Haunted House take. You could make some real coin this way.
Hey 2f, hook up one of your rooms like this and advertise it word-of-mouth-like as being a bit "disturbed." I'll bet you'll be booked out for months by adventurers trying to figure out the mystery.
Pair it with the HVAC ductwork of doom, and go to town.
For some real fun make it programmable to read out the letters of their license plates.-- RayfordSteele, Nov 05 2021 I think this would freak me out !
+-- xandram, Nov 05 2021 (+) I love it.
//Hey 2f, hook up one of your rooms like this and advertise it word-of-mouth//
Funny you should mention that.When all of the renovations are complete my wife is on board with me turning one of our rooms into the Bates Motel room.So far it will consist of;-Hydrochromic bath mats and towels that look like blood when wet.-Personalized messages written in anti-fog on the bathroom mirror.-A randomly self rocking chair.-A magnet activated projector which will cast a shadow of a person with a knife on the curtain slowly growing in size which disappears the second the curtain is opened only to reappear the second the curtain closes again.-A full length two-way wall mirror with a proximity sensor causing a skeletal image to be looking back at you when you get to within eight inches or so of it.-Lights and radio on timers.-Self slamming cupboard doors.-etc...
This idea would make a fine addition.-- 2 fries shy of a happy meal, Nov 05 2021 I think just creepy, understated, and unanswered would be much better. Go beyond that and you just get the casual haunted house where everything is expected to be ghastly.-- RayfordSteele, Nov 05 2021 I will run it past my wife.My prediction for the Bates room is that people will book it for others who will be completely unaware of what's been rented for them.
Imagine all of those things happening in a room you didn't rent on purpose. You'll clue in pretty fast that you've been pranked and enjoy getting startled over and over again... and then figure out which people you want to prank.
and they prank three friends, and they prank three friends and so on, and so on.-- 2 fries shy of a happy meal, Nov 06 2021 The mere thought of this just made me let out a really loud, guttural, bloody loud scream for help.
So a huge (+) from this old chicken shit.-- blissmiss, Nov 06 2021 Too much and the room will be famous on YouTube fast, ruining the prank.
For it to be a real experience, you want it to be just slightly “wrong.” Just one or two or at max three weird things that could seem like coincidence but just tickle the senses enough to be freaky.
A bathroom door that latches randomly. A shower knob that maybe slowly rotates just a little.
A mysterious stain on the carpet that relocates or grows nightly, getting closer and closer to the bed. (Not sure how to pull that one off yet).
Furniture that relocates in the night. First night is just a few inches, next night is a foot or so.-- RayfordSteele, Nov 06 2021 Ooh! Furniture that relocates at night will do just fine.
We're a backwater. Youtube stardom will not keep people from pranking their un-savvy friends.
Give me a year or so. I'll let you know how it goes.
Science people... science.-- 2 fries shy of a happy meal, Nov 06 2021 //A shower knob that maybe slowly rotates just a little// A little servo wizardry, so it can "fight" them trying to turn it, or turn on it's own, in either direction (ie. they turn it on & it goes BLAM all the way to hot, then back to cold, then behaves for the rest of the showering; or becomes harder to turn the more they try to force it...).-- neutrinos_shadow, Nov 07 2021 ^ nice. I wonder if you could make a dilatant door knob which would feel as though somebody were fighting you every time you wanted to leave the room.-- 2 fries shy of a happy meal, Nov 07 2021 A viscous damper (or dilitant or other non-newtonian) would be do-able, but it would always be the same. A servo would allow multiple different responses (at the expense of much greater complexity). Perhaps an easily-changeable (for you, the maintenance guy) door? Have a bunch of otherwise-identical doors with different dampers, springs, counterweights etc; swap them over whenever possible. (Guest gone for the day? Swap the door. Guest asleep? Swap the door...)-- neutrinos_shadow, Nov 07 2021 There are many great suggestions but the thing about a sink is, it's totally innocuous and the noise could easily be dismissed as an abberation of the descending water flow.-- xenzag, Nov 07 2021 Servos could be tricky in that they can usually be felt by the gearing. Maybe something like a phase change wax that adds resistant pressure against a friction surface, activated by a small heat element. The same could be applied to the door lock.-- RayfordSteele, Nov 08 2021 // Servos could be tricky in that they can usually be felt by the gearing. // Maybe you could scavenge a motor from a force-feedback joystick. The one I have moves fairly smoothly. It's not strong enough to stop the person from turning the knob, but it could definitely feel like someone is holding or moving it on the other side of the door.-- scad mientist, Nov 20 2021 // A mysterious stain on the carpet that relocates or grows nightly, getting closer and closer to the bed. //
A carpet that drains easily and dries quickly. A pipe underneath, flat on the top and flush with the floor. Valves that actuate by remote to pump water into the carpet at appropriate times and places. Optional: the scent of blood and a carpet that turns red when wet.-- Voice, Nov 22 2021 Doors that open or close silently and only when the occupant is definitely asleep. They could swear they closed the bedroom door. The sound of footsteps is easy, but must not be overdone.-- Voice, Nov 22 2021 Wet carpet would be bad. Too much mustyness and risk to ruin guests' electronic stuff. Needs to be something that doesn't attract mildew.
Paintings that switch images overnight or simply go black or have red letters scrawled on them for a few minutes. Dozens of ways to pull that off.-- RayfordSteele, Nov 22 2021 //mysterious stain on the carpet// //Paintings that switch images overnight// 2 words for those: thermochromic paint. A network of heating wires under/behind & you're set.-- neutrinos_shadow, Nov 22 2021 Great ideas but the point about the sink sound is that it's triggered by the most domestic of actions. It's also fleeting, unpredictable and causes doubt and dread.-- xenzag, Nov 22 2021 Do we think something similar could be done with a toilet flush, or would the bathos ruin it?-- pertinax, Nov 22 2021 It could be, but repeated flushings would be very wasteful of water.-- xenzag, Nov 22 2021 // but the point about the sink sound is that it's triggered by the most domestic of actions. It's also fleeting, unpredictable and causes doubt and dread.//
but... you know that you feed pearls to swine.Change is a given.-- 2 fries shy of a happy meal, Nov 23 2021 When I was a kid, my mom thought she'd try her hand at making sauerkraut. It didn't work, so she ended up stuffing it all into the garburator. I guess it was more than said g. could handle, though, as it started coming back up. I walked in at that moment, saw the sinister-looking mass emerging from the drain, and gasped, "What's that?" "It's sauerkraut," my mom said. For several years after, I thought sauerkraut was something that lived in sewers and occasionally tried to invade one's home.-- Ander, Nov 28 2021 random, halfbakery