Types of drying in the dishwasher: which ones are there and which one is better?

Dish­wash­ers vary in a num­ber of ways. One of the most impor­tant para­me­ters that you should def­i­nite­ly con­sid­er when buy­ing a dish­wash­er is the type of dry­ing. It should be select­ed depend­ing on indi­vid­ual needs.

Types of dryers in dishwashers

Man­u­fac­tur­ers offer mod­ern dish­wash­ers with dif­fer­ent types of dry­ers. Each has its own fea­tures and ben­e­fits. Con­sumers can choose the appro­pri­ate option among the fol­low­ing dry­ers:

• pas­sive (con­den­sa­tion);
• active (inten­sive);
• tur­bo;
• zeo­lite;
• intel­lec­tu­al.

Accord­ing to the qual­i­ty of dry­ing, they are divid­ed into class­es A and B. The first option is bet­ter and means com­plete­ly dry dish­es at the exit. The sec­ond option implies low­er qual­i­ty, but also low­er cost.

Passive drying

Pas­sive dry­ing is called con­den­sa­tion. The prin­ci­ple of its oper­a­tion is very sim­ple and based on the ele­men­tary laws of physics. In fact, pas­sive dry­ing means the nat­ur­al process. The dish­wash­ing process ends with rins­ing with hot water. It evap­o­rates from the sur­face of the dish­es, and the con­den­sate accu­mu­lates on the walls of the machine, then flow­ing down.

Active drying

Active dry­ing is also called inten­sive. It implies the pres­ence of a heat exchang­er placed around the body of the device. Dish­wash­er means heat gen­er­a­tion, and the water in the heat exchang­er is low tem­per­a­ture. Such con­di­tions cre­ate a pres­sure drop, which in turn ensures air cir­cu­la­tion inside the device. As a result, the dish­es dry much faster.

In addi­tion to the heat exchang­er, the device has a device for col­lect­ing air. It is nec­es­sary to cre­ate new air cur­rents.

Turbo dryer

This type of dry­ing in the dish­wash­er is also called con­vec­tion dry­ing. It implies the pres­ence of a heat­ing ele­ment and a fan. Due to these devices, hot steam is blown. This allows not only to dry the dish­es, but also to process them addi­tion­al­ly.

The pres­ence of acces­sories means that a spe­cial place is allo­cat­ed for them in the dish­wash­er. In addi­tion, man­u­fac­tur­ers pro­vide pro­tec­tion for such devices to avoid dam­age dur­ing the main process — wash­ing dish­es.

Zeolite drying

Zeo­lite dry­ing owes its name to a spe­cial min­er­al — zeo­lite. At the bot­tom of the dish­wash­er there is a tray where evap­o­rat­ing mois­ture flows. This pal­let has a spe­cial con­tain­er with zeo­lite. This min­er­al, when exposed to mois­ture, heats up and releas­es heat. This heat ris­es to the top, enter­ing the main part of the appli­ance, where the dish­es are locat­ed.

So far, zeo­lite dry­ers are installed only in lux­u­ry dish­wash­ers. Giv­en the speed of inno­va­tion, this tech­nol­o­gy will quick­ly become avail­able for bud­get house­hold appli­ances.

Intelligent Drying

This type of dry­ing means a built-in touch sen­sor. This sys­tem has recent­ly appeared and is rarely used.

The main func­tion of the sen­sor is to cap­ture the ambi­ent tem­per­a­ture. Depend­ing on this indi­ca­tor, a cer­tain mode is set in the dish­wash­er. For exam­ple, when the room tem­per­a­ture is low, hot­ter water is select­ed for rins­ing dish­es before dry­ing. If the room tem­per­a­ture is high, the sen­sor reacts to this fac­tor and selects air­flow for dry­ing.

What type of drying is best?

To choose the dish­wash­er with the best type of dry­ing, you need to con­sid­er sev­er­al fac­tors:

• accept­able cost of the unit;
• fre­quen­cy of use;
• the impor­tance of dry­ing speed;
• the impor­tance of the appli­ance’s pow­er con­sump­tion.

If you need the most bud­get option, then it is worth buy­ing pas­sive dry­er. It does not require addi­tion­al ener­gy costs and is sim­ple in design. You can adapt and wash the dish­es in the evening so that the dish­es dry nat­u­ral­ly overnight.

It will cost a lit­tle more mod­el with active dry­ing. Its impor­tant advan­tage is that it works not due to elec­tric­i­ty, but to some laws of physics.

Tur­bo dry­er attract­ed by the high speed of the process and its effi­cien­cy. The cost of dish­wash­ers with such a sys­tem is at an aver­age lev­el. It is impor­tant to know that a tur­bo dry­er means addi­tion­al ener­gy costs, so the ongo­ing main­te­nance of such a unit will cost more.

Zeo­lite dry­ing attrac­tive in many ways, but so far only avail­able in some mod­els. Their cost is quite high, so only a few can afford such a unit. The same fac­tor applies to smart devices. The mod­ern rhythm of life will soon lead to new inven­tions, so the lat­est achieve­ments will become avail­able in large quan­ti­ties and will sig­nif­i­cant­ly decrease in price.

It is impos­si­ble to say with cer­tain­ty which type of dish­wash­er dry­er is best. The choice depends on the finan­cial capa­bil­i­ties and needs of the con­sumer. Every­one can choose the opti­mal set of para­me­ters for them­selves (see how to choose a dish­wash­er).