Baker EdgeGARD EG 6320

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Refurbished Baker EdgeGARD EG 6320 clean benches available from American Instrument Exchange. Click HERE for more details.

We’ve been selling Baker EdgeGARD clean benches for decades and they are always in demand. Clean benches are designed to provide protection to a product placed on the bench worksurface by ensuring that anything in the bench area is exposed only to HEPA-filtered air and is intended for work with non-hazardous materials where clean, particle free air is required. Customers from a variety of different fields purchase these units from us, including aerospace research and manufacturing, bioscience, food processing, and pharmaceutical production facilities. And the Baker EdgeGARD EG6320 is a great option for anyone looking for a 6’ wide clean bench.

(A note here to say that biological safety cabinets are another type of laminar flow hood that serve a completely different purpose. While clean benches are designed to protect a product, a biosafety cabinet is designed to protect the product and the personnel from harmful agents inside the cabinet as well as protecting the immediate environment from contaminants. For more explanation or to browse used and refurbished biosafety cabinets for sale at American Instrument Exchange, click here.)

Both the Baker EdgeGARD EG 6252 and the Baker EdgeGARD EG 6320 are excellent products, offering stainless steel work surfaces that are 70.5” wide, but the EG 6320 offers a working of height of 34”, or more than 20% extra clearance within the work space, while maintaining the same overall exterior height of 74”. This additional vertical clearance in the work area has the obvious advantage of allowing users to put taller equipment inside the clean-air space as well as creating more space for the users themselves to work around the product.  The work surface is also about 30” deep, vastly increasing the overall usable bench space when compared with the 22” depth of the EG 6252.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5oI_MkR75bI&feature=youtu.be

In the past few years we’ve also been seeing more and more demand for clean benches with stainless steel work surfaces. Some models from other manufacturers are built with laminate work surfaces, which are acceptable for some work environments, but for true clean room style conditions stainless steel is a better option.

So if you’re interested in a used and refurbished clean bench give us a call or email for more information on the Baker EdgeGARD EG 6320. Thanks!

American Instrument Exchange has been a reliable source for used laboratory and scientific equipment for over 50 years, buying and selling equipment since 1969. Our surplus lab equipment is reconditioned for many types of laboratories, including biotech, biomedical, medical research, chemical, pharmaceutical, and university and hospital research laboratories. All lab equipment listed on our website is in stock and ships from our 30,000 square foot warehouse in Massachusetts. Our facilities include a fully equipped shop with highly trained technicians who thoroughly test each instrument before it reaches your laboratory. Please visit our website at https://www.americaninstrument.com/.

New Brunswick Innova incubator shaker 4900

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Refurbished Brunswick Innova incubator shaker 4900 available from American Instrument Exchange. Click HERE for more details.

Stacking incubator shakers like the Infors Multitron and the New Brunswick 44 are all the rage these days, and for good reason: they save floor space compared to chest style models, sometimes allow for modular expansion, and provide easy access and better ergonomics when loading or unloading.

But before there were the stackable pizza-oven style incubator shakers there was the New Brunswick Innova incubator shaker 4900. This is a large, single chamber unit that can be configured with up to four independently controlled orbital shaking shelves. The chamber heats to 60°C and can cool to ambient.

Brunswick Innova incubator shaker 4900.

As far as space savings go, the footprint of the New Brunswick 4900 is about 55”W x 30.5”D, with each shaking platform measuring 18” x 24”, both of which are comparable to most stackable units. In other words, the footprint to shaking capacity ratios are very similar.

The biggest drawback to the Brunswick Innova incubator shaker 4900 when compared with, say, a triple stack of Kuhner chambers, is that each of the stackable chambers can be set at a different temperature while the 4900 limits users to a single temp setting. The smaller chambers also typically recover temperature quickly after being opened (although the thermally insulated glass on the 4900 gives the chamber remarkable recovery time considering its size) and allow access to a third of the set of samples without disturbing the environment of the other two thirds of them.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M84klUg312w&feature=youtu.be

That being said, the New Brunswick Innova incubator shaker 4900 is a good option, particularly for a lab on a budget. As of this writing the list price of a single New Brunswick Innova 44 stackable incubator is about $16,000, meaning that three shaking platforms will cost almost $50,000 when shipping and installation is included. American Instrument Exchange lists the 4900 incubator shaker at a fraction of this cost, meaning that you’ll save a ton of money while still getting a quality product with very similar specifications. Please call or email us today for more pictures, pricing and availability. Thanks! 

