Bathtub Faucet Muffler Hack

Reducing Bath Fill Noise

BathtubHack

Not directly Server Sky related, but a fun bit of hackery

Like David D. Friedman, I take long baths and read. I need quiet time before bed in order to sleep, and a long hot bath with a non-threatening book works well for this (calculus is the best soporific!). Yes, it costs water and energy, but I live in Oregon, with more water and energy than most places.

But the noise of the occasional hot water refill interferes with my wife's sleep, who goes to bed before I do (reread "quiet time" sentence above).

A trick that reduces the noise:

Wrap the end of the faucet spout with a washcloth, so that a "pipe" of washcloth hangs down into the water. Attach as shown below:

The washcloth slows fill rate a bit, but it also eliminates most of the noise. It does this five ways:

• 1) The washcloth slows down the falling water, which longer hammers the tubwater surface.
• 2) The point of impact is muffled.
• 3) The cavitation and noise of the falling water goes away.
• 4) The resonance of the faucet spout itself is dampened.
• 5) This will reduce water hammer in older houses with poorly-secured pipes.

This also allows turning off the faucet handles with toes without risk of feet veering into a scalding hot stream.