ACP Systems’ Snow-Jet Industrial Cleaning System

Made entirely of stainless steel, the cleaning system has smooth surfaces and comes with a robot as standard. It is said it can be easily integrated into connected production lines and digitally controlled. Photo Credit: ACP Systems

ACP Systems’s JetCell-HP cleaning cell features dry quattroClean snow-jet technology and is specially designed for use in cleanrooms. The compact, digitally controllable solution is said to perform a variety of cleaning tasks automatically, either inline or as a stand-alone device. 

The cleaning process is dry and uses climate-neutral carbon dioxide. The compact cell is made entirely of stainless steel and has smooth, homogeneous surfaces without any external screws. The company says the machine can be easily integrated into a connected production line or operated as a stand-alone device.

All equipment components and materials are geared for cleanroom applications. Thanks to the flow-optimized design of the process chamber, it is said detached impurities and sublimated carbon dioxide are removed quickly and effectively by the integrated extraction unit. This is said to effectively prevent cleaned parts from becoming recontaminated and dirt pockets from forming.

To ensure a consistently superior cleaning result, the machine is fitted with a sensor system that continuously measures the snow jet density, the company says. It is said the digitally controllable cleaning cell can be easily integrated into and controlled by higher level host computer systems via standardized interfaces. To ensure full documentation and traceability, all process parameters such as CO2 supply, compressed air supply and jet time are recorded automatically and transferred to the host computer.

The system features a wear-free, two-substance ring nozzle through which the liquid carbon dioxide is fed. This expands on exiting to form fine snow crystals, which are then bundled by a separate jacket jet of compressed air and accelerated to supersonic speed. 

It is said the jet is easy to focus on a specific area. As it impacts on the surface to be cleaned, four mechanisms (thermal, mechanical, solvent and sublimation) work to ensure that particulate and filmic-chemical contamination are reliably removed. The crystalline carbon dioxide sublimates completely during the cleaning process. The surfaces/parts are therefore dry and can be advanced immediately to the next production step. It is said the cleaning process is so gentle on materials that it can even be used to clean delicate and fine-structured surfaces.

The system is scalable and can be easily adapted to different component geometries and used for partial or full-surface cleaning, the company says.