A urinal is a specialized toilet for urinating only, generally by males. It has the form of a container or simply a wall, with drainage and automatic or manual flushing.

There are two types of urinals, single person or multiple persons. A single urinal is designed for one man standing upright. The multiple man urinal is in a trough style and can accommodate more people. Community urinals are less common in the western world, but urinals like the one on the right still appear throughout the world.

Public urinals are normally designed for use while standing upright, and often contain a deodorizing urinal cake contained within a plastic mesh guard container or a plastic mesh guard without a urinal cake. The plastic mesh guard is designed to prevent solid objects (such as cigarette butts, feces, chewing gum, or paper) from being flushed and possibly causing a plumbing stoppage.

Purposes

In busy men's washrooms, urinals are installed for efficiency: compared with urination in a general toilet, usage is faster because within the room there are no additional doors, no locks, and no seat to turn up; also a urinal takes less space and is simpler than a toilet. Finally the higher position makes usage more convenient (except for short men and boys).

Because of the simplicity sometimes no other facilities than urinals are offered, e.g. on the street.

History

Expand: date=April 2008 The urinal was first patented in the United States by Andrew Rankin on March 27, 1866.

Flushing

Most public urinals incorporate a flushing system to rinse urine from the bowl of the device to prevent foul odors. The flush can be triggered by one of several methods:

Manual handles

This type of flush might be regarded as standard in the United States. Each urinal is equipped with a button or short lever to activate the flush, with users expected to operate it as they leave. Such a directly-controlled system is the most efficient provided that patrons remember to use it. This is far from certain, however, often because of fear of touching the handle, which is located too high to kick. Urinals with foot-activated flushing systems are sometimes found in high-traffic areas; these systems have a button set into the floor or a pedal on the wall at ankle height.

Voice-activated flush

In some regions of Japan, particularly the industrial zones of Honshū, many urinals feature a voice-activated flushing system. These flush systems are triggered by the word "wash!", "fire" or "destroy the grime" in over 30 different languages.Fact: date=August 2008

Timed flush