American Instrument Exchange has been a reliable source for used laboratory and scientific equipment for over 50 years, buying and selling equipment since 1969. Our surplus lab equipment is reconditioned for many types of laboratories, including biotech, biomedical, medical research, chemical, pharmaceutical, and university and hospital research laboratories. All lab equipment listed on our website is in stock and ships from our 30,000 square foot warehouse in Massachusetts. Our facilities include a fully equipped shop with highly trained technicians who thoroughly test each instrument before it reaches your laboratory. Please visit our website at https://www.americaninstrument.com/.

Our favorite used and refurbished floor model centrifuges

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Used and refurbished floor model centrifuges available from American Instrument Exchange. Click HERE for more details.

At any given time we have dozens of floor model centrifuges in stock from a variety of manufacturers. As of the date of this writing we have over 50 individual floor model centrifuges out in the warehouse, with two that just arrived from lab cleanouts and two that are sitting in the outgoing shipping area, fully refurbished and awaiting shipment to customers.

So given all the experience we’ve accumulated over the years we figured we’d share some opinions on our favorite models. These are short summaries. We’ve reviewed several of these models on this blog so feel free to check out those if you’d like more details, or you can always call or email us with questions.

Sorvall and Thermo Sorvall

For years the Sorvall RC-5C Plus was one of our most consistently selling refrigerated floor model units, and there are still many devotees of this model. In addition to being compatible with a huge catalog of over 30 different rotors, with a capacity of 4 x 750mL and a maximum speed of 21,000rpm, the Sorvall RC-5C Plus is also durable and relatively easy to repair for an experienced technician.

For high capacity models, we like the Thermo Sorvall RC BIOS. It’s designed for high-speed, high-volume batch processing applications and has a capacity of 6 x 1L. This unit uses carbon fiber rotors, which are lighter and more durable than metal rotors. (A note of caution, though: we have heard that Thermo is phasing out production and support of this model at some point in the near future. This doesn’t mean the unit won’t be serviceable but it can present some complications. We’ll provide updates if we receive any.)

Beckman Coulter Avanti

We’ve been fans of Beckman centrifuges for years, and the Avanti series are no exceptions. The Beckman Avanti J-25i is a high performance model that can be used for a wide variety of applications, including sample preparation, pelleting, extractions, purifications, concentrations, phase separations, and spin column and spin filter centrifugation; rapid separations; preparation of subcellular organelles; separation of blood cells and cellular components. It’s also compatible with over 20 rotors, including the 4 x 1L JLA-9.100 and the JCF-Z zonal rotor.

The Avanti J-26XPI is similar to the J-25i but with a max speed of 26,000rpm and a max capacity of 6 x 1L, depending on rotor selection. (There’s also the J-26XP, which is similar to the XPI except with rotary dial controls and digital display, rather than push button controls and digital display.)

Non-refrigerated floor model centrifuges

For applications that don’t require refrigeration the Thermo Sorvall Legend XF is a good option. The  BIOLiner swinging bucket rotor has a max capacity of 4 x 750mL and a speed of 3,500rpm, while the centrifuge itself is small enough to fit underneath benchtop counters in order to save valuable bench or floor space.

There’s also the beastly IEC model 2K centrifuge. Take a look at this unit and you’ll see why it reminds us of World War II tanks. These are sturdy and utilitarian with a capacity of 6 x 1L.

So that’s it, a summary of our favorite used and refurbished floor model centrifuges. This list is not meant to be comprehensive and we don’t want to offend any manufacturers by implying that we intended to neglect them. We’re looking forward to getting more experience with the Beckman Avanti JXN series and sharing our opinions on these models, as well as the Sorvall Lynx units.

As always, we’re here to answer any questions regarding used and refurbished centrifuges, or any other used lab equipment. Thanks!

American Instrument Exchange has been a reliable source for used laboratory and scientific equipment for over 50 years, buying and selling equipment since 1969. Our surplus lab equipment is reconditioned for many types of laboratories, including biotech, biomedical, medical research, chemical, pharmaceutical, and university and hospital research laboratories. All lab equipment listed on our website is in stock and ships from our 30,000 square foot warehouse in Massachusetts. Our facilities include a fully equipped shop with highly trained technicians who thoroughly test each instrument before it reaches your laboratory. Please visit our website at https://www.americaninstrument.com/.

