
There should
Be an engineering equivalent of the iGnoble
A biophysicist has found a way to save precious wine drops from leaking down the side of the bottle after it’s poured into a glass. There are ways to prevent spillage with nifty devices inserted into the bottle neck. But Daniel Perlman, a senior research scientist and inventor at Brandeis University in Massachusetts, America, …
The IgNobels don't have a fixed category list, so nominate them here. In 2013 there was this prize:
SAFETY ENGINEERING PRIZE: The late Gustano Pizzo [USA], for inventing an electro-mechanical system to trap airplane hijackers — the system drops a hijacker through trap doors, seals him into a package, then drops the encapsulated hijacker through the airplane's specially-installed bomb bay doors, whence he parachutes to earth, where police, having been alerted by radio, await his arrival.
In 2010:
ENGINEERING PRIZE: Karina Acevedo-Whitehouse and Agnes Rocha-Gosselin of the Zoological Society of London, UK, and Diane Gendron of Instituto Politecnico Nacional, Baja California Sur, Mexico, for perfecting a method to collect whale snot, using a remote-control helicopter.
2004:
ENGINEERING: Donald J. Smith and his father, the late Frank J. Smith, of Orlando Florida, USA, for patenting the combover (U.S. Patent #4,022,227)
My teapot in Japan in the 1970s had a grooved spout to stop the "English Tea syndrome". Never spilt a drop. For wine, do what any good waiter knows: at the end of the pour, twist the bottle to show the beautiful label to the customer (or the client) and absorb that last drop. No spillage.
More like centuries than decades, capillary breaks/gaps/grooves have been in use in building, roofing and carpentry since at least the middle ages if not before.
I have an idea for a roundy sort of thing that might make moving heavy things a lot easier,
I could put a rubber ring around it so that it absorbs the bumps a bit.
I was thinking of calling it 'a rotating heavy thing mover' anyone think it could catch on?
...yet no-one has applied the concept to wine bottles before.
Most invention is applying old ideas to new areas. If it makes the world a slightly better place, I'm all for it being patented.
I'm not clear though why the lip can't just be included in the mould - is that too fine detail for glass?
Can't be a lip as that has been around since the Grecians were Urning. This is a fully patentable 'non drip, diamond-cut groove' which has no relation to a lip or capillary groove of any type ... even those already molded into some plastic bottles which are not designed to purvey Oddbins' best plonk.
..screwtops have this already? *hic*
/winesacrilege
Some damn good wines come with screw tops[1]. Sure, the wine doesn't age quite as well but that's not really an issue in my house..
[1] Also, quite a lot of Aussie[2] wines :-)
[2] I jest - Dark Corner is a fine wine. Very quaffable. Hic, haec, hoc!
It stains the tablecloth.
s/tablecloth/shirt/g
Which is why there is currently one of my favourite white shirts soaking in the sink. Yes, yes, I know white wine is supposed to get out red wine stains but why would I have white wine in the house? It would have to take up room in the wine rack that nature clearly designed to be occupied by red wine..
In ancient times, the drinkers would delibrately spill some Drops on the floor to appease the gods. As time went by the bottle manufacturers decided to save us Plebs the effort and make the Drops come from the bottle. now we'll have to go back to appeasing the gods the old way!
Time to start stocking up on the carpet cleaner again!
I always thought the correct etiquette was to finish pouring with a snappy Gallic twist of the wrist and then lick the side of the bottle.
Perhaps that's why no one comes to my dinner parties?
I'd come to your dinner party, but only if I could have my own bottle and not share. I wouldn't want to co-lick..
She put a rubber band round them just below the spout
I'll tell my favourite tortie cat to up the rate she catches the rubber bands then...
(Nowadays, it seems to be the only thing she is interested in hunting. Either that, or all the posties in the area are diverting to my house to drop the rubber bands inside the garden gate..)