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My kids get nervous as soon as they even see a hand dryer. They start crying when it's on. I thought they were exaggerating, it never occurred to me that sound
by tda 7y ago
My kids get nervous as soon as they even see a hand dryer. They start crying when it's on. I thought they were exaggerating, it never occurred to me that sound levels for kids are different because they are smaller (though it makes complete sense). That, coupled with higher sensitivity to noise and more delicate hearing canals of youngsters kind of make me feel like a bad parent for trying to let them use the dryers anyway (Even though I have long since given up). This kids research proves my kids right, and I am not easily convinced ;) Great accomplishment for I should listen to my kids.
Already an impressive combination of curiosity and perseverance to get a scientific paper published for any non-academic, let alone a 13 year old!!
edit: The absolute worst things are these https://www.ehanddryers.com/hand-dryers/tap-hand-dryers https://www.ehanddryers.com/hand-dryers/tap-hand-dryers, my kids just plain refuse to wash their hands out of fear of accidentally triggering the dryer
- b3lvedere 7y agoOur local fast food restaurant has one of those. Coincidentally it's also a Dyson brand. They don't work very well. Water and crap gets everywhere!
- cannam 7y agoThe Dyson combined tap-dryers are awful, awful products - we have some in newly fitted bathrooms at my workplace. I don't know how they made it out into the world without shame. They're hard to trigger reliably, they blow water everywhere, they're generally cumbersome and unpleasant to use.
- papln 7y agoThat's amazing. In a 2 minute promo video with many clips of people washing hands, and many clips of people drying hands, they never show someone washing AND drying hands in the same clip. They know the poducts doesn't work at its primary value-proposition. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PkpP-mEUcAs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PkpP-mEUcAs
- simonh 7y agoI swear by their vacuum cleaners, but none of the Dyson hand dryers are good. The boxy air blade ones are the worst I've used so far, but I haven't seen the tap ones yet.
- ryanlol 7y agoEven the vacuum cleaners are meh at best. Beautiful from the outside, excellent finish but disappointing performance and features for the price.
- thom 7y agoWe have one and it is like trying to drag a tank around the house into small spaces. Like all Dyson products, it's cleverly engineered and presumably hasn't once been tested with an actual customer.
- bonestamp2 7y agoTheir stick vacuums are light, although the battery life is short. They are quite effective but only if you use the right head for the job. There is one head for carpet that is amazing for carpet, but it's terrible for hard floors. There is a head that is great for hard floor, but obviously terrible for carpet.
- mark-r 7y agoI love the stick vacuum for cleaning stairs, it's far more convenient than dragging a full size one up/down the stairs. Agreed that the battery life is too short.
- londons_explore 7y agoNot really beautiful - they're 100 percent plastic and look like a child's toy. At least put some anodised aluminium somewhere on it to make it look 21st century!
- 7y ago
- wrycoder 7y agoI’ve seen articles about Dysons filling the air with dispersed virus.
- rejschaap 7y agoYou are supposed to use water and soap to wash off the crap first.
- jasonmp85 7y agoI haven't seen one of those Dyson pieces of shit without at least some gunk or water sitting near the bottom, not draining or sliding into the airflow. Even if you get everything off your hands, having a stupid plastic device with a deep crevice in an environment with fecal coliform presumably floating around is a _great_ design let me tell you.
- gruez 7y ago>Water and crap gets everywhere! I've only seen those taps with trough sinks[1], which limits the mess. [1] https://i.ytimg.com/vi/nZfqFvsuE3s/maxresdefault.jpg https://i.ytimg.com/vi/nZfqFvsuE3s/maxresdefault.jpg
- bonestamp2 7y agoI was in Japan recently and they didn't have the Dyson one but they had very similar models from Panasonic and Mitsubishi and they were much quieter and somehow worked better. We need those.
- m4rtink 7y agoCan confirm this - the hand driers I've seen in japan were generally pretty small, yet very effective and quiet.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- minikites 7y ago>my kids just plain refuse to wash their hands out of fear of accidentally triggering the dryer That's probably fine, air dryers make your hands dirtier than if you haven't washed them at all. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/to-your-health/wp/2018/04/12/bathroom-hand-dryers-may-leave-your-hands-dirtier-than-before-gross-new-study-says/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/to-your-health/wp/2018/0...
- chaosbutters 7y agosame with lawn movers, the sounds and vibrations hurt kids. I couldn't stand using one until about 15 or 16.
- akerro 7y agoThat's not the only reason why children hear more and louder. When you're in your '30s you already have a minor hearing loss, you don't hear all sounds and noises then you did when you were 5. Children see more colours as well.
- JoeAltmaier 7y agoAlso, we hear using the cochlea, a spiral sense organ that sorts sound by frequency. In children the whole thing is much smaller. So they hear much-smaller wavelengths of sound which means higher-pitched sound. As we grow so does the cochlea so we hear lower and lower sounds and lose the sensitivity to the highest-pitched ones? I'm guessing that hair dryers have a scream in the upper register that adults don't normally hear.
- simias 7y agoThat's very possible indeed. I remember when I was a kid my grandparent's tube TV was making a high-pitched sound that was figuratively driving me insane (maybe generated from the HSYNC frequency, now that I think about it). I couldn't understand how they could bear it but of course when I told them they didn't get it because it was probably way outside of their hearing range. I'm fairly sure that now that I'm in my 30s I couldn't hear it either.
