IQS Newsroom Articles on Modular Clean Rooms
Modular Clean Rooms
A modular cleanroom is a clean room which is assembled on site from pre-cut components. Modular cleanrooms are considered more cost effective than other cleanrooms because of their basic construction and low-cost materials. These rooms can be purchased as a kit or installed by a technician. As with standard cleanrooms, modular cleanrooms are defined as seriously controlled environments. Clean rooms are designed to eliminate the dust, sand, salt particles and bacteria which enter a room through clothing and human skin. Because cleanrooms are sealed from outside air, supplies, people and equipment coming in and out must be tightly monitored. Anyone entering a cleanroom must wear a bunny suit which covers a person from head to toe. This avoids bringing in outside contaminants.
Clean rooms are classified by the number of dust particles per cubic foot of air, with classifications ranging from Class 1 cleanrooms to Class 100,000 cleanrooms. A Class 1 clean room is the cleanest room, allowing no more than one speck of dust particles 0.5 microns or larger per cubic foot; Class 100 never exceeds 100 particles of dust per cubic foot, Class 1,000 never exceeds 1,000 particles per cubic foot; Class 10,000 has a particle count lower than 10,000 per cubic foot and lastly, Class 100,000 has a particle count lower than 100,000 per cubic foot. Modular cleanrooms are designed to accommodate any class.
Because of the sterile nature of modular cleanrooms, they have become a necessary product for industries such as aviation, aerospace, electronics, hard drive manufacturing, military parts production, medical and pharmaceutical labs, meat processing and packaging, veterinary clinics, hospitals, medical offices and operating rooms. Lastly, they are used by scientists in the fields of micro technology and bio chemistry. Cleanroom manufacturers, cleanroom suppliers, cleanroom distributors and cleanroom companies are constantly working to ensure modular cleanrooms are meeting the standards of the industries that use them.
There are two types of modular cleanrooms: the hardwall modular clean room and the softwall modular cleanroom. Hardwall cleanrooms use panelized wall structures which support the roof and ceiling grid. These panels are made out of a variety of materials. Pharmaceutical, USP 797 compounding rooms and medical device clean rooms most often use panels made of reinforced plastic or high pressure laminate because these materials can withstand repeated cleaning and sterilizing without breaking down. Aluminum honeycomb panels are most popular for electronic industries because this material is non-outgassing, non particle shedding, anti-static and non-combustible. Other material options for hardwall construction include pre-painted aluminum, 24-gauge pre-painted steel, vinyl faced gypsum board, structural aluminum, paper or plastic honeycomb, expanded polystyrene and polyurethane.
Softwall structures consist of tubular steel frame structures supporting a ceiling grid. This structure uses pressurized vinyl curtains with a re-sealable entrance and exit to allow for maximum cleanliness. Both room structures are designed to only allow filtered air to enter the room. The air is filtered by filter units mounted in the ceiling. These units draw outside air through a HEPA filter, which filters the air before it enters the cleanroom. Modular cleanrooms are designed to be either freestanding or suspended from the building roof. They range in size from small enough to be lifted by forklifts to two-story structures. No matter the size, modular cleanrooms can be assembled inside of an existing building, attached to a building or as a freestanding structure.