One of the best aspects of working in air filtration manufacturing is being a part of a variety of other industries and businesses that require custom air filtration. One of the most interesting of these is our work in air filters for various types of equipment and vehicles.
While many people may think this refers simply to cabin air filters in cars and trucks, there is a huge range of vehicles and equipment that require custom air filters in order to operate safely. APC Filtration regularly works with large equipment and vehicle businesses that require new types of air filters. From cabin air filters, to robust filtration in off-road vehicles, to filters for equipment used in fire fighting and disaster recovery, custom air filters are required for the safety of millions of employees around the world.
Here are some of the top uses of custom vehicle air filters that APC has worked with in recent years. We’re always up for the challenge of creating and manufacturing custom air filters for new industries and systems.
Vehicles
Cabin air filters are some of the most common air filters in the world. Just because they come standard in vehicles, however, doesn’t mean they have to be designed to fit the standard. At APC, we believe in going above and beyond to provide the best product possible for our customers and their end-users.
APC designed a custom HEPA car cabin air filter to be used in vehicles. This required robust planning and testing to ensure that a HEPA filter could fit within a cabin air filtration system.
APC was also approached by a large manufacturer of air HVAC systems that was in need of a custom cabin air filter for their large construction vehicles. The catch? Their cab had already been designed with very little consideration for the air filter size, installation, or replacement. APC was required to find a custom cabin air filter solution that worked within these restrictions and confinements. Custom cabin air filters also must keep those operating on construction and farming sites safe from harmful air particles.
These large construction vehicles and consumer vehicles alike have the ability to use high quality cabin air filters that go above and beyond the industry standard. When companies fit their vehicles with custom cabin air filters or HEPA car cabin air filters, they are reducing the future cost to the operators in replacement and downtime. Having high quality cabin air filters in vehicles is key for operator health and safety.
Public Transportation
Anyone who regular takes the train or bus in a large city knows how important air filtration on public transportation is. It’s hot, it’s crowded, and without robust filtration in the train cars and buses, it can get stuffy very fast. However, custom air filters are also required on other areas of transportation, such as in the engines, and more commonly now, electric battery packs.
Electric buses are becoming more and more popular in cities, aligning with public sustainability policies and efforts to reduce our collective carbon footprint. Electric vehicles that operate all day require high performance custom air filters for cooling the battery packs to ensure they work at their maximum efficiency and avoid complications.
APC has designed custom air filters for cooling battery packs on electric public transportation buses. This is just one area of public transportation that requires custom air filters to operate smoothly. Cooling air filters need to be particularly robust for public transportation!
Off-Road Vehicles
Off-road equipment encapsulates a variety of types of vehicles – construction, agricultural, recreational, military, and more. In any off-road environment, air filtration is of the utmost importance to keep the cabin safe for the operator. This health and safety should always be taken into consideration when choosing an air filter manufacturer.
One unique challenge of off-road equipment air filtration is that filters and systems can easily clog with dust and debris, particularly in humid or wet conditions. An air filter for this application needs to ensure this does not happen, or else the equipment will have to be regularly taken out for maintenance and job efficiency slows down dramatically. This challenge has been faced by APC in the past.
Creating and testing off-road vehicle air filters is key for the success of the vehicle and equipment. We successfully created a custom air filter for these vehicles to ensure they worked efficiently even under the harshest conditions to reduce downtime and improve filter life.
Disaster Equipment
Equipment and vehicles used during natural disasters and disaster recovery often have strict requirements to adhere to to ensure that the operators are safe and the equipment is working to keep the air quality high.
Air filtration in recovery zones, such as the Superdome after Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans, needs to remove harmful particles from the air as well as help to remove them from surfaces. HEPA filters were put to use here to remove the bacteria and mold from the air before it could proliferate and cause health problems in the people staying there.
APC created custom air filters for firefighting tractors used in Fort McMurray in the 2016 forest fires. We designed, tested, and manufactured a 3-stage filter with a pre-filter, a HEPA filter, and a granular activated carbon filter to ensure that all smoke, odours, and dangerous breathable particles were removed from the cabin to keep the operator safe while they were in dangerous conditions.
These types of custom air filters are much more robust than traditional cabin air filters because the operator is in conditions much different than simply driving on the highway. These specialized vehicles require specialized custom air filters so that the operators can do their jobs safely.
