Goods de-dusting on entry
Material air shower
Every cart, pallet and drum that rolls up to a cleanroom door carries loose particulate on its surfaces. Wheel it straight in and the room's classification pays for what came in on the packaging. A material air shower stops that at the door.
- HEPA H13 / H14
- EN 1822
- ISO 14644
- Cabinet or roll-through tunnel
FIG. 01Plan of the chamber clear opening set out around a cargo footprint. Internal dimensions are built to your load, confirmed per project.
What a material air shower does, in one paragraph
What it does
A material air shower is an enclosed entry chamber for goods. HEPA-filtered air is jetted through nozzles at high velocity. The jets dislodge and carry away loose particulate, fibres and lint from the surfaces of goods, carts, pallets, drums and crates before they enter a cleanroom.
The goods stand inside a chamber. Jets of HEPA-filtered air sweep the loose particulate off, and only then does the far door open. The chamber is built around your cargo, not around a catalogue size. It can be a single stop-and-cycle cabinet. It can be a roll-through tunnel for goods that have to keep moving.
The air is not dumped after each cycle. It is drawn back through the filter and blown again. The two doors are interlocked, so they open one at a time and the pressure separation between the two sides holds.
- Subject
- Goods, carts, pallets, drums and crates. Not people.
- Air path
- Recirculating. Drawn back through the HEPA and blown again.
- Doors
- Interlocked, so one opens at a time and the pressure step holds.
- Flow character
- Turbulent jetting, not laminar. The chamber carries no ISO class of its own.
- Filtered supply
- Return to the HEPA
- Chamber
FIG. 02The air circuit of a material air shower. Room air is not exhausted after a cycle: it returns through a low-level grille, back through the HEPA, and is blown again at the nozzles.
Why the circuit is closed
Dumping the chamber's air after every cycle would pull the same volume of unfiltered room air in behind the load. Keeping the air, cleaning it and using it again is what lets the shower sit on a pressure boundary without fighting the building HVAC.
Supply high, return low. The particulate leaves at floor level.
Material air shower: specification at a glance
Two things decide the specification. What the cargo is, and how it moves through. The table below is the spine most buyers compare on: filtration, jets, doors, body and controls. Tagged figures are Fabtech build values, confirmed per project.
| Parameter | Typical specification |
|---|---|
| Filtration | HEPA H13/H14 to EN 1822; recirculating airflow drawn back through the HEPA and re-blown |
| Jet / nozzle velocity | high-velocity jetting, typically around 20-25 m/s at the nozzle |
| Nozzles | adjustable stainless-steel nozzles, arranged to sweep the goods on multiple faces |
| Doors | electromagnetic interlocked doors, open one at a time to hold pressure separation |
| Cycle time | operator-set, typically around 10-30 s per cycle |
| Blower / motor | dynamically balanced blower sized to the chamber volume |
| Body / construction | GI powder-coated or stainless steel 304 / 316 |
| Controls | control panel with cycle timer and emergency stop; optional UV |
| Room context | specified to protect the adjoining ISO 14644 (ISO Class 5-8) room and its ACPH design |
FIG. 03Fabtech build values are confirmed per project on the quote.
One thing to be clear about. The blast inside the chamber is deliberately turbulent, not a smooth even flow. It is a de-dusting blast that knocks particulate off surfaces and sweeps the goods clean. The chamber itself is not rated to an ISO class. Its job is to reduce what the goods carry into the room next door.
Cargo and tunnel sizing selector: cabinet or roll-through tunnel
How the goods move decides the shape of the unit. A single-chamber material air shower is a stop-and-cycle cabinet. The cart goes in, both doors interlock, the jets run for the set cycle, then the far door releases.
A roll-through (pass-through) tunnel is longer and open-ended in workflow. A pallet or trolley moves through it in a line rather than stopping. That suits higher or continuous throughput.
Size the chamber to the biggest thing that has to pass, plus clearance for the doors and the nozzle sweep. The selector below is the starting point. The exact internal dimensions are built to your cargo and confirmed on the quote.
- Swept by the jets
- Aerodynamic shadow
- Jet field
FIG. 04Longitudinal section through a roll-through tunnel, loaded pallet on the conveyor. The load transits continuously; the swept faces clear while the shadowed volumes stay loaded. Nozzle jetting is typically around 20-25 m/s at the nozzle
Draw the same load in section and the reason becomes obvious. Cargo geometry, not cycle time, is what decides whether a material air shower works on your goods.
None of this makes the shower useless on a pallet. It sets what the shower is for. Wrap the load, present the faces that matter, and treat the jets as a way of reducing carry-in rather than a way of sterilising a stack.
Swept clean
The top face of the load and the outer skin of the top course sit directly in the jet path. This is the part everyone pictures when they picture an air shower, and it is the part that actually gets cleaned.
