Search for test methods of particle protective clothing
Date Issued
2006
Date
2006
Author(s)
Lin, Yu-Ting
DOI
zh-TW
Abstract
Personal protective clothing is designed to protect workers against hazardous substances that might come into contact with the skin. Several widely accepted test methods are available to measure barrier properties of protective clothing against liquid and vapor assaults. However, there is no officially accepted test method for particulate protective clothing, probably due to lack of aerosol penetration data. For any given situation, equipment and clothing should be selected that provide an adequate and appropriate level of protection. Overprotection as well as underprotection can become hazardous and should be avoided. Accordingly, the ultimate goal of this study is to establish the test method for particle protective clothing.
In the present study, a variety of protective garments, currently used in health care industry, were tested for aerosol penetration and air resistance. Filtration velocity ranging from 0.1 to 10 cm/sec was employed to study the flow dependency. An Aerodynamic Particle Sizer was used to measure the aerosol concentrations and size distributions upstream and downstream of the garment media. Besides the protective garments, the flexible polyurethane foam was selected as a reference filter medium for their relatively low pressure drop due to the open pore skeletal structure and low packing density. The pressure drop across the filter medium was monitored by using an inclined manometer.
Aerosol penetration data showed that C-class garment performed well but at the cost of high air resistance. The overprotection may lead to uncomfortable physical conditions. Other garments showed unacceptable high aerosol penetration when the face velocity is above 1 cm/sec. An advisory should be issued to health care workers not to make large and fast move in the infection-control area, to avoid unnecessary high aerosol penetration. Particulate protective clothing of better filtration quality apparently needs to be developed. We propose the following items to be included in the future test method of particulate protective clothing: (1) aerosols (solid or liquid) with count median diameter of 10 μm to be the test agent, (2) face velocity of 5 cm/sec, and (3) a high resolution time-of-flight machine (such as Aerodynamic Particle Sizer) covering aerosol size from 1 to 20 μm to be used for measuring aerosol concentration and size distribution.
Subjects
微粒
防護衣
超低風速
particle protective clothing
extra-low face velocity
Type
thesis
File(s)![Thumbnail Image]()
Loading...
Name
ntu-95-R92841018-1.pdf
Size
23.31 KB
Format
Adobe PDF
Checksum
(MD5):ae8841b959a928dcacdba8f4436c8f4e