A Guide to Hand Dryer dripping

Today's hand dryers are much effective than ever before and an economic, energy-efficient and durable solution for public restrooms. Still, a hand dryer’s purpose is to dry your hands and that involves water being chased of your hands.

So what about the water dripping on the floor or the walls?

Is the water dripping really a problem?

Wall mounted, hands-under hand dryers can sometimes leave a water stain on the wall underneath them after being used.

The best solution here is to have a tile underneath the hand dryer and of course since we are talking about restrooms the area has to be cleaned regularly (for general hygiene purpose).

There are also splash guards available from some manufacturers.

Another factor is the efficiency of the hand dryer, the more effective the hand dryer is (like for the other advantages of a hand dryer) the less you will have the problem.

For example, the powerful Xlerator with a high-velocity air stream and nozzle completely eliminates water droplets while you are drying your hands.

Dyson V with tile underneath           Splash guards and ADA compliant recess kit for Xlerator

So generally the regular cleaning of the place, the quality of the hand dryer and also the natural evaporation of the water solve the issue of dripping and it is not usually a big problem.

Hands-in hand dryers have improved the water dripping

Manufacturers like Dyson with its best known Dyson Airblade AB14 have developed hands-in hand dryers which contains the water in the well, and it can't spray on the wall.

So you can see them as a better solution for water drops.

However, with a lot of use you can have water dripping down the sides.  So, like the issue with the walls, the restrooms have to be cleaned daily so that there aren’t marks on the floor.

Drip trays

To improve this situation, a mat can be put under the hand dryer, or there are also drip trays that can mount to the wall under the hand dryer and catch the water there, such as Driplate or Schonmann sold at Berl's Commercial Supply. Some similar hand dryers like the Mitsubishi and the World Dryer V-Max also have a tray to catch the water.

This is a nice solution, but it needs to be cleaned regularly as well.

Drip tray for hands-in hand dryer

Dyson Airblade AB14

Tank

Another solution is to have a tank to collect the water. The tank solves the problem of dripping down the sides, but you have to be careful that if the tank fills up with water and is not emptied, then it’s going to spill anyway, and you will have a pool of stagnant water building up mold down there. So if the tank is not regularly been taking care of, then it is better not to have one.

JVD has also thought about water and developed hands-in hand dryers with a shape which avoid water splash to the outside like the Exp’Air or the Stell’Air.

Drains

If you are planning your hand dryers when designing your restrooms, a solution can be to put little drains underneath the hand driers. Of course, this will have a cost and be more of a concern for public restrooms with high traffic.

Here is an example of little drains under Airblade dB AB14 in a motorway station in France.

Drain underneath an Airblade dB                     The Airblade Tap, faucet with hand dryer integrated

The best solution: the Tap hand dryer

Finally, Dyson came again with the best solution for water dripping with the innovative Dyson Tap hand dryer.

The Tap is a hand dryer and faucet together mounted in the sink and allows hands to be dried without moving from the sink.

Not only does this save wall and floor space, but it also eliminates drips since the user stays in one place and the drain captures all water as it comes off of the hands and goes directly into the sink. Be careful though to provide a sufficiently large sink or with fairly high sides (vessel sink) in the case of the tall model AB10 to prevent water blown being thrown out of the sink.