[labnetwork] Parylene Coater Concerns

[Hathaway, Malcolm R]

Hi Matt,

I'm sure more experienced hands will weigh in shortly, but this might be worth considering...  Perhaps it would be cost effective to mount the unit in an old fume hood, or some kind of exhausted enclosure (not knowing how big this unit is...)

At Harvard we have a maintenance bench where all manner of messy procedures take place.  Ours is in the chase, but perhaps some kind of bulkhead mounted enclosure opening into the cleanroom would work for you, without the expense of a separate HEPA area.

It feels like this would provide more positive control of the particulates (i.e. no tracking of particles on boots, suits, etc).  And everybody gets to work "in the cleanroom".

An another benefit might be (if the sash can be positively closed) that it would not add much to HVAC loading if kept closed when not in use.

Is this a bay + chase design, or a raised floor?


Mac Hathaway
Harvard CNS



________________________________
From: labnetwork-bounces at mtl.mit.edu <labnetwork-bounces at mtl.mit.edu> on behalf of Matthew Moneck <mmoneck at andrew.cmu.edu>
Sent: Friday, December 13, 2019 3:45 PM
To: labnetwork at mtl.mit.edu <labnetwork at mtl.mit.edu>
Subject: [labnetwork] Parylene Coater Concerns


Dear Colleagues,



Happy Holidays!  I would like to poll this community for some feedback.  We have an SCS Labcoter 2 parylene system in our old cleanroom facility.  That facility will soon shut down, and we are planning to relocate the tool.  Due to the particulate and debris this tool generates, especially during maintenance cycles, we prefer not to move it into our new class 10, class 100 cleanroom facility.  At the same time, we have faculty using the tool for applications where particulate contamination during sample loading is a concern.  They would like to have it in the cleanroom.



It is my understanding that many labs have either moved their parylene systems out of their cleanroom or they have installed the system in a lower class environment (class 10,000 for example).  Our plan to satisfy all parties is move the system to a lab not currently operated as a cleanroom (i.e we are less worried about debris generated from the tool) and to build a relatively inexpensive softwall cleanroom around the tool to mitigate the particulate concerns during sample handling/loading.  We have used these mini environments before for other equipment we could not put in our cleanroom, and they have served us well.  However, there are still concerns from the researchers using the tool.



My questions to this community are as follows:



1.       Where to do you have your parylene system installed (e.g. class 100, 1000, or 10,000 cleanroom or in a standard lab environment)?

2.       Do you have any comments or feedback on the benefits or pitfalls of using a softwall cleanroom for similar applications?

3.       Do you have any other feedback or options we should consider?



As always, we appreciate the input from this group.



Best Regards,

Matt



--

Matthew T. Moneck, Ph.D

Executive Manager, Claire & John Bertucci Nanotechnology Laboratory

Electrical & Computer Engineering | Carnegie Mellon University

5000 Forbes Avenue, Pittsburgh, PA 15213-3890

Phone:  412-268-5430

ece.cmu.edu<https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__www.ece.cmu.edu&d=DwMFAg&c=WO-RGvefibhHBZq3fL85hQ&r=TEMLD8-VsxCGtcVzmvpT5GFNSczskEKHzW6aYlttmIY&m=rcutvRsqSaf-eqUSSKdjAJi2pvrJBspaQkyvua2vDig&s=80j1cphC13xxL4bP6KhE6kQeyRXfJ7D8RtUBb7igtrc&e=>

nanofab.ece.cmu.edu<https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__www.nanofab.ece.cmu.edu&d=DwMFAg&c=WO-RGvefibhHBZq3fL85hQ&r=TEMLD8-VsxCGtcVzmvpT5GFNSczskEKHzW6aYlttmIY&m=rcutvRsqSaf-eqUSSKdjAJi2pvrJBspaQkyvua2vDig&s=v15KiJrNDGBC9iHVkQa-PVJFe3RL1VSXGOqK5NCis28&e=>


-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://mtl.mit.edu/pipermail/labnetwork/attachments/20191214/2404d5ff/attachment.html>