Many industries rely on the technology of pass boxes that handle material transfer between a non-controlled and controlled environment (or two cleanrooms with different standards). Pass boxes make sure that no contaminant occurs when material is transferred into the cleanroom on carts or carriages and therefore, maintains the hygiene of the lab. Design and manufacturing company Kleanlabs, explains.
Manoeuvring in a cleanroom with a cart
Cleanroom operations such as material loading and unloading may require a solution that is optimal for carts and carriages. It might be awkward to handle semi-finished or finished products separately and it would be much more efficient to load everything onto a cart. Most pass boxes, however, have something like a doorstep, which makes it somewhat suboptimal to use carts in the cleanroom. Some cleanrooms have a so-called sluice gate solution that an employee can load the material into the cleanroom through. However, the maintenance costs of a sluice gate that size can be quite costly.
The alternative solution
The newest cart-friendly model of pass boxes has been designed without a doorstep to solve this problem. They are available in custom sizes, so that they fit any kind of cart from small to large. Moreover, they can save a lot of space because they only take up as much space as they must for the cart. Cart-friendly pass boxes also minimise the contamination entering the controlled environment, because the material transfer will not need any human assistance.
Custom solution, elevated efficiency
These compact cart-friendly pass boxes can be installed anywhere, even after the cleanroom has been finished. The active model is equipped with a ventilation system, allowing active cleaning of materials inside. The stainless steel version is the most popular, as it reacts best to structural forces during material transfer.
