This is pretty interesting. People swear by Dyson’s sucking products, now they have a new one that blows:
Looks interesting, but a $300 fan will not be on my short list of must-have purchases anytime soon.
It appears to solve a problem that I’m not sure exists—has “choppy air” from normal fans really been an issue with which mankind has struggled?
I wonder how it works. Maybe an intake on the base, with the air channeled up through the frame of the toroidal thingy? It has to have an impeller. I wonder if it’s like an industrial fan in the base, with a cylindrical turbine instead of conventional blades.
I also wonder why “smooth air flow” is somehow better, with a strong tendency toward :dubious:.
If you look at the video on the website, there’s reactions of people who see/feel the fan for the first time.
However, I notice that the airflow doesn’t seem to be… torrential. Even though the people bend down very near the fan, it doesn’t look as though anyone’s hair or clothing moves due to the airflow.
I still think it must be neat as hell, but I’m curious how much air it actually pushes.
From their website:
So yes, there’s a blower of some sort in the base. At the top end, the basic principle is a venturi. The compressed air comes out of a ring-shaped nozzle, and the air flow “picks up” the air from behind the fan and sends it forward. It’s the same sort of physical principle that makes spray paint cans and carburetors work.
Engadget opened it up and discovered a vacuum cleaner blower in the base, so it looks like Ogre was spot on.
They also say it’s less effective than a regular fan, and about as loud as a vacuum cleaner, so I’m not sure how it’s worth $300.
Yes, if you dont want it to mess up the sound waves from your speakers.
Every audiophile needs one !
A $300 novelty fan?
Wow, that Dyson guy sure has a lot of time on his hands.
If he can find a few suckers to buy them well then good for him, I guess.
It’s cool looking, but $300 is a lot for a fan.
Grammatical hijack: That website contains the sentence, “The Dyson Air Multiplier™ fan works very differently to conventional fans.” Is that correct or should it be “differently from conventional fans”?
My inner science fiction geek wants to see this technology used for helicopters.
cnet.com states it’s about as loud as the fan in an Xbox 360. Loudish - but no louder than anything else.
That is a fantastic looking fan! I want to try it out…
I’m teh winnar! I hereby award myself 0.025 interwebz.
But seriously, no. It looks like something from a 1986 Sharper Image catalog. Not my aesthetic at all.
It’s pretty lame to call this a “bladeless” fan. It’s clearly got blades in the turbine that’s inside the base.
But then wouldn’t they be hovercrafts instead of helicopters?
Nah, I mean use this ring instead of a rotor. It probably wouldn’t be able to generate enough thrust, but damn, it’d look cool to see helicopters with rings instead of blades. Probably quieter, too.
I think the UK practice is to say ‘to’.
5.28 gallons of air per second works out to about 42.3 cfm (cubic feet per minute, the more standard units for rating air moving equipment). What would be a good place to learn how this would compare to, say, a 1932 General Electric 9" fan with anodized steel finger guard?
Essentially, a NOTAR helicopter does the same thing that this fan does.
i.e.: it does have a rotor, but they’re hidden within
Small, high speed impellers/blowers are loud. Venturis are loud as well.
This this will not quietly drone in the background.