Baker SterilchemGARD III Advance SG603TX total exhaust bio safety cabinet

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Used and refurbished floor model centrifuges available from American Instrument Exchange. Click HERE for more details.

The Baker SterilGARD III Advance SG603TX is a durable machine built not just with functionality and user comfort in mind but with longevity.

A quick primer in case you’re not familiar with the difference between biosafety cabinet classifications. Close to 90% of the units sold on an annual basis and in use now are designated as Class II, Type A2 or Class II Type A/B3. Class II Type A2 cabinets meet requirements for protection of product, personnel and the environment and are widely used to clinical, research, hospital, life science, and pharmaceutical settings. All BSCs with Class II designation have front access with inward airflow, HEPA filtered vertical airflow in the work area, and HEPA-filtered recirculated air.

Baker SterilchemGARD III Advance SG603TX

Class II Type B2 cabinets, also known as total exhaust bio safety cabinets, are used in applications that require protection from hazardous particulates, vapors and gases. These models are almost hybrids of a Class II Type A2 model and a chemical fume hood. Toxicology labs often utilize Class II Type B2 biosafety cabinets, as well as labs working with tissue culturing of possibly infectious subjects, antineoplastic drugs, genetic material, asbestos, volatile toxic chemicals, radionuclides or any substance that generates hazardous airborne particulates or where chemical effluent is present. These units must be hard ducted to a dedicated exhaust system and/or remote blower motor to discharge 100% of the filtered air from the laboratory.

Like other biosafety cabinets, when the total exhaust Baker SG603TX is in operation room air enters the front access opening of the cabinet (i.e. the raised glass sash) at a minimum of 100 FPM then enters the front work surface perforation. The cabinet down flow blower draws room air in at the top of the cabinet and pushes it into the down flow plenum and through the supply HEPA filter. Most of the HEPA filtered down flow air passes through a diffuser but some of the air is directed down the back of the viewscreen creating a high velocity air curtain at the front access opening. The HEPA filtered down flow air in the work area splits at the work surface. Some of the air enters the rear work area perforation while the remainder of the air enters the front work surface perforation. The air is pulled through the drain pan area, up the rear and side wall plenums, through the exhaust HEPA filter and out through the 12” exhaust collar at the top of the cabinet.

Before purchasing a total exhaust bio safety cabinet, talk to your facilities management team or HVAC technician. Because of the hard ducting and external ventilation requirements modifications to the building may be required for installation. Because of the risk that contaminated air will flow back into the laboratory in the event of a ventilation failure operators will need to install a monitor to gauge the exhaust flow when the BSC is in use.

The Baker SterilGARD SG603, the SterilchemGARD SG603TX features a 10° tilt to the glass sash viewing screen and a padded armrest, both of which contribute to overall comfort and ergonomic benefit of users. The membrane switch pad is clearly labeled and typically at eye level (depending on installation height and height of users, of course).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EKmHAyUHo_Y&feature=youtu.be

Like all Baker products, the SG603TX is durable and efficiently designed. And while you can always call American Instrument Exchange with questions about refurbished lab equipment you’ve purchased from us or plan to purchase from us, tech support at The Baker Company provides is always superb and the staff is knowledgeable, polite, and patient. In short, like all Baker products, we give the SG603TX a hearty thumbs up. 

Thermo Scientific Forma Series 3 CO2 model 4110 incubator

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Refurbished Thermo Scientific Forma 4110 incubator available from American Instrument Exchange. Click HERE for more details.

Let’s start by saying that we love the Thermo Scientific Forma 3110 and the more recent Thermo Scientific Forma Series II 3110 incubators. That’s not hyperbole. We’ve been working with these models for almost 30 years now and they are everything that you should want in a piece of lab equipment: durable, easy to operate, simple yet utterly functional design. When we heard that Thermo was coming out with an “improved” version we were both skeptical and a little nervous, because often improved is secret code for “lots of fancy bells and whistles with decreased longevity.”

