Saturday, October 27, 2012

Cinderella

I took a look at the blog's readership stats, and it's clear that Cinderella is the most popular subject here by a huge margin. In fact, toilets in general are the biggest source of new readers.

Given the new-found focus, I thought I'd recap our recent trials and tribulations with our own Cinderella toilet.

The cooling fan is set to turn on as soon as the lid is lifted. The fan is very important, given the heat generated by the combustion process. Without proper cooling and ventilation, it could be quite dangerous. That's one of the advantages of the Cinderella over other incinerating models; its sensor and fail-safe system is quite sophisticated.

Sooz found that the fan didn't come on when we turned it on, and a quick review of the manual indicated a fan failure. A call to Johan, the Cinderella expert I first met 5 years ago, confirmed it. Johan arranged for a new fan to be sent out along with instructions (in Swedish) and a little repair kit.

There was a bit of confusion in which the fan was sent to Stavsnäs instead of direct to us, but Sooz retrieved it and I was able to indeed replace the fan simply.

I was a bit miffed that the fan failed. After all, our Cinderella doesn't get continuous usage, and I keep the bathroom warm when we are away so it isn't subject to below-freezing temperatures. Then again I suppose not using it on a regular basis might be bad, too.

Johan softened the blow by not charging me for the fan, even though the warranty is only two years. He's a good guy (and so is everyone else I met in the company), plus he knows I am an influential blogger on the subject of incinerating toilets!

All's well that ends well, and our Cinderella is safely shut down until next year.

5 comments:

Unknown said...

Hi there, very interested to hear more feedback around how you are finding the Cinderella toilet. How often do you use it? ie only on holidays? What do you find is the maximum number of people that can use it comfortably? Do you have to wait long in between uses? Also, is the power use noticeably high? 2kWh per use seems like a lot to me! Look forward to hearing from you. Thanks so much!

Unknown said...

Hi there. Very interested to hear more about your experience of using the Cinderella Toilet. How often do you use it and how many people can comfortably use it in a household? Also, how do you find the power usage? Is it very expensive? What made you choose Cinderella over other waterless toilets? Look forward to hearing your feedback! Thanks!

Don said...

Lily, we like the Cinderella very much. We do use it just on holidays, so only 6-7 weeks a year. But we have had 8 people use it on some weekends and it holds up fine. There is no delay between uses, so it can be used anytime.

I have calculated around 4kr per 'flush' so it is a bit expensive but the lack of smell or maintenance is worth it to us.

The Cinderella was a much better product than any others I looked at, well-made with good safety features. We are happy with it.

Unknown said...

Hi Don, thanks so much for your reply. Very interesting! I hope you don't mind me asking a few more questions. Why did you need a toilet like the Cinderella and not a normal toilet? I thought Cinderella was quite an environmental option but with the high power use I now feel it's not. What were your main reasons for purchasing? Do you know anyone else who owns one and why they purchased? Thank you very much for your help with my research. Lily

Don said...

Lily, there is no sewage or septic on our island, so composting is the only other option. Given the cold climate, heat and ventilation of a compost pile is needed constantly. We felt that given the short bursts of power during our infrequent visits were still less than the constant power and maintenance requirements of a composted solution. Plus there's no smell or handling of toilet tissue with a Cinderella- much nicer!