ECU DESIGNED FOR FDA MEDICAL DEVICE MANUFACTURER

A medical device manufacturer requiring a close-tolerance cold and dry environment to protect its onboard process chemicasl brought a concept environmental control unit design to Air Innovations. AI's task was to refine the concept to meet the customer's performance, serviceability and space specifications, and to design a unit ready for manufacturing.

Because the client sells these units to a worldwide customer base, part of the challenge was designing a system that could hold temperature and humidity levels across a broad range of differing environmental conditions while operating 24/7 year-round.

To achieve the client's required temperature and humidity specifications the cooling coil needed to operate well below the point of freezing. The major challenge became how to maintain the environmental needs without defrost interruptions. The solution that has been developed relies upon two independent cooling coils and process fans operating on a alternating basis managed by software and various sensor inputs to determine switch-over intervals. All the more challenging considering this was required to fit into a space equivalent in size to a small microwave.

The product is currently in the final stage of FDA approval and is expected to go into full production later this year.