Silicon Valley EOS /ESD Society
Silicon Valley EOS /ESD Society
Providing Information for the Protection of Sensitive Electronics
Approximately 4 minutes reading time
This is the latest addition to the Silicon Valley EOS/ESD Society. Each month, we provide this Ezine to our members and friends.
Inside this new journal, you will find news and helpful tips for controlling ESD (Electro-Static Discharge)
http://www.esdsiva.org/esd_ezine_3.htm
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In This Issue:
SiVa News & Events
ESD coatings -Product Award from RD Magazine
Electro Static In Space - What to expect
The 30,000 Volt Jacket
ESD Help - Wrist Straps and Feedback From Our Readers
ESD Q&A - How can Electrostatic protection can be maintained
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SiVa News
SiVa recently attended the International Facilities Managers Association (IFMA)"Vendor Fair" at Nortel Networks. Attending the fair were 50 of the top vendors of products and services provided to Silicon Valley. Our team of Lem Hollins, Ryan Money, Toni Gurga and Steve Guzman set up a interesting display of ESD and charge generation examples. At our booth, we had a Novx 5000 - Auditing and Training Unit and a Credence CTC 034-3 EMI detector.
As persons walked by our table, the antenna would pick up on their retained body charge and display it on the light tower. Many attendees were quite surprised on how much voltage they were carrying. Also a surprise to the attendees was the amount of EMI signal that was generated just by rattling metal washers in a vacuum formed container or plastic baggie. The Credence CTC 034-3 detector picked up on the peek EMI signal and displayed it on the LED scale.
All in all we meet over 75 people and almost all of those were planning to give our society information to co workers within their company.
2006 ESD Discovery Committee Forming
We are looking for people who can volunteer 1/ 2 hour a week helping us for the
on one of our ESD Discovery 2006 committees. Contact us to join our team. Send an email to esdsv@esdsiva.org if you are interested.
SiVa ESD Discovery 2006 Exhibitor sign up start in October with a special promo program
Starting October 1 and going thru December 1, 2005 -Sign up for ESD Discovery 2006 and receive FREE Web Space Ad and get a ESD Today Newsletter Ad for 1 Year. This is a very special offer and will not be repeated again Contact Leo G Henry to reserve the Table Space today.
Renew your Membership and get access to the Members Only Site
SiVa has started a "Members" page. Many of the previous presentations, newsletters, QA tips and much more can be found within this new section.
Click on http://www.esdsiva.org/Members_only/mindex.htm
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SiVa Events
October 18, 2005 ..... Al Wallash, Hitachi, SPICE Molding Review..
November 15, 2005 - Ian Morgan-Pragmatic
ESD Testing
December 2005
..... Christmas Party TBD
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In The News
Environmentally-friendly Conductive Coatings
2005 R&D 100 Awards: Eikos Inc Invisicon® technology has been recognized as one of the 100 most technologically significant new products of 2005 by R&D Magazine. The 43rd annual competition of the R&D 100 Awards saw entries from many of the most prestigious companies, research organizations, and universities in the world.(see www.rdmag.com)
Transparent conductive coatings are essential to an ever-increasing number of fast-growing applications, such as flat panel displays, sensors, fiber optics, spacecrafts, and electronic packaging. These coatings are ultra-thin (100nm or less), optically transparent, and electrically conductive. Nearly 95% of the transparent conductive coatings market is filled by indium tin oxide (ITO), which, while having excellent electro-optical properties, has many inherent limitations such as its brittleness and propensity to fail under mechanical stress.
>>More info: www.eikos.com
Coping with Static Electricity in Space
RedNova Fri, 12 Aug 2005 5:52 AM PDT
Astronauts on the Moon and Mars are going
to have to cope with an uncommon amount of static electricity.NASA -- Have you ever walked across a wool carpet in leather-soled shoes on a dry winter day, and then reached out toward a doorknob? ZAP! A stinging spark leaps between your fingers and the metal knob. That's static discharge -- lightning writ small. Static discharge is merely annoying to anyone
Those readers who thought that the biggest threat from wearing clothes hewn from synthetic materials was to your street cred, be warned: they could transform you into a walking static bomb ready to discharge carpet-threatening voltages.
