[Mike Halliday]

What do you consider to be an acceptable drying time and  ( more importantly) what do your customers consider to be acceptable

I think 5-6 hrs is acceptable,  so you clean a carpet in the morning and the room is back in use by teatime or if you clean it In an afternoon Then they have to be aware that  it still will be damp on an evening.

This is an average, we've all have occasions when with perfect circumstances the carpet dried in an hour ( hot day, French doors open,  nylon short pile, not too dirty etc..etc)

But on average what's acceptable?

[tim handley]

I have to say, with my storm, and on a not too minging carpet i was  finding them pretty much dry before i even left until recently. Okay, not bone dry obviously but virtually dry to touch...... now the weather has changed they arent drying so quick. I  tell the customers they should be dry within three hours, maybe a bit more if its very cold and they are thick carpets.........
I remember having a wool mix carpet cleaned by somebody 20 odd years ago in our last house, they took three weeks to dry and stunk of wet dog all that time.....   we thought that was normal!!!!  Id like to know what drying times are achieved with a truckmount???   hotter water, more powerful vac power..........

[wayne zabel]

Judging by all the stuff you read on adverts/ websites ect ect I thought  all carpets were dry in an hour

I always say about 6 to 7 hours for wool and 3 to four hours for synthetics.

[tim handley]

i clean ours quite often, in summer they are bone dry in less than an hour, i did them recently and they took three/four hours... but i gave them some serious welly...........

[wayne zabel]

I have no doubt that some carpets can be dry in an hour - I just think this general statement you often see is misleading to the public

[Mike Halliday]

I use a truckmount, using a 47 blower ( my last one had a 56) so it's got lots of vacuum, my water is heated with gas so very hot, and still I won't suggest 1-2hrs dry times,  they  get  told minimum 4 hrs but if they are wanting to put furniture back then It's the rest of the day or in its a late afternoon clean I tell them to put them back the next day.

If I'm clean a full house I can use air movers, so when I finish the first room can be returned to normal  but this has had 2 hrs with forced drying,

It's alright saying 'dry to the touch' but stick a heavy table on a carpet and it will press down into the pile where Mousture can still be present.

[Lewis Newby]

You can make it sound better by wording it

Touch dry in 1-2 hours, then fully dry 2-3 hours after.

Sounds better then 4-6 hours

[garyhumphreys]

Carpets are rarely dry in 3/4 hours. If you put a chair down with dyed wood or a table, chances are there will be transfer into the carpet. I think it's much better to tell the customer the truth rather than exaggerate the speed they will dry, this only serves to make you look incompetent.6-8 hours sometimes if your not using airmovers. And you're relying on the customer to make sure the rooms are aired out and the temperatures high enough. How many customers lock the house up and go shopping or back to work when your finished.

[tim handley]

Lewis nailed it!!!!    touch dry, feels dry, you can walk on it if you need to, but it needs longer to dry properly "due to the nature of the deep clean my wonderful machine has given your carpet " etc etc...

 lets throw a spanner in the works, its touch dry after youve cleaned it, but then youve applied a high quality "................. stain protector"... insert supplier  of your choice.........    how long from cleaning, to protecting to bone dry then??   Lets say this time of year................

[Dave_Lee]

When \i was porty operator I used to tell them, when asked, around 24 hours. Never a problem they accepted that as reasonable.
Of course I knew they would be dry quicker then that, and when they were they would be doubly pleased. better to be a bit pessimistic rather over optimistic when asked about things like drying times. If you tell them 2 hours and 5 hours later they are still damp, you are not going to look very good are you.
Like Mike I usually say the average carpet should be dry in 4 to 6 hours.
Dave.

[Mike Halliday]

Tim if you apply the correct amount of protector on top of an already damp carpet then you are looking at next day drying.

I think drying times are more of an issue to us than the customer, like Wayne says look how often we hear some one mentioning  carpets drying in an hour (especially when they have just took delivery of a new machine ) 

the amount of customers  who tell me they are  going out for tea as they exspect  the carpet to be still damp on the night, they also tell me they will leave the furniture until the next day  nobody is exspecting carpets to be dry in 1-2hrs.