So we were very pleasantly surprised when we received and inspected the Thermo Scientific Forma4110 incubator. The 6.5 cubic foot capacity chamber is virtually identical to the chamber of the 3110, so with the door open you can hardly tell the difference between the two models. The HEPA filtration is still embedded in the chamber, with continuous air filtration so that the entire chamber volume is filtered every 60 seconds. The walls are constructed of stainless steel and triple-thick which helps with both heat retention and improved energy efficiency as well as temperature uniformity throughout the chamber. The interior glass door is heated so that condensation is minimized. Other specifications are also similar to the older versions: temperature range from 5°C above ambient to 50°C, CO2 concentration range from 0% to 20%, relative humidity of greater than 90% at 37°C. Both TC or IR sensors are available. Like the 3110 models these are designed for either benchtop use, undercounter use, or they can be stacked in pairs.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XNVfJIGNQBs&feature=youtu.be

The biggest change is apparent when looking at the front door of the unit and the prominent touchscreen. One of the beneficial consistencies of the 3110 was the simple control panel, and in recent years there has been a rash of over-exuberance for flashy LED touchscreens replacing simpler but more dependable screens with bright touchscreens that break regularly and need to be replaced at almost predictable intervals. Time will tell if this is the case with the Thermo iCAN touchscreen designed for the 4110 incubator, but upon first inspection this appears to be a well-built model. (Replacement screens are available and as of the time of this writing are listed at a little over $500.) The interface itself is relatively straightforward, with easy to follow menu prompts and better visibility for basic visual monitoring. The control configuration is split into six categories: settings, event logging, options, icon description, keypad lock, and software versions. The data-logging feature is a useful addition: this allows you to monitor and view events, set a recording interval (i.e. 120 seconds), download the log using a USB drive, and performance graphing. Is this 100% necessary in a cell culture incubator? Of course not. But with increased data demands and standards at the very least it is comforting to know that the 4110 has this capability.

The Thermo Series 3 is also compatible with Thermo’s DeviceLink HUB, a wireless monitoring program that monitors temperature, gas levels, alarms, and alerts from the incubator using either the RS-232 or USB output connection. (Full disclosure: we haven’t had a chance to test this system.) Alarms can be sent directly to users by both email and text.

All in all, the Thermo Scientific Forma 4110 seems like a good choice, but the final verdict is still out, dependent on whether the iCAN touchscreen shows durability over the years. Please feel free to call or email us with any questions or comments regarding this model or any of the other refurbished incubators we currently have in stock.

American Instrument Exchange has been a reliable source for used laboratory and scientific equipment for over 50 years, buying and selling equipment since 1969. Our surplus lab equipment is reconditioned for many types of laboratories, including biotech, biomedical, medical research, chemical, pharmaceutical, and university and hospital research laboratories. All lab equipment listed on our website is in stock and ships from our 30,000 square foot warehouse in Massachusetts. Our facilities include a fully equipped shop with highly trained technicians who thoroughly test each instrument before it reaches your laboratory. Please visit our website at https://www.americaninstrument.com/.

Why we Install new HEPA filters in Bio Safety Cabinets

Spoiler Alert: Because It’s Better for our Customers

New customers often ask us whether we can discount the price of bio safety cabinets by either leaving the old HEPA filters in place or not providing any filters. The short answer to this question is, “Sure, but you’re going to end up paying more later.” Purchasing a bio safety cabinet without HEPA filters is like buying a car without tires: you can do it, but you’d better know what you’re doing and have plan in place before you hand over a check and get the keys.  

Here’s a quick primer on how bio safety cabinets work. Biological safety cabinets (also called BSCs, biosafety cabinets or bio hoods) are designed to provide three basic levels of protection. Class I units provide personnel and environment protection for the safe handling when working with chemicals and powders. Class II designated units must meet the requirements for personnel, environmental and product protection. Class III biosafety cabinets are aerosol-tight enclosure with a non-opening, completely sealed, front window, so the operator is separated from their work by a physical barrier (sometimes referred to as “gloveboxes.”) There are different variations and level of safety within each of these categories, but broadly speaking every bio safety cabinet falls under one of these three designations.

