What was your great invention idea?

I’m developing a bed that can, in fact, make itself.

more like failed than already existed.

i once tried to make a generator that takes its energy from the bobbing up and down motion of the ocean.

as it turns out, it does not matter how much copper wire and magnets i could pack in the thing, it would still have had to have been the size of a silo just to power a light bublb.

Glass beer bottles shaped like ugly women. If you find them attractive, it’s time to stop drinking them!

Also, the same thing, but shaped like ugly guys, so that the straight ladies and gay men aren’t excluded from the market.

Not my idea, but my wonderful boyfriend thought up a vacuum to suck up bugs, so I don’t have to get to close to them to kill them! It already exists.

Mine was the Po-Leash. I was in a cough-syrup induced haze and all I remember is it was some ”ingenious dog leash system” that I described in lengthy detail as my husband was trying to go to sleep. ~

To tell you the truth if I had a great invention idea I wouldn’t post it here and would be relaxing on the islands with the money I made from it. :)

@Chikipi Well the question is an idea that you had that you thought was great and then you found out that it was already invented.

@sjmc1989 Aha! I read the question wrong so I probably need to be going to bed.

@poisonedatidote that has already Bern made, it used hydraulics. sorry if I got your name wrong, I’m on an iPod

Actually I invented Fiber optic tubes when I was 5 years old. But they were much bigger and being 5 I didnt know what patenting was or how to do it.

I had an idea in high school that my friends just won’t let go: a CD case that doesn’t break (cuz they all break, don’t they?). Any time there is a discussion about inventions, they always bring it up as their own idea.

Since I love home fries with fried eggs, I thought it would be cool to package egg yolk in small microwavable tubs that could be nuked (only a little bit, so it stays liquid) and poured on the potatoes. Seems like it might be difficult to pull off though.

My brother has the best ideas. One of them is a reverse microwave that makes food frozen, instantly. An even better idea was a backwards lightbulb; instead of producing light, flicking the switch creates darkness.

@drdoombot Lurve! Enough said. :)

I’ve said it before- The cordless extension cord!

been +uses

When I was 14 or 15 I came up with the idea to make a hair brush with a detachable piece that you could use to just pull all the hair out. Well, I saw an infomercial for that very thing two or three years later. Blast!

My mother came up with the idea of the coffee cup lids that have that removable section so you can sip through them. She would always cut open the lids with a pocket knife for when she was driving and then McDonald’s started doing that!

I always put a price of chicken in a bun at KFC and put the sauce in, and now they made the kernel snacked. That really pissed me off!

It was a sundial, but it just didn’t catch on.

But seriously, when u was younger I figured that the sun had to do with time in a way, so I made a sundial in it sandbox. Then I found out it was invented already.

I want to invent a machine that rakes leaves.

Football bats.

I thought of the reverse microwave/instant freezer years ago. I also thought up a pen that you put your finger through instead of around to avoid hand cramps, (already invented), broccoli in Mac and Cheese (Kraft or someone came out with it), a waterproof pad for ideas you get in the shower and need to write down (happens to me quite often), and several others, many of them quite unfeasible or not practical.

My ideas are either too late, or too bizarre to be a commercial success.

I once had thought of using rodents on wheels to power my laptop.

Unfortunately the rats formed a union and demanded so much cheese the project was no longer viable.

@Dog get a cat, nothing breaks up a union of rodents like a cat.

My mother was making pizza bagels for us in the oven years and years before that damn commercial:

Pizza in the morning
Pizza in the evening
Pizza at supper time
With Pizza on a bagel,
You can eat Pizza anytime!

That commercial broke my heart and made me think of the millions our poor family had missed out on.

@drdoombot my Dad and his brothers invented a rear tine garden tiller back in the 40’s. They sent the idea off to a well-known company, and without the rights to it, they were, um, shit out of luck.

Many people feel your pain.

Are you trying to steal my idea?

You know those ‘support ribbon’ magnets you always see on the backs of cars? Like: “Support our troops” or “Fight for a cure!”. I thought they were getting ubiquitous, so I came up with the idea to make facetious ones, like: “Support Car Magnet Suppliers!” or “Support your local strip club!” Not long after that, I saw one on a car. :/

A friend and I came up with the idea of one machine that both washes and dries your clothes. We thought this was a great idea. It already exists, but nobody uses them. Maybe commercial laundry places do…

Was this question inspired by Clair and me talking about sliders and werewolves?

A few years ago I invented a SIDS (Sudden Infant Death Syndrome – cot death) and a child immersion swimming pool alarm. Both to working prototype stage but could not get support for production. I often play around with inventions. Last month I developed a new form of intrusion detector, full perimeter without infrared or any form of sensors. Still working on that – building a prototype now.

I have a rife/pistol/shotgun aiming device that can accurately hit a living thing the size of a sparrow at fifty metres without having to open my eyes. Works in total darkness in other words. Costs less than $200 to make. Its limitation is that it will ONLY work in darkness or twilight.

I love inventions, for example chocolate coated kumquats perhaps with a dash of spice, but i just checked that and it’s been done, a bicycle frame that is loaded with round cylindrical rechargeable batteries in series that powers a motor on the back, linked to wheel (and led lights, speedometer, ipod, sat nav, compressor, and loads of cool stuff) ....speaking of compressors a wind turbine that compresses air in a tank for airline tools, in garage workshop, a modern boat that is power assisted by the passengers in exercise rooms with electricity generating rowing machines, the deep cycle batteries could operate a large sail etc.

Back in the 80’s I came up with an idea to transfer the photos you bring into the store for development. Into a digital format so you could pick them up further down the road or when you got home. Something unheard of back then. I called it the LDSS Light to Digital Video Storage System. Using CCD’s (a very new technology), use of servers, back then they were purely data storage, and a dedicated data pipeline.
Back then 60min. Photo was the big photo processor of time. They would just upload the images to their server, and your photos we available from any location. Drop off keep going. Or you could get them off your computer when you got home, actually you could choose the pictures you wanted, then either pick them up or they would mail them to you. A little different process then how we do it now. But was doable.
I waited too long, technology and the internet caught up.

Now that is no big deal.

@troubleinharlem I would buy the raking machine. We have a leaf blower, but my husband won’t use it for some reason.

Cars with solar panels on their roofs, that would run purely on solar energy and be the only vehicle allowed in big cities (where you can’t go that fast anyway due to traffic). They finally got invented this year!