Do you want to know how to dry boots fast?
If you work in an industry that requires you to wear work boots daily, you will need to know how you can dry them fast.
You see, some work boots are quite expensive, so you cannot buy a pair for each work day. If you are caught in a drench and the boots get wet, you will need to dry them so that you can wear them the following day.
Growing up, there are some skills that you should just learn. Same as knowing how to swim and ride a bike, you should also know how to dry shoes fast.
How Do You Dry Leather Boots Fast?
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How long do leather boots take to dry? Air-drying leather boots can take anywhere from 4 to 12 hours. And that is not fast!
When leather absorbs water, you can almost give up on it. But not just yet. These few tricks will help you dry your skin boots and wear them the following day.
Clean the boots first
Well, they are already soaked, right? Go ahead and clean them out because clean leather dries faster than dirty leather.
If you are trying to dry boots that have mud all over, they will not dry properly. If you have to do a job, do it well.
After cleaning the boots inside out, you can remove the insoles (if they are removable) and the shoelaces too.
Dry them from the inside and outside
The first thing to do is to stuff the boots with paper towels and old newspapers to help retain their shape and at the same time, help absorb the moisture from inside.
After that, you can keep the boots in the line of heat. Please note that you should not place the boots right in front of direct heat.
You have to keep checking the newspapers so that if they are too wet, you can remove them, scrunch up fresh ones and stuff them in the boots.
Another option is to stuff the boots with a towel. Towels are super absorbent, so it will get the moisture out of the leather.
When using a towel, you can stuff part of it inside the shoes and then use the rest of it to wrap the boot. You have to keep on checking the status of the towel to change as soon as it is wet.
Use a fan to dry the boots
This method only works for people who have the right standalone fan, with a long stand and a stable base.
Remove the laces and the insoles and then make two hooks using two pieces of wire. Hang the boots on the fan in such a way that the open end of the boots face the fan blades.
When the fan starts rotating, the air pulls the moisture from the leather. This is a good method to remove the moisture from the boots overnight.
Use a boot dryer
Never put boots in a dryer. Also, never put steel boots in a dryer. They will damage your dryer. Come to think of it, you should actually not put any types of shoes, even converse shoes in the dryer.
But a boot dryer is different. And it is specifically designed to dry shoes and boots.
If you are a boot enthusiast or you work in boots all week, you need a boot dryer. Please note this is a boots dryer. You should never put your boots in a regular dryer.
What this piece of equipment does is that when you plug it in, it releases warm air, just the same way that the sun makes the air warm. The warm air dries the boots rather than the direct heat.
One of the most recommended boot dryers in the market today is DryGuy DX Forced Air Boot Dryer and Garment Dryer that you can buy on amazon.com.
It can dry boots that are as high as 16 inches (hello cowboy boots!) , has a switch for heat or no heat and it has a three-hour timer just in case you do not want to expose your boots to too much heat.
The DryGuy DX boot dryer not only dries boots, but it also eliminates odor. When you finally get your boots out, they will be fresh. It also does not damage the leather making the boots.
If you are looking for a means to dry your boots overnight and wear them in the morning, invest in this dryer. It can heat up to 105°F/40°C.
Lastly, you can also use this dryer to dry your garments. It can hold up to four of them.
How to dry leather boots overnight
Your best bet if you have leather boots that you need to dry overnight is to use a boot dryer. However, when you get home at night, you just cannot rush out to buy a boot dryer.
In that case, we recommend that you try using the towel and newspaper method. Stuff the boots up. That way, the material that you have used to stuff the shoes absorbs the moisture from the inside and from the outside too.
Use rice if you can spare it
Rice is a super absorber. That is why people advise you to cover your mobile phone in rice if it falls into water.
If you can spare the amount of rice that you would need to fill a pair of boots, go ahead and do it. It will absorb every ounce of moisture from the leather.
This would have to be a tremendous amount of rice since it is advisable to fill the interior with shoes and then cover the exterior with more rice.
If you are wondering how to dry shoes fast, you can use this method, but all that rice will go to waste since you cannot cook it.
Keep them a distance from campfire or stove
Heat is heat, it does not matter where it comes from. The only thing that you should avoid is keeping the boots in front of direct heat from your fire. This will dehydrate the leather completely and cause damage.
Keep the boots a good distance away from the heat so that they dry from the warm air rather than the heat.
It is also best to hang the boots because hot air rises. Stuff them with old scrunched up newspapers so that they can absorb the moisture from the inside.
How to dry steel toe boots fast
Steel toe boots offer the ultimate protection for your feet and toes. They protect your toes and metatarsal area from falling objects. If you hit your foot against a stump or something, you will be protected.
The best method to dry steel toe boots fast is to use a boot dryer. You can set the timer for 3 hours and then check the boots.
Other methods such as stuffing and using towels might not work fast. So, definitely, it is the boot dryer for these.
You can also use a combination of methods such as stuffing and indirect heat. The stuffing material absorbs the moisture from the interior while the warm air outside dries the exterior.
Can you dry boots in the oven?
You should not dry your boots in the oven because the gum used to bind them will start falling apart.
Because the oven has a lot of heat, it might start disintegrating the glue binding the shoes. Besides, the direct heat might also damage the leather.
For leather boots to remain supple and flexible, they have a small amount of natural moisture. Direct heat sucks all this away, leaving the shoes vulnerable to damage.
In short, just don’t dry your shoes in the oven.
Wrapping Up
That is how to dry boots fast. But you need to know whenever your boots are soaked, the topmost protective layer of leather conditioner is compromised.
Thus, after drying the boots using any of the methods that we have discussed here, apply the conditioner on the leather. That will make it waterproof and give it a new lease of life.