HEPA filters in Bio Safety Cabinets

Class II, Type A2 bio safety cabinets are the most common designation and require two HEPA filters. During operation air-flow is drawn into the work chamber via the front aperture and continues under the worktop and up the back plenum, where 70 % is recirculated through the main supply HEPA filter to provide down flow and 30 % exits out through the exhaust HEPA filter and out of the chamber. The vertical laminar flow biological safety cabinet provides operator protection by means of inflow, product protection by means of down flow and environmental protection by means of the filtered exhaust. This is the most common type of bio safety cabinet that you’ll typically find in a tissue culture lab.

To change the filters in these hoods the front cover has to be removed and many manufacturer’s include an interior cover that has to be removed as well. After that, depending on the make and model of the unit the motor may have to be loosened, a HEPEX bag needs to be removed/replaced, and brackets removed or loosened, among other small steps. Then the gaskets on the new filters must be coated with grease to help insure a seal and the processed reversed. And here’s the kicker: the media in these filters CANNOT BE TOUCHED AT ALL OR ELSE THEY WILL BE DAMAGED AND UNUSABLE. Tightening the brackets with a wrench and graze the filters with an elbow? Forget it – you’re not going to pass certification, so you’d better order a new filter. For around $750. Or more.

HEPA filters in Bio Safety Cabinets

But here at American Instrument Exchange we work with bio safety cabinets extensively. On average we’re installing three or four sets of filters a week and collectively our team here has over 75 years’ experience working with BSCs and installing filters as of the time of this writing. We know that we can install filters quickly and correctly.

So if you’re looking to purchase a bio safety cabinet, let us remove some of the stress and aggravation from the process for you. Call us today for a quote on a refurbished unit from Baker, Nuaire, Labconco, Thermo, or any other manufacturer. We’ll install the HEPA filters here and put the unit through certification to make sure that it works properly and to manufacturer’s specifications. When it arrives in your lab it will be ready to go, hassle-free!

American Instrument Exchange has been a reliable source for used laboratory and scientific equipment for over 50 years, buying and selling equipment since 1969. Our surplus lab equipment is reconditioned for many types of laboratories, including biotech, biomedical, medical research, chemical, pharmaceutical, and university and hospital research laboratories. All lab equipment listed on our website is in stock and ships from our 30,000 square foot warehouse in Massachusetts. Our facilities include a fully equipped shop with highly trained technicians who thoroughly test each instrument before it reaches your laboratory. Please visit our website at https://www.americaninstrument.com/.

Rainin E4 XLS electronic pipettes

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Use and refurbished Rainin E4 XLS available from American Instrument Exchange. Click HERE for more details.

Okay, full disclosure: sometimes we’re not huge fans of selling used and refurbished pipettes. Mainly because they can be a lot of work for not a lot of revenue. Also, because while many times pipettes are a commodity type product people still seem to get emotionally attached to certain brands and styles of pipettes, even though all of them essentially do the same thing.

Rainin E4 XLS.

But the Rainin E4 XLS electronic pipettes are a different story. These are electronic single-channel pipette with a small but clean graphical user interface. Users can navigate the menus using the embedded joystick control and soft keys to set operating modes. The memory storage allows you to save your common protocols or settings, which can both save time and reduce errors in your lab. With secure service data, lockable modes, and password protection, these pipettes are compliant with secure GLP/GMP practices. The battery can be recharged using a simple micro-USB port at the top of the display screen.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AwwHqYca-LY

When we first saw these we expected the screen to add to much weight to the top of the pipette and cause the entire thing to feel top-heavy and awkward during operation, but this isn’t the case. The Rainin E4 XLS pipettes have a good balance to them and feel natural in our hands during use.

Right now we have full sets of the Rainin E4 XLS pipettes in stock and available, including multichannel units. Click here to see models currently available from American Instrument Exchange. You can also call or email us anytime with questions. Thanks! 

American Instrument Exchange has been a reliable source for used laboratory and scientific equipment for over 50 years, buying and selling equipment since 1969. Our surplus lab equipment is reconditioned for many types of laboratories, including biotech, biomedical, medical research, chemical, pharmaceutical, and university and hospital research laboratories. All lab equipment listed on our website is in stock and ships from our 30,000 square foot warehouse in Massachusetts. Our facilities include a fully equipped shop with highly trained technicians who thoroughly test each instrument before it reaches your laboratory. Please visit our website at https://www.americaninstrument.com/.

