Do You Need A Soundproof Cleanroom?

Do You Need A Soundproof Cleanroom?

A cleanroom can be designed to meet the needs of almost any application with any requirements, from controlling static and humidity to even controlling sound. You probably know whether your application requires control for things like humidity and static, but what about sound. Do you need a soundproof cleanroom? Here are some conditions where you might.

Loud Manufacturing Environments

If your facility is a manufacturing environment that requires protective hearing equipment like earplugs ear, soundproofing your cleanroom is a good idea, especially if hearing protection isn’t necessary for your cleanroom processes. Hearing protection might even hinder those processes, as foam from earplugs and earmuffs can hold and shed particles.

If your cleanroom contains the loud equipment and the rest of your processes outside the cleanroom don’t require hearing protection, it can be worthwhile to soundproof your cleanroom so that hearing protection is only required inside. This can greatly reduce hearing-related injuries to your personnel and reduce the cost of hearing protection for your company.

Loud Equipment Containment

If you have a piece of equipment or pieces of equipment that are particularly loud, rather than creating a soundproof cleanroom, a more efficient solution might be creating a soundproof containment room for that equipment. A modular soundproof room can be created around a loud piece of equipment. The benefit to this is reduced noise and need for ear protection in your facility. Additionally, modular containment rooms can be freestanding or can incorporate your existing structure, so no matter where a piece of equipment is housed, it can be soundproofed.

Sensitive Processes

If your cleanroom operation is a particularly sensitive process, a soundproof cleanroom may also be beneficial. Sound is vibration, and delicate operations may be affected by loud noises and strong vibrations, which a soundproof cleanroom can reduce.

Proprietary Information

If your cleanroom operations are top secret or deal with proprietary information which should not leave the walls of the cleanroom, a soundproof cleanroom can also prevent the unplanned and unwanted spread of information by containing sound within the cleanroom.

 

Angstrom Technology’s modular cleanrooms and in-plantinplant buildings can be customized to control sound, if your application requires. Get in touch with one of our design engineers to discuss your project.

 

Cleanroom Terminology: Air Showers

Cleanroom Terminology: Air Showers

Early in the cleanroom design process, all of the cleanroom terminology and jargon can be confusing, especially when designing a controlled environment is a complex process with many factors to take into account. Here’s an explainer on one of those terms, air showers, that may help you determine whether your cleanroom requires an air shower.

What are air showers?

Air showers are enclosed spaces that use high-velocity air jets to remove contaminants from people and items entering the controlled environment. They are placed at all entrances to the cleanroom and are connected to a HEPA or ULPA filtration system. Air showers can be used to prevent contaminants from entering the cleanroom, but they can also be used to remove contaminants from people and objects exiting a quarantine or other controlled environment to prevent cross contamination.

Air showers are particularly useful for cleanrooms requiring a high level of control, such as ISO Classes 1-5. Industries that commonly use air showers include pharmaceuticals, biotech, hospitals, aerospace, and semiconductor manufacturing.

Air Shower Specifics

All air showers function in the same way—air blows onto the person or object in the air shower, blowing loose contaminants off before the person or object enters the cleanroom space. The differences are really in size, materials, and filtration system.

Size

The size of your air shower will depend on what needs to pass through it. If only people will be passing through your air shower, then you won’t need a large one (depending on the number of people). However, if carts with product need to enter your cleanroom, your air shower will need to accommodate the person pushing the cart as well as the cart.

Materials

Air showers are generally constructed from either steel, aluminum, stainless steel, or plastics. The material used may depend on your budget as well as the application and requirements of the air shower.

Filtration system

Air showers can use HEPA (high-efficiency particulate air) filters or ULPA (ultra-low particulate air) filters, depending on your needs. HEPA filters remove particles greater than or equal to 0.3 µm with 99.99 percent efficiency; ULPA filters remove particles greater than or equal to 0.12 µm with 99.9995 percent efficiency.

Angstrom Technology designs cleanrooms that can incorporate a variety of design features, including air showers. Talk to an engineer today to get started designing your cleanroom.

 

What Is An Inplant Building?

What Is An Inplant Building?

The new trend in industrial and commercial building is inplant buildings. While this may seem like just another trend, there are many reasons why an inplant building might be useful in your factory or industrial application. What are inplant buildings, and what are their benefits? 

What is an inplant building?

Inplant are essentially a building inside of a building, specifically, a factory plant. It’s not just a room, though. An inplant building is more like a suite of rooms or a building itself, with freestanding walls, it’s own ceiling, etc., though it may incorporate some of the factory’s existing structures.

Inplant buildings can serve a lot of purposes, from creating office spaces to separating process flows and more. These inplant buildings are constructed modularly, which has a lot of benefits in terms of build time and cost.

What are the benefits of inplant buildings?

Some of the uses of inplant buildings are obvious: say you need some offices. You don’t want to set up desks and cubicles on the factory floor, next to your inspection area or where the forklifts are parked. An inplant building can solve this dilemma. If you have equipment that is loud and requires hearing protection, you can create an equipment enclosure to contain it and reduce noise to surrounding outside areas. 

