Measurement of Detachable Submicrometer Particles and Surface Cleanliness of Clean Room Garments

The quality and cleanliness of clean room garments is an important issue to the contamination control industry. Garment cleanliness may be evaluated with techniques such as the Helmke Drum tumble test, and surface examinations using Multiple Internal Reflectance (MIR) and Energy Dispersive Spectroscopy (EDS). The author summarizes four years of experience with tumble testing of various clean room fabrics and monitoring the effectiveness of clean room laundry processing. Common patterns of tumble test results and fabric comparisons are reviewed. Measurements of salts, metals and organic surface contaminants on clean processed garments are also presented. Together these methods may be used to diagnose and monitor the clean wash process. Critical factors in maintaining the quality of freshly laundered garments are identified, and a comparison of clean room laundries is presented.