Lower courses
Every course shields the one under it from the ceiling jets. Course two and course three see spent, slowed air rather than a jet, so a taller stack does not simply take longer to clean, it has a floor on how clean it gets.
Inboard faces
The faces where two cartons touch have no jet path from any direction, at any cycle time. Side banks fire across the load, not into it. Nothing reaches a seam in the middle of a block stack.
Pallet deck and feet
The deck underside, the stringers and the feet sit below the jet line and behind the deck itself. They are the surfaces that touch a warehouse floor and they are the last ones a shower reaches.
| If your goods are | Consider | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Hand-loaded trays, small crates | single-chamber cabinet | one item at a time, stop-and-cycle is enough; a pass box may even suit smaller items |
| Carts / trolleys | single-chamber cabinet sized to the cart footprint | the cart parks, cycles, and rolls out; door width set to the cart plus clearance |
| Pallets / drums | wider single-chamber cabinet or a roll-through tunnel | pallet footprint drives the chamber width and the nozzle arrangement |
| Continuous / high throughput | roll-through (pass-through) tunnel | goods move through in a line instead of stop-and-cycle, so the line does not queue at the door |
FIG. 05Read the row that matches your goods, not the row that matches your doorway. A cart that can park and a pallet that has to keep moving want different chambers at the same footprint.
The right call comes from three numbers. The biggest cargo footprint. How many units per shift. And whether the goods can stop, or have to keep moving. With those three, the chamber is designed around your workflow.
Cargo footprint
The biggest thing that has to pass, in plan, with the load at its widest.
Units per shift
How many, and whether they arrive steadily or in bursts at a shift change.
Stop or move
Whether the goods can park for a cycle, or the line has to keep running.
What are the components of an air shower
A material air shower is a short list of parts, each doing one job. A blower moves the air. A filter cleans it on the way round. Nozzles turn it into jets that sweep the goods. Interlocked doors and a timer control the cycle. The table sets out what each part is and what it does.
| Component | What it does |
|---|---|
| HEPA filter (H13 / H14, EN 1822) | filters the recirculated air so the jets are clean; captures particulates only, never gases or vapours |
| Blower / motor | drives the airflow and sets the jet velocity at the nozzles |
| Adjustable stainless nozzles | direct the high-velocity jets across the goods surfaces to dislodge loose particulate |
| Recirculation path | returns the air from the chamber back through the HEPA to be re-blown, so the shower does not dump room air |
| Electromagnetic interlocked doors | open one at a time to reduce cross-contamination risk and hold the pressure separation between zones |
| Control panel (timer + e-stop) | sets the cycle time, runs the blower for the cycle, and stops safely on demand |
| Body (GI powder-coated / SS 304 / 316) | the wipe-clean enclosure that carries the nozzles, filter housing and doors |
FIG. 06Seven parts, one job each. The filter grade and the door interlock are the two a specification is usually written around; the rest follow from the chamber size.
One limit worth knowing before you specify
A HEPA filter removes airborne particulate only. It does nothing for solvent vapour or fumes. If the worry is chemical vapour on the goods rather than dust, an air shower is not the device for the job.
Material air shower or personnel air shower: which you need
The device is the same idea pointed at a different subject. A material air shower is built around goods on a cart, pallet or trolley. The chamber and the doors follow the cargo footprint, and the nozzles are arranged so the jets sweep the load. A personnel air shower is sized for people walking through, with nozzles aimed to sweep garments as staff enter the gowning boundary.
Most GMP facilities need both, on different doors. Goods come in through the material shower on the logistics side. People come in through the personnel air shower on the gowning side.
If you are specifying the whole entry sequence, size the two together against the same room. For how any air shower works in general, see the air shower overview.
Personnel air shower Air shower overview
A pass box is a different device again. It transfers a small item through a wall without a person, passively, behind interlocked doors. A material air shower actively de-dusts a large load in transit. Many facilities use both, on the same boundary.
This page
Material air shower
Goods, carts, pallets and drums
The sibling
Personnel air shower
Staff entering the gowning boundary
- Subject inside the chamber
- Goods on a cart, pallet or trolley
- A person walking through
- What sets the size
- The cargo footprint
- The gowning doorway
- Nozzle aim
- Across the load, multiple faces
- At garments, head to foot
- Where it sits
- The logistics door
- The gowning boundary
- Formats
- Cabinet or roll-through tunnel
- Single or multi-person cabin
FIG. 07Most GMP facilities run both, on different doors.
- HEPA grade, EN 1822
- H13 / H14
- Room class the shower protects
- ISO 5 to 8
- ISO Class 5 limit at 0.5 micron
- 3,520 / m³
- Cabinet or roll-through tunnel
- Two formats
What you get when the air shower is built in-house
Fabtech Cleanrooms engineers and builds material air showers in-house in India. The same team stands behind each unit, from the quote through to handover.