A primer on used and refurbished incubator shakers

Used and refurbished incubator shakers available from American Instrument Exchange. Click HERE for more details.

Given our extensive history of buy and selling used and refurbished lab equipment, we have seen our share of incubator shakers and the evolution of different styles. These units are basically a combination of other machines: a shaker placed inside an incubator. While there may be some labs that still prefer the old-school approach of placing a shaker into an incubator, for most people the convenience of a single machine with shaking and temperature controls integrated into the same control panel is preferable.

Incubator shakers incorporate oxygen and evenly distribute nutrients throughout the culture media and are used for cell culturing, cell aeration, and solubility studies. In addition to offering stable temperature conditions, shaking incubators use an orbital agitation at variable speeds to affect the growth of cell cultures.

refurbished incubator shakers

Tabletop incubators generally offer the smallest incubation chamber and platform spaces. These units are designed to sit on a lab bench and agitate small sample loads. The are convenient and often cost-effective options for labs with relatively little space and without high-throughput volume needs. Most of these units are designed with a clamshell style lifting lid that opens sort of like a car’s hood. Often these lids don’t create a seal that’s quite tight enough to effectively isolate the chamber from ambient conditions, so the downside to this design is that the temperature uniformity in the chamber tends not to be as consistent as with other models. One of our current favorite incubator shakers is the Thermo Barnstead MaxQ 4450.

refurbished incubator shakers

Undercounter incubator shakers are larger than benchtop models and are about the size of an undercounter refrigerator or freezer. (Some manufacturers refer to these as “floor model incubator shakers.”) In addition to have one orbital shaking platform of about 20” x 20” many of these units can also be equipped with a fixed shelf of the same size. The New Brunswick Innova 4230 is a good example of an undercounter incubator shaker.

refurbished incubator shakers

Stackable incubator shakers are the latest and greatest design. (Although before these came along there were the chest-freezer style models as well as the New Brunswick Innova 4900.) These units remind us of pizza ovens, with doors that glide up to open and down to close. Many also feature slide out platforms for easy loading. Infors and Kuhner both make popular models. Our favorites though are the New Brunswick Innova 4400 series and the New Brunswick Innova 44 series. The New Brunswick units are great because of their modularity: you can purchase one unit to start, and then as your needs expand purchase a second unit to stack on top of the first, using OEM hardware.

We stock all these different style of incubator shakers, used and refurbished, from a variety of different manufacturers. If you have any questions about which style is right for your lab, or would like information on pricing and availability, please give us a call or email today. You can also browse our website to see specifications of different models. Thanks!

American Instrument Exchange has been a reliable source for used laboratory and scientific equipment for over 50 years, buying and selling equipment since 1969. Our surplus lab equipment is reconditioned for many types of laboratories, including biotech, biomedical, medical research, chemical, pharmaceutical, and university and hospital research laboratories. All lab equipment listed on our website is in stock and ships from our 30,000 square foot warehouse in Massachusetts. Our facilities include a fully equipped shop with highly trained technicians who thoroughly test each instrument before it reaches your laboratory. Please visit our website at https://www.americaninstrument.com/.

Market Forge Sterilmatic autoclave

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Refurbished Market Forge Sterilmatic autoclave available from American Instrument Exchange. Click HERE for more details.

It’s hard to improve on some classics: the paperclip, for example, or the Little Nipper mouse trap. Or the Market Forge Sterilmatic Sterilizer. These autoclaves are durable, dependable, relatively inexpensive, and can be used in a wide variety of settings for sterilization of liquids, instruments and glassware up to 9” tall.

Market Forge

The Market Forge Sterilmatic doesn’t look like the most modern, flashy piece of lab equipment in the world, and that’s because it’s not. This autoclave is built for function and durability and not as a showpiece. The analog controls hardly ever break and the simple handle-locking door is basic, functional, and virtually “operator error” proof.  The chamber has a 16” and is 26” deep, for a total capacity of 85L. Temperature range is 110°C to 121°C and the unit can preheat and reach sterilizing temperature from a cold start in ten minutes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vxXE5VHY6FM&feature=youtu.be

Operating this unit is about as difficult as operating as a household microwave oven: simply load materials into the chamber, shut the door, and set the temperature and timer. The amber pilot light on the display will indicate when the unit is in operation. 

