Snake oil products that customers want to buy.

[ladodger34]

I got one of those friends who bought one of those gas mileage "miracle cures" from some place. Some vial of liquid you add to a full tank of gas to increase your miles per gallon twofold, or so it claims. Of course, it does absolutely bupkus.

Mythbusters tested a few different gas mileage cures and IIRC, none of them significantly added any fuel efficiency. A couple of the miracle cures actually decreased MPG.

[Brighid45]

The latest snake oil gadget here is the solar-powered fan you hang in your car to keep the interior cool. The ads claim that even on the hottest days the fan can cool your car down to under 80 degrees Fahrenheit by pulling the hot air out. So one of the local news crews did an admittedly unscientific test where they took three cars of the same make and parked them in a lot where they were under full sun with the windows rolled up. They ran their a/c units until they were all a uniform 80 degrees inside. One car had nothing done to it, one car had a sunshade placed in the windscreen, and the other had one of the fans put in the window. Identical temperature gauges were put in the back seats of all three cars out of the sun. Five hours later, the cars were opened and the gauges checked . . . and they all read the same: 120 + degrees Fahrenheit. So much for the car fan!

[bean]

I got one of those friends who bought one of those gas mileage "miracle cures" from some place. Some vial of liquid you add to a full tank of gas to increase your miles per gallon twofold, or so it claims. Of course, it does absolutely bupkus.

A friend of mine had the "Tornado" - basically an overpriced piece of metal or plastic that you put in the air intake tube on an engine. I kept telling him all it would do is impede air flow, which in turn would hurt mileage and power. It was marketed (still is) as turning turbulant air into a swirling vortex. Yeah, it might do that, but as soon as it hits the butterfly of the throttle body and the plenums in the intake manifold that's all a moot point.

The car ran like absolute shit when he put it in. His mileage dropped by about 5 mpg and it lost a lot of power, also triggered a check engine light. Seems it really screwed with the MAP sensor.
edit: Beaten by Ringtail. You're better off taking the $70 or so you'd spend on the tornado and replace the air and fuel filters, toss a new set of spark plugs in, and if needed, a new distributor/cap rotor. You'd see a better improvement there.

The only real snake oil I'll use on a car is the crap that's sold to help you pass emissions - but only the really, really cheap stuff. It's basically just rubbing alcohol anyway, but alcohol burns cleaner than gasoline when it comes to the sniffer.. my car has 204,300 miles on the original engine and cat, it needs all the help it can get to pass.

My parents current kick is Seasilver. They swear it cures everything, though at least it doesn't seem to be harmful going by the ingredients list (but it's all stuff you could get seperately for 1/10 of the price).

[novicecrafter]

lol

how about some herbal pills that "electromagnetically smooth out the intrinsic vibrations of your brain" aparently turning you into a vegtable for $40 a bottle.. hehe now available and pushed on you by the sales people at your local health food national chain....

They sold like hot cakes at the place I used to work *rolls eyes

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

Some sort of shock belt thing that used small jolts of electricity to stimulate the muscles. It was supposed to be just as good as a workout but allowed the person using it to just sit on their ass and do nothing. Very popular, even my sister bought one.

My roommate in college junior year bought that thing. He used it once, and then it just sat in a corner in the living room.

The latest snake oil gadget here is the solar-powered fan you hang in your car to keep the interior cool. The ads claim that even on the hottest days the fan can cool your car down to under 80 degrees Fahrenheit by pulling the hot air out. So one of the local news crews did an admittedly unscientific test where they took three cars of the same make and parked them in a lot where they were under full sun with the windows rolled up. They ran their a/c units until they were all a uniform 80 degrees inside. One car had nothing done to it, one car had a sunshade placed in the windscreen, and the other had one of the fans put in the window. Identical temperature gauges were put in the back seats of all three cars out of the sun. Five hours later, the cars were opened and the gauges checked . . . and they all read the same: 120 + degrees Fahrenheit. So much for the car fan!

Scary thing is, some dry pool diving team member is going to buy that thing, install it in his/her car, assume it's safe to leave his/her child or pet in the car with the windows closed on a hot day...and return to find the kid or pet roasted to death.

[skeptic53]

There has been fad, after fad, after fad, after fad in the the "alt med/supplement/herbal" industries:

Anyone remember DMSO? Kombucha tea?

Some are still around: Spirulina, bee pollen, echinacea, zinc pills. No better than placebo according to Consumer Reports, (but don't knock the placebo effect, it can make a difference).

Some are harmless but way overpriced: coral calcium, high-priced vitamins, sea salt. Some vitamins are sold in a legal pyramid scheme, a la Amway, such as Herbalife, Km, and others. Way, way overpriced.

The magnets and copper bracelets have already been mentioned.

Some things are HARMFUL:
*colloidal silver permanently turns your skin blue, it was hyped around Y2K as preventing "toxins" from building up.
*the fad before "coral" calcium was "natural" calcium in Dolomite, from the Dolomite mountains of Italy. Too bad a lot of it was contaminated with lead.
*ANY kind of enema is a bad idea unless there is no other way to unblock severe constipation, but coffee enemas are ridiculous. "Toxins" do not build up in the colon, the lining of the colon is a specialized form of skin that constantly sheds, nothing "builds up" or is stored in the colon.
*ephedra, Ma Huang, Dong Qai can cause heart attack, brain stroke, or heat stroke. Ephedra has killed several professional athletes who used it in hot weather.

