Cleanroom Garments That Last Longer and Protect Better

Van Moer replaces this slider with a reinforced polyamide variant. Resistant to industrial washing and all common sterilisation methods, including steam and gamma irradiation. No corrosion, therefore no particle release and no uncontrolled discharge.

Van Moer has been developing cleanroom garments for the semiconductor, pharmaceutical and food industries for many years. Not as a by-product of a broader workwear range, but as a specialisation. This has led to choices you won’t find at competitors. Below, we explain what those choices are and why they matter.

Why is the human being the greatest source of contamination in a cleanroom?

A cleanroom is, at its core, a race against itself. Air filters, walls and floors are controllable. The people who enter that space every day are the uncontrollable variable. A seated employee emits 100,000 particles per minute. Someone walking around produces more than a million.

In an ISO Class 5 environment, a maximum of 3,520 particles of 0.5 µm per cubic metre of air are permitted. In ISO Class 8, this rises to 3,520,000. A factor of one thousand difference. A garment that suffices on the production floor of a food company has no place in the manufacturing environment of electronic chips.

Cleanroom garments protect the product, not the person. At Van Moer, this translates into design tailored to the specific working environment: ability to be sterilised, electrostatic discharge, pore size, freedom of movement. Not a standard solution, but a garment that starts from what the environment technically requires.

What makes cleanroom garments technically different from ordinary workwear?

Ordinary workwear is made from cotton or cotton-blend fabrics. Cotton continuously sheds fibres. In a cleanroom, this is unacceptable. Van Moer uses fabrics made of 98% polyester with a tightly woven structure that minimises fibre emission. The pore size of the weave is deliberately determined: too large and too many particles pass through, too small and heat build-up becomes a problem for the wearer. The correct pore size is a technical compromise between protection level and wearing comfort.

The 2% carbon fibre in the fabric serves a different purpose. It makes the garment antistatic. Carbon fibres prevent the garment from building up static charge, which solves three concrete problems: the garment does not attract particles from the environment, it does not cause uncontrolled electrostatic discharges to sensitive components, and it does not cling to the skin of the wearer. The latter sounds like a comfort issue. In practice, it is also a safety and quality issue, because an operator who is hindered by their garments moves differently and generates more contamination.

Why does Van Moer use a polyamide zipper instead of metal?

We are the only provider on the market to have switched to 100% non-metallic zipper closures for critical zones. The zipper is made of uncoloured polyamide PA6. No metal, no colour pigment, no components that oxidise.

That sounds like a detail. It is not a detail.

Metallic zipper sliders corrode after repeated exposure to washing, steam sterilisation or gamma irradiation. A corroded zipper slides stiffly, damages the garment and leads to rejection — even if the rest of the fabric is still perfect. In laundry statistics, zipper damage is the number one reason for the premature rejection of cleanroom garments.

The PA6 slider does not corrode. It survives steam sterilisation at 134°C and gamma irradiation. For ESD environments, it also eliminates an additional risk: a metallic zipper on the front of the garment creates an uncontrolled conductive path precisely in the most critical zone. Non-metallic design eliminates that risk at the source.

How does ESD fabric actually dissipate static charge?

An ESD incident on a silicon wafer can destroy components worth thousands of euros without the operator noticing. In pharmaceutical production, static charge attracts fine dust precisely in the wrong places. The risk is concrete, not abstract.

In standard ESD fabrics, the carbon fibre runs in one fixed direction through the grid. This works, but not optimally. Charge spreads unevenly, builds up in zones, and dissipates later and in a less controlled manner.

At Van Moer, the fibre orientation is specifically configured differently. The fabric is deliberately oriented so that seams are avoided in critical zones. Seams interrupt the conductive path and create weak points where charge accumulates. By eliminating those seams, conduction runs through the entire garment without interruption. Faster dissipation, more uniform distribution.

The consequence is higher fabric consumption in production. When the cutting direction is determined based on fibre orientation and seam position, yield on the roll is less efficient. That is a real production cost we consciously accept. The result speaks for itself: in independent tests, our coveralls come out best in terms of conductivity and wash resistance, and last an average of 15 to 20% longer than comparable products.

Why do Van Moer garments last 15 to 20% longer?

Customers notice this not in theory, but in practice. With correct use and maintenance, Van Moer ESD cleanroom garments perform reliably over the long term. This is not coincidence, but the direct result of two constructive choices.

Thanks to our special construction, we can guarantee a longer service life. The garments remain better shaped with correct use and maintenance, better retain their barrier effect and ESD performance, and reduce the risk of premature rejection due to zipper damage.

In TCO terms, the impact is direct: a garment that lasts 20% longer means forty fewer replacements per cycle for a fleet of 200 garment sets. Less administration, less variation in garment quality, more stable cleanroom performance over time.

What challenges do industrial laundries face with cleanroom garments?

Three problems recur systematically.

Zipper damage is by far the most common. For a fleet of thousands of garments, this results in a substantial rejection rate. Damage only becomes visible during the return inspection, not during washing itself. Van Moer’s PA6 zipper measurably reduces this percentage.

Traceability is the second bottleneck. A cleanroom laundry processes garment sets from multiple companies simultaneously. Each garment must be traceable per employee, per wash cycle and per client. Every Van Moer garment has a marking patch on which a barcode or personal identification can be applied. This enables management without additional administrative burden.

Temperature compatibility is the third. Garments for which the manufacturer does not document an explicit wash test represent a risk for the washing process. Van Moer extensively tests all fabrics and trim parts for industrial washing and documents the test results.