- BorgHunter 7y agoTypically a high-pitched whine from a CRT is from the flyback transformer. I found, when I was a kid, that sometimes a well-placed whack on the CRT's cabinet could temporarily fix the problem. Nowadays, I have no idea if I can hear that whine anymore or not, as CRTs are quite uncommon. Probably not. Much for the better, as it used to give me headaches.
- h2odragon 7y ago15Khz colorburst whine. Its amusing how many audio recordings even today show a notch filter used at that frequency, years after there were no CRTs anywhere in the recording process.
- PakG1 7y ago>> The absolute worst things are these https://www.ehanddryers.com/hand-dryers/tap-hand-dryers https://www.ehanddryers.com/hand-dryers/tap-hand-dryers, my kids just plain refuse to wash their hands out of fear of accidentally triggering the dryer Wow, I was recently in an airport bathroom where a young boy absolutely refused to wash his hands. His father was extremely patient and said that he needed to wash his hands. The boy was near tears saying that they would miss their plane. It was all a really strange and illogical situation. Until I read your sentence. I don't know if this is why the boy wouldn't wash his hands, but it makes me realize that sometimes kids have reasons for what they say or do, even if they can't explain it. Reminds me of the hand licking incident: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18842009 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18842009 I thought I had read all about the hand licking incident and learned not to make presumptions about kids. Today, I realize that the lesson hasn't really been ingrained into me yet.
- mattbk1 7y agoThank you for sharing that link. Truly.
- papln 7y agoOne thing to remember is that sometimes it's correct to realy trust your kids even in contradiction to your best assessment of the situation. The hand-licking story is about tactics for diagnosis, but another angle is that (sometimes) it's OK to not understand something, to think your kid is wrong, but to let them have their way anyway. Missing a plane vs dirty hands? Trust the kid, find another solution (grab a towel, wipe hands on pants, take the germ risk, etc), and talk about it later as best you can. You don't want to let your kid be the boss of everything; you don't want to let your kid ignore your intructions or choose to do something fun instead of necessary work, but if your kid would rather stand there and do nothing while getting upset instead of doing some small work item, they aren't "cheating" you out of anything by getting their way.
- behringer 7y agoKids have a reason for everything they do. If you don't know the reason, it's because you've failed to communicate with them. Sometimes they don't know themselves, but that's still a kind of communication failure. There are many things my kids were saying that I only figured out days, weeks or years later. Listen, guide them, let them be, and don't be a helicopter parent.
- jordache 7y agothat sounds like a sensory processing issue.
- dheera 7y agoYou know what really hurts my years? As a child, and even now? Airplane toilet flushes. I always wish there were a 20 second delay so I could hit it, wash my hands and run out of the bathroom.
- climb_stealth 7y agoAgreed. Luckily there is a small delay between pushing the button and it actually flushing. I usually press the button and then cover my ears until it stops again.
- Shivetya 7y agoif its bad for kids, imagine dogs. I know the professional dryer my mother uses is specifically designed to put out good airflow but does so with by using a slower speed but larger vane fan. the motor and input is near the user with a long exhaust tube exiting near where the dog is, they are always mounted to allow ease of movement.
- jwr 7y agoKids can also be over-sensitive to certain kinds of sounds. This is related to sensory integration and in some people the neural system adjusts automatically, while others might require SI therapy. This over-sensitivity is not due to the volume itself, but occurs later in the neural processing. I've seen it myself: a child would have no problems with loud music, but any kind of noise (as in, white noise) would be painful. This included hair dryers, vacuum cleaners, some power tools, and sounds of water/sea.
- dmix 7y agoWho would have thought Hand Dryer buyers would have such a nice ecommerce website to shop on! I wish every ecommerce store looked as good and simple as that one.
- Lorin 7y agoI had a similar problem as a child with hair clippers at the barber... some were really loud and were put right next to your ears!
- mindgam3 7y agoShoot, I get nervous and feel like crying when I see a hand dryer, and I’m in my mid 30s. Those devices are literally painful for me to be around. I view them as a scourge and will consider not washing my hands if there’s no soundproofed alternative.
- abugheratwork 7y agoI always think they should just take it down and put up a sign that says, "Too cheap for towels." It won't damage my hearing and will get my hands just as dry.
- mindgam3 7y agoLet’s not even mention how they always try to justify these monstrosities by saying they’re better for the environment. Insult to injury.
- jasonmp85 7y agoYES! "This device saves trees" No, it doesn't. We should be (and AFAIK often are) at the point that paper towel pulp is coming from forests we replant. Also, I don't know, maybe those dryers "save trees" but the paper towels provide a forcing function for someone to always have a couple of ready forests on hand, which seems better?
- mindgam3 7y agoYeah, I just don’t buy it. 100% recycled paper towels are a thing. And if you really want to get technical it seems like manufacturing and using those devices consume far more energy. Anyway, glad I’m not the only one shaking my head at these things...
- jdmichal 7y agoHonest question: Have you tried just vigorously shaking your hands and then letting them air dry? It only takes a couple minutes. Worth the wait to still have clean hands.
- greedo 7y agoMy kids had a pathological fear of the automatic flush toilets when they were little. They were so loud, and they considered them out of control.