Quality variables of meltblown submicron filter materials

Abstract

Meltblown submicron fibre filter media has been produced at a production rate of a few orders of magnitude higher than that of conventional single syringe electrospinning. Fibres are produced while varying the air pressure and die-to-collector distance (DCD). The submicron fibres are about 240 nm in diameter. The average fibre diameter of the submicron fibre nonwoven filters media decreases with increasing DCD and air pressure. The average fibre diameter of each sample is indirectly related to the hydrohead and filtration efficiency, but is directly related to the pore size. The quality factors improve slightly for samples produced at a greater DCD, whereas the quality factors for the media decrease slightly for samples produced at a higher air pressure. The average fibre diameter is related to the hydrohead, filtration efficiency, and pore size. The sample MSFM6 is found to have the smallest average fibre diameter and the highest filtration efficiency. The filtration efficiency of different submicron fibre nonwoven media samples improve with increasing DCD or air pressure. The use of nanofibrous media has proved to be a good way to filter out submicron-sized particles.