ESD Control Program (Flooring Requirement)

[Apoch]

Hi! I'm new in the forum.

I have been tasked to establish an ESD control program in the company though sensitivity of the product to electrostatic damage does not exceed 500V.

My dilemma right now is now is whether the controls I'm planning to set up would be "over-kill" as what is needed for the product. Therefore, I am thinking of not having ESD floor cloating (as what we have right now are non-ESD dissipative vinyl). We will just focus on equipment and workstation groundings. Would this be practical?

Thanks in advance.

 

[Jim Wynne]

Hi! I'm new in the forum.

I have been tasked to establish an ESD control program in the company though sensitivity of the product to electrostatic damage does not exceed 500V.

My dilemma right now is now is whether the controls I'm planning to set up would be "over-kill" as what is needed for the product. Therefore, I am thinking of not having ESD floor cloating (as what we have right now are non-ESD dissipative vinyl). We will just focus on equipment and workstation groundings. Would this be practical?

Thanks in advance.

Welcome to the Cove.

There's been quite a lot of discussion here on the subject of ESD control, such as this recent discussion thread: Must Chairs be Grounded for ESD Control?.

You can also scroll down to the bottom of the page and find related threads and use the search function to find even more.

 

[Citizen Kane]

Hi !


I think if you are a production facility that uses small components mounted on PCBs you should have also the floor to be ESD. Ofcourse, by start you should have ESD coats and ESD shoes (or ESD shoe covers - by this you will also avoid dust on production; or ESD strips).

If there are analysis stations on WPs that are in close/direct work with the components, it must be installed also wrists linked to ESD working tables.

Also, don't lose from focus the most important step afterwars: the ESD check ! - this should be mounted before the ESD areas and the access to those areas should be granted only if you passed the ESD check and only with a card access.

A good ideea might be to have an ESD checking device that is verifiying both shoes separatelly.

For the special ESD floor, you should make shore you choose a good company that make quality work - if you take a cheeper one, in time you will get cracks on the floor - and the rework will cost a lot due to "special painting" (!)


For more details, send me a pm.

 

[David Hartman]

Instead of floor coating (which has to be cleaned often), why not invest in ESD grounded area mats. If you use a wave soldering machine, a SMT oven, of coating machine where workers are going to be on their feet and moving from one area of the machine to another floor mats and shoe straps/ESD shoes would be better than having them drag a ground strap around for any distance.

 

[Susan1]

For an EPA area a minimum amount of ESD precautions would be required.

–Bench grounding (including shelving where ESDS are within 30cm)
–Bench mat grounding
–Wrist strap & cord
–ESD tooling
- ESD packaging only​

If wrist strap is impractical/dangerous footwear and flooring/ESD matting should be the primary method​

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Where unprotected ESDS components are stored in an EPA, they need to be in conductive/dissipative storage (ESD lin bins) toting and grounded (i.e. shelving, racking, trolleys).​

Where ESDS components are not stored in an EPA, they need to be in closed shielded bags or enclosed ESD toting.​