Lab Armor Bead Baths were specifically designed to work with Lab Armor Beads to optimize their performance.
Uniform Temperatures
It’s all about a good design. With Bead Bath designed specifically for beads, temperatures are consistent and uniform everywhere in the bath. Thermal uniformity is +/-1.0 at 37ºC.
Always On
It’s always on, ready to use. You never need to turn it off. There is nothing to evaporate. It’s just like a trusty always-on incubator. Unlike a standard bead-filled water bath, Bead Bath allows you to achieve a new set temperature quickly, without long warm-up delays, so you can make fast adjustments.
Stays Clean
Contaminated samples and reagents result in distorted data and unpredictable outcomes. Reduce the risk of contamination, achieve reproducible results and have greater confidence in your work.
Stays Organized
Unlike water baths that require racks, floats, and bottleneck weights, Bead Bath naturally holds things in place without accessories. So no more floating accidents.
Why use a bead bath?
Thermal beads (in place of oil or water) reduce the dangers of fire, contamination, and lack of temperature control. They’re the perfect option for heating vessels in a constant, stable environment with a broad temperature range of -80°C to +180°C.
Traditional water or oil baths cannot retain heat for long, and they create condensation, which can not only be messy in the lab but can also cause bacterial growth.
Waterless laboratory bead baths reduce the chances of contamination, have a quick heat-up time, and provide much higher thermal retention than water. Plus, bead baths never evaporate which improves temperature performance and saves energy.
Highly recyclable. The Beads are formed from solid recyclable metal. The material is very desirable to recyclers, which means the raw material used in Lab Armor® Beads can be reused in other products.
More Energy-efficient. Beads can transform a water bath into a smarter instrument that uses less electricity. For instance, water constantly evaporates during water bath operation. As water evaporates it cools. Due to this evaporative-cooling effect, the bath must heat more frequently, which increases energy consumption. A bead bath uses over 4X less energy when set to 65 ºC and over 2X less energy at 37 ºC. Plus, a bead bath provides more constant temperature and fewer temperature fluxuations during operation than a water bath.
No Gray Water: Lab Armor has worked hard to eliminate the need for many of the germicides that are a common part of water bath maintenance. Bead Baths are dry and periodic decontamination with a biodegadable, earth-friendly disinfectant, such as 70% EtOH is usually all that is required to keep most unwanted microbes away.
Lab Armor Bead Bath vs. Water Bath
| Bead Bath | Water Bath | Oil Bath | Sand Bath | |
| High Thermal Efficiency | Yes | Yes | Yes | No |
| Microbial/Biofilm Resistant | Yes | No | Yes | Yes |
| Cross-contamination Resistant | Yes | No | No | No |
| Minimal Cleaning | Yes | No | No | Yes |
| No Refilling | Yes | No | No | Yes |
| Rack & Accessory Free | Yes | No | No | Yes |
| Angled Incubation Possible | Yes | No | No | Yes |
| Constant Volume | Yes | No | Yes | Yes |
| Non-Corrosive | Yes | No | No | Yes |
| Broad Temperature Range (-80 to 180C) | Yes | No | Yes | Yes |
| Non-water tight Vessel Compatibility | Yes | No | No | Yes |
| No Evaporation (Instrument Burn-Out Protection) | Yes | No | Yes | Yes |
| Always On (No Warm Up) | Yes | No | No | Yes |
| Mobile or Field Use Compatible | Yes | No | No | No |
| Non-combustible | Yes | Yes | No | Yes |