Wall Mounted Extraction Arms for a University Nanotechnology Lab | University of Louisville

The Solution

Labs USA supplied two wall mounted chemistry extraction arms, each a three inch diameter arm at forty three inches long, mounted on its own wall bracket with a white powder coated aluminum capture hood.

The arm is specified as a chemistry arm rather than a general purpose one, which matters when the air being pulled through it contains acid and solvent vapor rather than welding smoke or dust. Materials in the airstream have to tolerate what the lab actually uses. At forty three inches, the arm reaches across a standard bench depth and returns compactly, and the articulated joints hold position where the operator leaves them instead of drifting back during a procedure.

Mounting on wall brackets rather than the bench keeps the entire work surface usable. Nothing is bolted through the top, no leg or stand occupies floor space beside the station, and the arm folds back toward the wall when the bench is being cleared or used for something else. In a shared teaching facility that reversibility is important: the room gets reconfigured between courses and semesters, and equipment that only works in one layout ends up removed.

The capture hoods are powder coated aluminum, which is light enough that the arm holds position easily and rigid enough to keep its shape in a room where people reposition it many times a day. White finish matched the laboratory interior and, more practically, shows contamination rather than hiding it.

Two stations were fitted rather than the whole room. That is a deliberate approach to source capture: put the extraction where the vapor is actually released, instead of raising general exhaust across a room where most benches are doing dry work. It also gives the department a template it can extend station by station as courses change, which is exactly how wall mounted extraction arms tend to be adopted in academic buildings.

Advantage

A teaching laboratory has three ways to control vapor at a bench station: build another fume hood, raise general room exhaust, or capture at the source. A fume hood is the right answer for extended work with significant quantities, but it is expensive, it consumes a large volume of conditioned air continuously, it takes floor space a shared facility does not have, and it separates a class from the demonstration behind a sash.

Raising general room exhaust is the least targeted option. It moves a very large volume of air to dilute a very small volume of vapor, and it still allows that vapor to travel past a person’s breathing zone before it is removed. In a teaching room where several people stand around one bench, that path matters.

Source capture removes vapor within inches of where it is released, using a fraction of the airflow, while leaving the work visible and reachable for a group. That is why extraction arms are standard equipment in university teaching labs. Where benches sit away from walls, ceiling mounted arms do the same job from above, and Labs USA also supplies laboratory fume hoods and lab furniture when a station needs full enclosure instead.

Return on Investment

The first return is operating cost. Every cubic foot of air a laboratory exhausts is conditioned air the building paid to heat, cool, and dehumidify. Kentucky’s humid summers and cold winters make that cost real. Two extraction arms exhaust a small targeted volume compared with an additional fume hood running continuously, and that difference repeats every hour the building is occupied.

The second is capital avoided. Adding a fume hood to an existing teaching lab is rarely just the hood: it usually means ductwork, a fan, electrical work, casework modification, and a period where the room is out of service. Wall mounted arms attach to existing structure above existing benches and leave the room in service.

The third is teaching capacity. A station that a group can gather around, see, and use is worth more in a teaching facility than a station where one person works behind a sash. Keeping bench tops clear and the room reconfigurable protects the flexibility a shared academic facility depends on.

The fourth is maintainability. Arms, hoods, joints, and dampers are individually replaceable components. A university maintains this kind of system piece by piece rather than budgeting for a wholesale replacement.

Serving Universities and Research Labs Across Louisville and Kentucky

This installation is at the University of Louisville in Louisville, Kentucky. University research buildings present a particular kind of laboratory problem: the buildings are long lived, the science inside them changes every few years, and the ventilation infrastructure was designed around what the building did when it opened. Retrofitting capture at specific benches, without touching the base building systems, is often the only practical way to keep those rooms current.

Labs USA supplies extraction arms, fume hoods, laboratory casework, work surfaces, balance tables, and cleanrooms to universities, research institutes, and industrial laboratories in Louisville, Lexington, Bowling Green, Covington, and across Kentucky and the Ohio Valley, and works on laboratory projects nationwide. Academic clients usually buy in small increments tied to a course or a grant, so equipment that can be added station by station fits how they actually fund work.

Related work includes exhaust snorkels and extraction arms in wall, ceiling, and portable forms, laboratory fume hoods for enclosed chemical work, lab furniture and casework for teaching benches, and laboratory tables for instrument and weighing stations.