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Innovative clean room cranes for aerospace engineering

Aerospace engineering has pushed the envelope of what is technically and economically possible.  Essential parts of production take place under clean room conditions with ALTMANN cranes. ALTMANN clean room cranes help produce high-quality parts and increase the efficiency of production.

Perfect choice of material. No wear. For your production under clean room conditions.

To ensure trouble-free production of components for the aerospace industry, important production phases need to take place under clean-room conditions. This also calls for a suitable crane solution, such as a clean room crane that helps produce high-quality parts and further increases the efficiency of production.

All components of our clean room cranes have been optimized for clean-room capability. We ensure that your products can be manufactured in the highest possible quality while increasing your production efficiency. Extra effort for conversion, servicing and maintenance becomes unnecessary thanks to a clean room crane.

ALTMANN clean room cranes for the aerospace industry excel in the following:

  • Use of maintenance- and lubricant-free load belts instead of cables or chains
  • Easy-to-clean, smooth surfaces (no undercuts where particles accumulate)
  • Completely sealed assemblies
  • Load hook made of stainless steel
  • Low-wear material combinations on friction surfaces (e. g. drive wheel treads)
  • Semi-enclosed energy systems so that moisture can drip off

For more than 20 years, we have been holding a leading position in the production of clean room cranes. We are known for facing challenges in design and manufacturing of clean room cranes as well as for constantly setting new standards, not only for aerospace engineering but also for all other industries (for example the food industry, semiconductor production). Our clean room cranes are equipped with high-performance electric belt hoists that have been particularly designed for production under clean room conditions. Contact us now so we can successfully implement your requests.

We offer the following additional options for clean room cranes:

  • Digital load display
  • Design completely in stainless steel, available in various grades (e. g. 1.4301, 1.4571 etc.)
  • Lifting speeds < 1 mm/min (!)
  • Electronic load monitor for recording operating data (remaining service life, hours of operation, number of hoisting cycles, number of overload shutdowns etc.)
  • Tandem operation for the simultaneous control of several crane systems
  • Synchronisation of several crane axes with millimetre precision (hoists, trolley and crane carriages)
  • Wireless communication for data exchange with neighbouring clean room cranes or higher-level process control systems
  • Distance monitoring of neighbouring clean room cranes
  • Semi-automatic and fully automatic controls, e. g. for positioning
  • Avoidance controls for permanently installed obstacles in the clean room working area - and much more

Clean room cranes consist of a number of special components, some of which have found their way into other industrial cranes. We have for example implemented an automatic crane system that can reach a speed of 160 m/min at an acceleration of 1 m/s² due to the use of special wheels from clean room cranes. For such systems, speeds of around 40 m/min and accelerations of around 0.2 m/s² are typical. With the aid of the special wheels normally used in clean room cranes, such speed and acceleration increases can even be achieved without rack-and-pinion drives and other kinds of non-slip drives.

For production in clean rooms, minimising the negative effects of airborne particles is essential. Our high-performance electric belt hoist was originally developed for clean rooms and for installation in clean room cranes. Our belt hoist specially designed for use in clean rooms is already in the fourth generation and available with all configurations.

Ways in which the ALTMANN belt hoist excels include:

  • Use of maintenance- and lubricant-free load belts instead of cables or chains
  • Extremely low natural vibration for high-precision positioning of loads to be lifted
  • No polygon effect and no lateral hook travel when lifting or lowering
  • High resistance to wear
  • Smooth surfaces for easy cleaning
  • Low-wear material combinations on friction surfaces (e. g. drive wheel treads) prevent formation of electrically conductive abrasion products
  • Extremely low noise emissions
  • Load hook made of stainless steel or with hard-chrome plating, if requested

The unbeatable advantages of the electric belt hoist used in clean rooms and clean room cranes have led to their use for production in other sectors.

Every particle released from a crane falls downward due to gravitational force and the usual airflows in clean rooms. Both wear and particles disturb your production and impair the high quality of your products. The frequently installed facility for air exchange circulates air from the ceiling downward to a raised floor or to suction openings at the edge of the floor, inevitably bringing every particle down onto your products. Deleterious effects often become apparent only during final tests at the end of the production process. This results in high repair costs. Given the high standards of your products, these costs are usually higher than the purchase price of a clean room crane. The top priority during the development of clean room cranes is to avoid sources of particle emission, a requirement that standard cranes fail to satisfy in any respect. Many parts of such cranes emit particles continuously, and material combinations unsuitable for clean-room environments are a constant cause of wear.

Particle emission of a non-clean room suitable crane due to:

  • Wear on the running wheels
  • Wear on energy supply systems
  • Outgassing of solvents on painted surfaces
  • Outgassing from lubricants where lubricated parts such as cables and bearings are exposed 
  • Grit from cable or chain drives
  • Particles expelled from fans in the drives

We avoid all this with our clean room cranes and also ensure that your productivity does not just plateau at a high level but instead increases significantly.