Charged Questions Archives

Question:

Our company currently adheres to the same ESD standards as the ones you recommend on your website: The total system resistance of the person, footwear, walking surface and ground must be less than or equal to 3.5 x 107 or 35 meg-ohms maximum.

However, at a recent ESD conference, attendees were told that an ESD floor can have a maximum resistance of 1Ghom (1 billion ohms), as long as the voltage generated in the walking test does not exceed 100V.

Could you please provide your input to the pros and cons for this seemingly excessive resistance to ground?

Answer:

From a purely technical perspective, a floor’s ESD properties can be evaluated:

1) by measuring the floor’s resistance to ground;
2) by measuring the total resistance ground of the system including the person and the floor;
3) by using a walking test to measure voltage generation on a person;
4) or by testing some combination of the above.

According to the recommendations ... More

ESD Flooring Standards — click here to read the article in PDF format

Can you explain the differences between low static and anti-static with grounding?
I had a General Contractor ask me this question recently.

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