One benefit to inplant buildings is their modular construction. Modular construction can be less expensive than traditional construction. Additionally, it is quicker to assemble modularly constructed buildings, which saves you time and lost production time, which saves you even more money. Plus, modular construction depreciates faster than traditional construction, an added tax benefit. 

Another benefit to modularly constructed inplant buildings is their flexibility. If you need a temporary office space for example, an inplant building can serve that purpose and be quickly and easily taken down when no longer needed. In fact, the modular components can all be reused for a new application. If you need to add onto a modular building, or change the layout in some way, modular construction offers that flexibility, since you can add new modules and reuse existing ones in new formations.

Because of their easy of assembly, you can even construct or modify your inplant buildings with your own personnel—no subcontractors required.

 

If you’re looking to create an inplant building, contact the design engineers at Angstrom Technology to see how modular construction can work for your situation, and be sure to check out our guide to Modular Offices and Inplant Buildings.

Hidden Cost Benefits To Modular Construction

Hidden Cost Benefits To Modular Construction

Modular construction isn’t just the latest trend in construction because it’s efficient—although it is, and that is a major benefit—it’s also on the rise because some of the amazing financial benefits that come from modular construction, some of which you might not realize when first weighing the option. Here are some of the hidden cost benefits to modular construction that could make all the difference in your cleanroom or office suite addition.  

Lower overall cost

This isn’t hidden, necessarily, but it’s worth stating, again and again: Modular cleanrooms, when compared to conventionally constructed cleanrooms with the same features, are going to cost less. The savings you’re going to see from modular construction, in terms of the construction and installation cost, the cost of special features, the time it takes to build, and the maintenance costs are going to put conventional construction out of the running.

Depreciation

Modular construction depreciates at a faster rate than conventional construction—in fact, up to five times faster. While that much not be a positive if you’re purchasing a modular home to live in, it is a positive if you’re a business building a cleanroom, offices, or other additions to your facilities. Why? Tax advantages. With current tax codes in place, the initial cost of a conventionally constructed cleanroom or office suite or other space would have to be over 30 percent less than the initial cost of the same space using modular construction to match the tax advantages of the modular structure.

Reuse

Traditionally constructed structures are meant to be permanent. You can’t easily disassemble them and reuse the components in a new location or in a new configuration. Additions, renovations, updates, and modifications to conventionally constructed spaces are costs hidden in the future. With modular construction, the components of your modular cleanroom (or any other kind of modular structure) can be disassembled when no longer needed, easily modified to accommodate changes in your process and needs, easily added onto, or even disassembled, moved to a new location, and reassembled. Can you do that with a conventionally constructed cleanroom? No way.

 

If you’re interested in how a modular cleanroom or inplant building can save money in the long and short run, give Angstrom Technology a call and speak with one of our expert design engineers.

Cleanroom Terminology: Pass Through Chambers

Cleanroom Terminology: Pass Through Chambers

When designing a new cleanroom or planning an upgrade of an existing cleanroom, it can be easy to get bogged down in the terminology. One such piece of cleanroom terminology is pass through chamber. Here we explain what a pass through chamber is and its important features and benefits for cleanroom design.

What is a cleanroom pass through chamber?

A cleanroom pass through chamber has a seemingly self-evident name: it’s a chamber through which you can pass materials. More specifically, it is a chamber that allows you to pass materials into and out of your cleanroom without your employees having to exit and enter the cleanroom and gown. They allow materials to enter the cleanroom while reducing the contamination entering the cleanroom. 

These chambers come in many different sizes and can incorporate many different materials, depending on the needs of your cleanroom. Heavy duty sealing locks prevent contamination from passing through the chamber when it isn’t being used, and double door designs can prevent cross-contamination issues. There are also stainless steel corrosion-resistant designs, fire safe designs, and chemical resistant chamber designs, along with designs that can incorporate HEPA-filtered air blowers. 

What are the benefits of a Pass Through Chamber?

Pass through chambers, since they allow materials to enter and leave the cleanroom without requiring employees to gown up and enter and exit the cleanroom, have obvious benefits for maintaining a high level of contamination control in the cleanroom environment. Additionally, the chambers increase productivity because they allow employees to work more efficiently—no need to go through the time-consuming gowning and air-showering process every time an item is needed in the cleanroom. 

These chambers also reduces the number of employees who need to be in the cleanroom environment, cutting down on the potential for contaminants entering the controlled environment. It also means that you’ll need less costly gowns and other PPE on hand. 

What kinds of cleanrooms need pass through chambers?

Any cleanroom that requires the transfer of materials into and out of the cleanroom on a regular or frequent basis could benefit from a pass through chamber in their cleanroom design. These chambers are a feature that can be easily integrated into a new cleanroom design or installed into an existing cleanroom. Research facilities dealing with new and volatile substances, medical cleanrooms dealing with dangerous and contagious substances, pharmaceutical cleanrooms requiring a high level of sterility, and electronic and technology cleanrooms often incorporate pass throughs in their cleanroom designs to manage contamination and keep productivity high. 

Whether you need pass through chambers, air showers, or any other specialized cleanroom features, Angstrom Technology can design a cleanroom that incorporates those features.