Keeping Your Class 100 Cleanroom Actually Clean
If you’re running a Class 100 cleanroom, you already know the nightmare of outgassing. One tiny bit of particulate shedding from a heating element and your semiconductor wafers are ruined. It’s frustrating. Most standard infrared lamps just can’t hack it—they break down under the heat and start spitting out microscopic debris right where you don’t want it. We figured out a way to stop that. We use high-purity synthetic quartz and a gold-reflective coating. Simple, but it works. Why the gold? It’s not about looking fancy. We put a thin layer of gold on the back of the quartz envelope because gold is incredible at reflecting infrared radiation—about 98% of it, to be exact. Instead of letting heat bleed out everywhere, we push it all forward toward your target. This means you aren’t wasting energy, and your HVAC system doesn’t have to work overtime to keep the room cool. Plus, you hit your target temperatures way faster without having to crank the wattage to some scary level. The grit and the glass We stick with high-purity quartz because cheap glass just burns out. Quartz can take a beating. You can cycle the power on and off, and it won’t crack from the thermal shock. As for the gold, we use a vacuum deposition process to lock it to the quartz. We did this because if that coating flakes or peels, you’ve got particles on your silicon. And that’s the last thing you want. This process makes sure the gold stays put. Getting it running These lamps are basically drop-in replacements for your curing and drying stages. You can wire them right into your current controllers. But here is the catch: keep an eye on your heat density. Because that gold coating is pushing almost all the energy forward, the front of the lamp gets much hotter than a clear one. Just make sure your shielding and cooling fans are up to the task. You don’t want a concentrated blast of heat accidentally frying a nearby sensor.