As I become older, I regret that there are some inventions, electrical and otherwise, which will not be created in my lifetime. It would be a tragedy if I did not share the invention ideas with you in the hope that some young dynamo would take up the baton.

Starting simple. Crying children are common in public places and at home, and conventional means of noise reduction are not always possible. One can always put the child’s head inside a plastic bag but it is not a solution which comes without a prison sentence. So, what we need is a spray can of ‘Kalmzit’ (pronounced ‘Calms It’). It is a spray can which has a mixture of painkiller syrup and chloroform, with compressed nitrogen gas propellant. Baby cries . . . spray . . . sleeps. If we replace the pain killer syrup with pepper syrup we get the crowd control version, ‘Kontrolzit’. Important not to mix them up. The market is huge. Many variations in the range can be created. ‘Stoneszit’ for drug inducement at trance parties, ‘Dopzit’ for alcohol inducement and ‘Droneszit’ to induce sleep at board meetings.

Ah, so clever. Our next invention is the ‘Re-barker’. This consists of a locating microphone, a directional waterproof loudspeaker array, a tripod and a portable control box and amplifier. Placed outside, if a dog bark above a certain magnitude is heard, the system will swivel to locate the bark source and repeat, amplify and retransmit the bark. This will continue until the bark source stops. Programming options will include recording and random bark transmission at intervals so that the dog owner gets his own disturbance back in full shape and form.

He-man beer cooler. This is a doughnut-shaped toroidal cylinder with a hollow chamber that can enclose a beer can. It is pumped to a few atmospheres using a hand spring exerciser, which the he-man will be using while watching sports. A been can is placed in the centre of the doughnut and the pressure in the chamber is released. The resulting heat change cools the beer.

One more serious invention I would like to see is a wood-fired electrical power generator. There are many generators that run on wood which is heated to produce a combustible gas. However, I am talking about a generator that has a boiler and a steam cycle which drives a generator. Hardly matters how efficient it is when the primary aim is to get rid of the wood without paying somebody to take it away.

Another invention: high-fire-spec, low-noise tough transmission board. As everybody knows, these days there are many buildings with dry-wall construction. Some of the walls are dry walls and some have to have a good fire spec – one hour minimum fire rating. If the dry walls are for student accommodation, they also have to resist vandalism. What is wanted is a board that has a build-up which meets all the above. These will be made in the factory and assembled on site into preplaced frames. This will be a departure from the track and stud dry wall, which relies on site skills to build on site. We do so many buildings where such a wall will be of great demand, but we are stuck in an American/European mindset, which includes thermal resistance, in addition to fire and noise transmission and toughness. We do not have a thermal requirement in South Aftica.

Doors. Door hinges in South Africa are the conventional leaf type. They require skill to fit to the door, skill to fit the door to the frame and luck to get it all true. A better idea (used in Germany) is to have the door hang on pintles like those that support the rudder of a small sail boat. Infinitely adjustable and easy. Anyway, if you want to borrow these ideas – go right on ahead.