Hair Hero - The new Dyson Supersonic hairdryer has really created some hype in the hair market, we go behind the scenes to find out what really gives it the Wow factor

James Dyson, the brains behind the globally recognised Dyson brand, has always been at the forefront of technology.

With his hoovers recognised amongst many households around the world for digital motors, quiet acoustics and fluid dynamics it’s no surprise that Dyson wanted to tap in to the hair market.

The extensive research that went on behind the scenes of developing the Supersonic is quite something, with Dyson wanting to create a hero hair dryer which tackled the daily frustrations hairstylists around the world faced when using existing dryers.

Hair science
With a background in household goods, it’s unsurprising that the Dyson engineers really needed to learn and understand the variety of hair types (seven, in total) in order to ensure the end result was effective.

The engineers quickly learned that the different hair types handle stresses differently. Asian hair is actually different in shape, and is the heaviest and coarsest. This means that it tends to align more easily and tangles less. Whereas Caucasian hair has the highest density of all. It grows at an oblique angle to the scalp and is slightly curved, which means the hair is more likely to be wavy or curly.

Technique is key
In order to really gain the deepest insight into hair drying techniques, the engineers spent 275 hours watching over 100 women over two continents wash and dry their hair.

From the hours of insight test footage, engineers managed to analyse some interesting figures against common hair dryer usage including:
• 15 angle changes were made in one drying session
• It took 20 minutes on average to dry the hair
• With the average weight of a professional hairdryer being heavy, it took women on average five seconds to feel the strain on their wrists and arms
• The most common area of struggle was the back of the head, on average consumers spend 40 per cent of their time in this area >

Leave it to the professionals
Talking to the professionals was key in executing not only a product relevant for consumers, but also hairdressers who use a hairdryer, day in, day out. Over the course of the programme engineers spoke to eight experienced hairdressers who told them the recurring blow dry disaster they see from clients is driven by a lack of understanding behind the direction air needs to travel in order to make hair look smooth.

As well as the physical positioning and comfort around the head during styling, women also need to be able to position air down the hair instead of across it to gain that overall smooth effect.

Supersonic powers
The name says it all. The Dyson hairdryer really is “supersonic” for many reasons. First and foremost, it has a patented Air Multiplier™ technology which means that the volume of air coming out of the hair dryer is three times that going into the motor. Air takn into the motor is accelerated over an annular aperture. This creates a jet of air, which passes over an airfoil shaped ramp that channels its direction.

Not only this, the Dyson Supersonic has a unique heating element. In order to fit this engineers needed to develop a double stacked, interwound heating element with a hole through the middle. Other hairdryers often use flat sheets of Mica which slot together in a Christmas tree shape, with wire then wrapped around the structure.

But due to the shape of the Supersonic, engineers needed to develop a heating element which uses specially produced Mica tubes, positioned as a donut shape with two, resistive wires made from a chrome aluminium alloy wrapped around them. These wires are structured in a wave-form pattern and interwoven around thet tubes.

The Supersonic homes the smallest Dyson motor to date– the V9. This motor is able to suck in over 13 litres of air through the diameter of a small coil, just 27mm, every second. Engineers also spend time working with aero-acoustics to be sure that the hairdryer remains as quiet as possible when in use, this they managed to achieve through the use of the V9, 13 blade impeller.

After three years of engineering a high-tech and high-touch product, the Dyson hairdryer was officially launched to the professional market in 2016 and with renowned salons already huge fans of this gizmo it won’t be long until we see advanced, further editions of this Supersonic created to what will be even more impactful in our industry. 

Contact Dyson Middle East by calling: +971 (0) 4 350 7800.