Because of the combination of easy operation and durability, we sell a lot of Market Forge models to hospitals, academic labs, nursing facilities, clinics, and other labs with high throughput, high demand sterilization needs, because this is a rough and tumble machine that can withstand a lot of use.

Please give us a call today for more information on the Market Forge autoclave, including pricing and availability. Thanks!

American Instrument Exchange has been a reliable source for used laboratory and scientific equipment for over 50 years, buying and selling equipment since 1969. Our surplus lab equipment is reconditioned for many types of laboratories, including biotech, biomedical, medical research, chemical, pharmaceutical, and university and hospital research laboratories. All lab equipment listed on our website is in stock and ships from our 30,000 square foot warehouse in Massachusetts. Our facilities include a fully equipped shop with highly trained technicians who thoroughly test each instrument before it reaches your laboratory. Please visit our website at https://www.americaninstrument.com/.

Water jacketed vs. air jacketed incubators

Click HERE to see refurbished incubators in stock and available at American Instrument Exchange.

We sell a lot of refurbished incubators, and a large portion of those are CO2 incubators used for cell or tissue culture. Some customers prefer water-jacketed models while other people prefer air-jacketed units (also known as direct heat units). Today we’ll look at the differences between the two types along with some of the advantages and drawbacks of each design.

Water jacketed CO2 incubators

As the name implies these units utilize a water container or “jacket” that surrounds the chamber on five sides to help maintain temperature stability despite door openings or fluctuating ambient conditions. Because water has a high heat capacity and holds temperature longer than air, the incubator jacket will help the chamber maintain a steady, consistent temperature level and recover heat loss quickly if the door to the incubator is opened or in the event of a power outage.

Water jacketed CO2 incubators.

The potential downside to this stability is that reaching setpoint temperature with a water jacketed incubator can take up to 24 hours. This is not the end of the world for most labs, but if you plan to use the incubator for different applications that require different temperature settings the temperature stabilization time should at least be taken into consideration.

The biggest drawback to water jacketed incubators in our opinion is the risk of contamination. Think about it: you’re talking about a warm, dark, wet environment, perfect for bacterial and fungal growth. Even if you use distilled, sterile water to fill the chamber the threat of contamination exists. If contaminated the jacket must be cleaned before you can continue using the incubator.

Water-jacketed units are also heavy. To fill a typical Thermo model, for example, requires 11.7 gallons of water. At 8.34 lbs per gallon, that means the water alone weighs almost 100 lbs, and so a stacked pair of these incubators can weight upwards of 700 lbs.

Air jacketed CO2 incubators

Air jacketed or direct heat CO2 incubators are easier to set up and get into quick operation than water jacketed models because they don’t have to filled with distilled water and they can reach setpoint temperature more quickly. These units produce chamber heat by conduction via heating elements on the exterior of the chamber walls. Temperature uniformity in the chamber of air jacketed models has improved significantly in the last 10 to 15 years but in general they still don’t have the same uniformity or stability as water jacketed units. The air jacketed design also allows for high heat sterilization/decontamination cycles of temperatures up to 180°C. 

The big drawback to direct heat models is less the issue of stability and more the issue of longer temperature recovery time after door openings than their water jacketed counterparts. Additionally, should a power failure in the lab occur these models can lose temperature up to five times faster than water jacketed models.

Summary

At the end of the day, most times the decision comes down to personal preference, previous experience, and budget. We still stock the classic Forma 3110 water jacketed CO2 incubator, which was an industry standard for decades, as well as newer vintages like the Thermo Forma 4110. On the other hand, many of our customers prefer air jacketed models like the Binder C150 and Panasonic MCO series because of the sterilization cycle option. As always, feel free to call or email us with any questions about incubators or other lab equipment.

American Instrument Exchange has been a reliable source for used laboratory and scientific equipment for over 50 years, buying and selling equipment since 1969. Our surplus lab equipment is reconditioned for many types of laboratories, including biotech, biomedical, medical research, chemical, pharmaceutical, and university and hospital research laboratories. All lab equipment listed on our website is in stock and ships from our 30,000 square foot warehouse in Massachusetts. Our facilities include a fully equipped shop with highly trained technicians who thoroughly test each instrument before it reaches your laboratory. Please visit our website at https://www.americaninstrument.com/.