Particle sluice for reducing particles

Technical cleanliness in assembly processes becomes increasingly more important: Technical standards specify clean room conditions (DIN EN ISO 14644) and aspects of clean room assembly in the automotive sector (VDA19 Part 2). This also puts a focus on the requirements for automatic feeding of screws and other fastening elements such as nuts, threaded pins, bolts, blind rivet nuts etc. Dirt particles adhering to the fastener bulk material may end up in the feed bowl, for example, or metal dust may be caused by vibration or friction between the fastening elements in the feed bowl. STÖGER AUTOMATION GmbH has developed a particle sluice which prevents these particles from being deposited onto the surface of the work piece, thus leading to contamination, unintended contacts or short circuits. This particle sluice is installed before the screwdriving system. The fasteners fed into the device will be cleaned from any adhesive particles and dust and subsequently fed through an enclosed system into a filter. A clean air stream blows the fasteners further. Depending on the particle sluice version, different levels of the  DIN EN ISO 14644 standard can be met.