That means the chamber is sized to your cargo rather than picked off a shelf. The unit is installed, integrated into the cleanroom entry and validated where the project calls for it. What is in the scope is set out below.
Because the same team builds the room the shower feeds, the unit is specified to protect that room's classification and its ACPH design from the start. This is the same team that has delivered cleanroom and containment projects across pharma and biotech in India. Project scope and specifications are available on request.
Projects delivered Cleanrooms for pharmaceutical manufacturing Cleanroom equipment range
- ChamberBuilt to your cargo footprint, single-chamber cabinet or roll-through tunnel.
- FiltrationHEPA H13/H14 filtration to EN 1822.
- Nozzles and doorsAdjustable stainless nozzles; electromagnetic interlocked doors.
- Install and integrationInstalled and integrated into the cleanroom entry sequence.
- Room fitSpecified to protect the adjoining ISO 14644 room and its ACPH design.
- QualificationDQ/IQ/OQ/PQ documentation where the project calls for it.
- After handoverEquipment-level AMC available on the equipment.
Be straight about what the unit achieves
An air shower reduces the particulate carried in on goods, but not to zero. How much it reduces depends on cycle time, surface type and how consistently it is used. That is why the cycle is validated as part of the entry sequence rather than assumed.
Pricing a material air shower works the same way anywhere across India. A short conversation about your cargo, throughput and room gets you an installed figure.
The standards that sit behind a material air shower
An air shower does not have a single product standard of its own, the way some enclosures do. It is judged by two other things instead. The room it protects, and the filter it runs.
The filter inside the shower carries an EN 1822 rating. The room the shower feeds is designed to a cleanroom class. For pharma and biotech work, the entry sequence also has to support the facility's EU-GMP grade. The table names each standard and what it covers on this unit.
- EN 1822
- The filter inside the unit
- ISO 14644
- The room on the far side of the door
- EU-GMP
- The facility the entry sequence has to support
| Standard | What it covers on this unit |
|---|---|
| EN 1822 (H13/H14) | the grade of the HEPA filter that cleans the recirculated air |
| ISO 14644 (ISO Class 5-8) | the classification of the room the shower feeds, and its ACPH design |
| EU-GMP Grade A/B/C/D | the grade the pharma or biotech facility is inspected against, which the entry sequence supports |
| Schedule M and WHO-GMP | India's gowning and material-transfer expectations for the same facilities |
| IS / BIS | no single named Indian Standard is cited as the air shower code; any reference is confirmed per project |
FIG. 08None of these is an air shower product standard. Each one names a different thing the unit is judged against: the filter inside it, the room beyond it, or the facility around it.
So there is no dedicated Indian code to quote you. Anchor the conversation on EN 1822, the room class and GMP practice instead.
The room on the far side
The class of the room on the far side of the shower is the number that matters. It sets how much carry-in the entry sequence has to remove before the goods are through the door.
FIG. 09ISO 14644-1:2015 airborne particulate classes and their EU-GMP equivalents. Each figure is the maximum permitted concentration of particles 0.5 µm and larger per cubic metre, and each step down the ladder is a factor of ten. Air change rates and face velocities are typical design ranges rather than values the standard sets, and the density swatch is indicative, not to scale.
Material air showers, common questions
A material air shower is an enclosed entry chamber at the goods entry of a controlled area. It blows HEPA-filtered air at high velocity across carts, pallets, drums and crates. The jets carry loose particulate away before the goods enter, so the cleanroom holds its ISO 14644 classification more easily.
A blower drives the air through a HEPA filter to EN 1822. The grade is H13/H14. Stainless nozzles jet it over the goods. A recirculation path returns it to the filter. Interlocked doors open one at a time to hold pressure separation. A control panel carries the timer and e-stop. The body is GI powder-coated or stainless 304/316.
They work the same way but are sized and aimed differently. A material air shower is built to a cargo footprint, with nozzles that sweep goods on a cart or pallet. A personnel air shower is sized for people, with nozzles aimed at garments at the gowning boundary.
It depends on whether the goods need active de-dusting. A material air shower blows loose particulate off carts, pallets and larger cargo with high-velocity HEPA-filtered jets. A pass box is a passive transfer window with interlocked doors, for smaller items crossing a wall. Many facilities use both.
There is no single size. The chamber is built to your biggest cargo footprint, plus clearance for the doors and nozzle sweep. A single-chamber cabinet suits carts and trolleys that stop and cycle. A roll-through tunnel suits pallets, drums or continuous throughput. Send your cargo footprint and units per shift.
There is no single list price. Cost depends on the chamber size, the cargo footprint, cabinet versus roll-through tunnel, the body material and the controls. Send your cargo size, throughput and room, and a manufacturer can return an installed figure.
Tell us what has to get through the door
Send us your cargo footprint, throughput and room. We will come back with an installed quote that covers the chamber, nozzles, doors and integration together.