The Airblade is truly a revolutionary way to dry hands. What makes it that way is how fast you can dry your hands without heat or paper towel waste. The inventor, James Dyson, had an idea of hand drying hands without heat and with the lowest possible energy consumption. He did this by making the device literally scrape the water off your hands rather than just circulate the air around your hands.
As mentioned above, James Dyson is the inventor of the Airblade. The idea came to him after he got fed up with wiping his hands on his pants because the hand dryer was too slow. I remember as a child using those old hot air blowing hand dryers and waiting so long, many times I would just have to walk out with wet hands.
Since the invention of the Airblade, different companies had to rethink their product designs and now there are other powerful options on the market. For example, the Xlerator hand dryer is so powerful it is almost painful to hold your hands under the stream of air.
These options make it easier for business owners and healthcare centers to make the best choice for their clients while being cost-effective.
In order to compare the two types of dryers we need to take into account the cost of purchasing and running the unit, The cleanliness of the machine, and the effectiveness in drying hands quickly. Both of these units are going to save your business a great amount on money on paper towel waste while at the same time, save our trees.
COST
Both units are very pricy to begin with but it needs to be looked at as a long-term investment. Both are much cheaper to run than paying for paper towels. Both claim to save 80% energy usage compared to conventional hand dryers.
HYGIENE
It is proven that bacteria will grow more readily in a warm environment. Conventional hand dryers would pull in all the air in the room and circulate it without filtration coupled with heat. This in turn will multiply the number of bacteria on the device and keep it circulating throughout the room. The Airblade by Dyson has addressed this issue so that after you wash your hands you are not then blowing bacteria laden air all over your hands again. They have accomplished this by adding a HEPA filter that removes most bacteria from the air being pulled into the device and a system that only uses cold air to scrapes the water from your hands within 10-12 seconds. On the other hand, the Xlerator hand dryer has no filter and still uses a heating element to blow warm unfiltered air onto your freshly washed hands.
EFFECTIVENESS
Both units are very fast at delivering the outcome of drying your client’s hands fast and effectively so they don’t walk out with wet hands and have to wipe them on an unsanitary surface. The Airblade claims to dry your hand within 10-12 seconds and the Xlerator hand dryer within 10-15 seconds. Not a huge difference between the two but far faster than the old-fashioned hand dryers of the 90’s.
