Working in a cleanroom is one of the most interesting, rewarding, and – let’s admit it – at times frustrating jobs around. As anyone familiar with the environment will attest, the rules around performance are complex and labyrinthine, and – in a good cleanroom – they’re updated and perfected almost constantly. From the tasks to [Read More…]
Throughout the history of US space travel exploration, big concepts have dominated. Big budgets, big ideas, big dreams, and big names. Founded in 1958 under the Eisenhower administration, one such name – the North American Space Agency (NASA) – was to become the center point of aerospace development and research. Initially founded as a response [Read More…]
What do self-driving cars have in common with solar power? If you were hoping we’d be announcing the development of a car that runs purely on the power of the sun you are a more optimistic reader than we’d imagined! Perhaps one day we’ll be able to bring you that kind of news but, for [Read More…]
A Shimmering Red Presence in the Clear Night Sky* The year is 2035 and Mark Watney, botanist and mechanical engineer, casts a wary eye over the latest weather report. A dust storm with intense winds is approaching and it’s time for him to move to safety. The rest of his team sets out but Watney [Read More…]
Can I Relaunder Cleanroom Wipes, and Use Them Again? Virtually all cleanrooms use wipers once then discard them. In an effort to save money, some cleanroom personnel have considered relaundering wipers. It is instructive to learn why relaundering wipers may not be a viable approach. Three factors are paramount: Levels of contamination on the wipers [Read More…]
In this post we will continue with the next part of our series Cleaning A Contaminated Personnel’s Behavior Decontamination Tools for Quality Managers, to see how we can eliminate the cause of nonconformity and also prevent the occurrence of the same undesirable situation in the future. You can find Part 1 of the series here. Fill out [Read More…]
Every time a Quality Manager notices nonconformities related to personnel’s behavior, he needs to find a rapid solution to correct it. This does not always come easy, as the QA Manager has to be firm in eliminating the cause of the nonconformity and, at the same time, have a diplomatic approach, targeting the staff’s awareness [Read More…]
Knitted brows, serious faces. Movement with a strong sense of purpose. No wasted motion. An atmosphere of crisis. Palpable intensity. Something is amiss. Direction from management is clear: “Find the contamination source and fast!” The drop in yields was unmistakable and seemed to come out of nowhere. Something had changed and two weeks of intense [Read More…]
In Part I we saw the consequences of using low-cost (likely off-spec) raw materials or consumables – the expenditure of many resources and man-hours to track down contamination sources. Unfortunately, this scenario plays out all too often when sub-standard wipers are substituted (to “save money”) for a previously specified branded product that had been performing without incident [Read More…]
Aside from the perennially famous ‘death and taxes,’ there are two other givens in our modern world: continual miniaturization and impoverished eyesight. It might, in fact, be contended that one precedes the other but that would be a discussion for a different kind of post. In this one, however, we are excited to take a [Read More…]
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