[scott johns]

as already mentioned it will always depend on fibres we are cleaning and pile heights also natural
or symthethtic. also on weather conditions summer times with heat and all windows open will
always accelerate drying times,this  time of year cold weather and windows opens is not doing
us any favours, we always use air movers and stay for 20mins it always goes well with clients.
saying that we done a house the other day very large 80/20 and we protected it the house was so hot
it was like a sauna I didn't even use air mover the carpets where practically dry, what im getting at
is advise the clients to turn on the heating with windows just open enough this will assist in the carpets
suites drying much faster and possibly like a previous member whohad to go back because carpet smelt probably took to long to dry. I would say 4 - 6 hours to be dry as a rule of thumb it all depends on
the operator. happy cleaning

[Bob Allen]

I sometimes tell my customers "I can turn the PSI water pressure down to 50-100 and "lick" the surface and they will dry very quick"
but they all agree they would rather have a proper deep clean even if it means it might take a bit longer to dry.

[sean oregan]

All depends on method, I can say "carpets dry in an hour" but that's if I vlm clean them.
But with my storm 3/5 hours normally this weather I just do extra dry passes.

[Mike Halliday]

Do extra dry passes really make any difference??

When I used a wand with a sight tube I could see the water being sucked out and after the first couple of dry passes you never really got any more out, if it doesn't come out with the first couple then any more are could be wasted.

Doing short runs could be better, rather than clean the full width of the room then go back and do your dry strokes do 4 widths of the wand then go back on yourself and do your dry strokes this will recover the water before it gas time to penetrate deep into the carpet. Or single wet passes then 3-4 dry passes straight away. I've seen so many Youtube videos of carpet cleaners cleaning half a room with just wet strokes then going back and drying it off

[Simon Gerrard]

Whatever your drying time, you can reduce it with a couple of these.
When doing multiple rooms you can leave one in a room and move them around  as you do them, even half an hour in each room greatly reducies the drying time - and it looks the part too, people notice these little touches.

http://www.restormate.co.uk/epages/15094.sf/en_GB/?ObjectPath=/Shops/15094/Products/DRI-POD

[Radek Jablonski]

Yep, have one but need two more. 3 will be a nice set for multiple rooms.
Recentlly got velo airmover, good for sofas , 2 dri pods better for rooms then 1 velo.

[jasonl]

Almost every carpet I clean is post bonneted , I have wool downstairs and polypropylene on floor 2 and 3 at home , they are always dry in 2 or less hours when I clean them . Stairs in 4 hours .

[COLIN BRIGHT]

funny this should come up... had a client, who after the job said he wanted to pay by cash and could I go back the next day as he had none on him, I said a cheque would be fine, I cleaned it last Wednesday and apart from the arms,(that had a lot of dye transfer and needed extra effort) the rest was almost touch dry before I left ( using truck- drimaster upholstery tool- air mover) had a call this afternoon as he is not happy with the clean, "it took 3 days to dry but looked no different why eventually dry, so we have washed the cushions in the washing machine and now the frame looks a different colour"
I SMELL A RAT.... going to see it tomorrow, if indeed when you leave it is touch dry, how is it possible to take another 3 days for the rest to dry....NEVER had a call like this before
1.why didn't he phone the next day when it was still "WET" as he put it
2. why would you wash the cushions Before phoning me with this Complaint
any feed back would be welcome
my thoughts are the arms have not come up as well as they wanted (all explained at time of quote) so making up a load of poope to get a refund

[maxcampbell]

Does anyone else routinely ask their customers what their experience of drying time is?

Everyone has a different idea of what dry means - and estimating it without asking the customer is meaningless - we're not there!

We leave a feedback form with one question asking the customer to report the drying time, and asking how they felt about it. we get every combination of answers you could imagine - from "it took 4 hours, far too long" to "a couple of days, but that's OK", but we reckon the average reported "drying time" is 6 to 12 hours.

We leave a snail drier behind on quite a few upholstery jobs.