"Regular" medicine is frequently just as bad. The claims for "powerful", "instant relief", "new" are usually hooey. Most stuff advertised on TV has one or more of the same generic ingredients that have been available since the early 1960's.

Example:
Theraflu is:
-acetaminophen (Tylenol)
-dextromethorphan (the DM in Robitussin DM, a mild cough suppressant)
-pseudoephedrine (Sudafed, a decongestant)
-chlorpheniramine maleate (ChlorTriMeton, an antihistamine, put in not for allergies but because it causes drowsiness)
AND...
-lemon tea. Replace the lemon tea with 60 proof booze and you have Nyquil.

"non-drowsy" Theraflu leaves out the antihistamine. "Cough and cold" will sometimes add guaifenesin, a mucus-thinning agent usually listed as "expectorant"

These ingredients do work, but they are not worth the price. Theraflu is worth about $.02 per dose, it's sold at almost a $1 a dose. Buying Theraflu is like buying a Hyundai but paying the price of a Lamborghini. It's not useless, just way overpriced.

Few people know that Benadryl and Sominex are the same active ingredient, diphenhydramine HCL, easily available generically and much cheaper.

Another scam is "Our medicine has X milligrams of relief, there's has only Y", comparing two different compounds of different potency. This is like saying "Our beer contains 16 oz of stupefecation, while their vodka shot only has 1.5 oz"

I could go on and on but you get the idea.

[chantal]

Scary thing is, some dry pool diving team member is going to buy that thing, install it in his/her car, assume it's safe to leave his/her child or pet in the car with the windows closed on a hot day...and return to find the kid or pet roasted to death.

I smell a lawsuit

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

Few people know that Benadryl and Sominex are the same active ingredient, diphenhydramine HCL, easily available generically and much cheaper.

AHA! So now I know why Benadryl knocks me right out.

[Crosshair]

AHA! So now I know why Benadryl knocks me right out.

My mom and I use it as a sleep aid. I use it about once a month when I simply can't get to sleep. Take 2 of them + half hour = ZZZZZ. However they do affect people differently. My dad takes 4 and goes to work. They simply do not make him tired, but they clean his nose out good. He only does that when his nose is very runny.

/*Thud*

[chainedbarista]

diphenydramine can also be used for pets when travelling or when fireworks are shooting off.

diphenhydramine is a great drug, but has the nasty dehydrating effect.

while the products themselves are sucky, sometimes the commercials for them are beyond funny.

[Kiwi]

Spirulina is a fad? I was told by my doctor to take it to up my iron intake because I dont like eating meat.

I also took colloidal silver and colloidal mineral for 2 years and it didnt do anything to my skin....

Im not a big fad person myself....if its sold on TV only, im not buying it!

[Rapscallion]

We still sell Spirulina, but it doesn't go that fast.

Rapscallion

[Argabarga]

AHA! So now I know why Benadryl knocks me right out.

That's one of the more interresting things I've learned at pharmacy, when people stop by for sleep aids, the Pharmacist usualy recomends they take an allergy med since most of them will knock you right out becuase of the diphenydramine in it. Sleep aids are all about marketing and not thier chemistry.

Speaking of the diet/energy pill fads, why do people really seriously think they work, or work in the "miracle" sense? If there WAS a pill out there that instantly caused you to lose weight and develop an amazing sex life, would it NEED advertized? at 2am? on dead TV channels?

[Rubystars]

Argyria

http://www.together.net/~rjstan/

Don't EVER take colloidal silver again!

"There is a documented case in which a woman did not turn gray until five years after she stopped taking the drug."

[AFpheonix]

Meh. If people think the stuff is working for them, then go ahead and buy it, if they need help to get over their wierd little brain block.
The sea bands work on accupressure points, which, while not proven by any reports, isn't disproven, either, and if someone feels like they are less sick by using it without having to deal with the sleepy dizzy feeling they'd get from Bonine or Dramamine, more power to them.

I do get annoyed with the people who get stuck on their particular brand of cold remedy, though. I can show them the ingredient lists on ones that are identical yet cheaper, and they'll go elsewhere to get their little magic pill elsewhere. Whatever.

The other thing similar to that are the people that have to have the brand name version of a product instead of a generic. Typically if they're wanting a brand name of a narcotic, I pretty much figure that they're going to sell the stuff. The FDA doesn't let generics come out willy-nilly without having the companies prove that their medication has the same amount of active ingredient, the same efficacy, and time release as the original product.

Diet pills and other additives are the other products I see a lot. They get rather put off when they ask the pharmacist what diet pill she recommends, and she replies that simple diet and exercise are the only way to go. These are girls that are skinnier than me (I'm a size 10).

The airborne is pretty funny, too. I've had people that act like it's a religious thing to take this stuff. Same thing with Emergen-C. I don't know how many people know that vitamin-C is water soluble, so pretty much they're just peeing out all that supplement they just plunked down a lot of money for...