Just ask Frank Clewer, a high-energy Aussie from Warrnambool, Victoria, who accumulated an estimated 30,000 volts of static charge simply by walking around his home town in inadvisably large quantities of non-natural tailoring. According to ABC News Online,
he then walked into the lobby of a local business and unleashed the stored energy through the floor. ....read more
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Financial releases, Market notes
RTP Company Signs Distribution Agreement With NCM; Major China
Distributor of Specialty Plastics
WINONA, Minn.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--July 28, 2005--Global specialty compound leader RTP Company announces the signing of a distribution agreement with NCM the leading distributor of engineering materials in China. The agreement names NCM as RTP Company's primary distributor for the China market
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Q/A & ESD Help
Q. Electrostatic protection can be maintained as long as all items in the system are at the same potential.
A. Not true, ESD can still occur
B. Not true. To prevent an ElectroStatic Discharge all items must be at zero electrical potential
C. Daisy-chaining of ESD protective workstations ground wires is desirable
D. Every element to be grounded at an ESD protected station shall be connected to the same common point ground
E. Every element to be grounded at an ESD protected station shall be connected to a different electrical ground
Answer: D
Per ANSI/ESD S20.20 Foreword A: “All conductors in the environment, including personnel, must be bonded or electrically connected and attached to a known ground or contrived ground (as on shipboard or on aircraft). This attachment creates an equipotential balance between all items and personnel. Electrostatic protection can be maintained at a potential above a “zero” voltage ground potential as long as all items in the system are at the same potential.”
Per ANSI/EOS/ESD S6.1, Grounding paragraph 4.1.1 “Every element to be grounded at an ESD protected station shall be connected to the same common point ground.”
Courtesy Of Desco Industries
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Help Info
Did you Know...
Wrist straps should be tested daily with results logged. The wrist strap cord appears to be a relatively simple assembly. However, the design requirements are considerable, given the wide range of user applications and the durability requirements of constant tugging, flexing, and dragging over the edge of workstation tops and equipment chassis.
* ** Comments on our last issue from our expert readers ***
Dear E-Zine Editor.
As always, thank you for an interesting and informative issue.
I must comment, however, on the information provided in the latest issue regarding ionizer emitter point cleaning.
Help Info
Properly maintained ionizing points will give you high performance over the lifetime of your system. Maintaining ionizing points requires regular cleaning and operational testing.
Ionizing points must be cleaned on a monthly basis. If points are extremely dirty when cleaning, increase frequency to weekly. In very dirty environments, it may be necessary to clean daily or at the end of each shift.
I absolutely agree with the first sentence. Every ionizer needs regular maintenance to provide the operating conditions critical to the success of
the static control program. Do not let anyone promise you maintenance-free operation of an ionizer. The closest we come to this is an alpha ionizer,
which contains no emitter points and only requires annual changes of its source. The following comments refer only to corona ionizers.
The second sentence regarding cleaning frequency displays a misunderstanding of the operation of the ionizer and its maintenance
requirements. There are two basic issues that determine the frequency of ionizer maintenance. The first is the design of the ionizer itself. Some
ionizers, particularly AC ionizers, are little more than a high voltage supply connected to an emitter point. The output balance and ionization
level will depend on the emitter point condition and frequent maintenance
is needed to assure the desired operating conditions. Steady-state-DC and pulsed-DC ionizers can be designed with sensor monitoring and feedback systems, capable of maintaining balance and output levels over a wide range of emitter point conditions. Some systems are capable of maintaining ionizer balance to 1 volt or better, and maintenance intervals for some applications are 6-9 months.
The second issue that must be considered in determining ionizer maintenance intervals is the environment in which the ionizer will be used. Consider the cleanliness of the environment, is it a cleanroom (what class?) or is it an uncontrolled work environment? What are the particle levels in the air, and more important, what types of chemicals are present in the air? Chemicals in the air may result from those used in the manufacturing
process, or from large numbers of operating personnel. Ionizers both attract particles from the air and interact strongly with chemicals in the
air, forming particles on the emitter points. Once again, the ionizer design and the required operating conditions will determine the frequency
of maintenance. Maintenance intervals typically range from 1 month to 9 months over a wide variety of applications.
For a general electronics application in an uncontrolled (i.e.,non-cleanroom) work area, ANSI ESD S20.20 recommends checking ionizer
balance on a monthly basis. Any out-of-specification condition would first be dealt with by cleaning the ionizer emitter points. If this restored
ionizer operation, it would indicate the need for more frequent maintenance. On the other hand, if the monthly checks of ionizer operation
indicated that the
ionizer was operating correctly, no maintenance would be necessary. The maintenance interval would be extended until the need for maintenance was determined. In general, this is the procedure for determining the correct maintenance interval for an ionizer. Check the
ionizer operation regularly until the need for maintenance is indicated. Unfortunately, the material you have published seems to indicate that
ionizers are a constant maintenance issue. Nothing could be farther from the truth. In all but the most critical or specialized applications,
ionizer maintenance intervals are 3-9 months, with recalibration and certification done on an annual basis. The time to clean an ionizer rarely
takes more than a few minutes. There are certainly ionizer applications that will require more frequent maintenance, but modern ionizer designs
have extended the maintenance intervals in these applications as well. If you have an application that requires daily ionizer maintenance, you
should be asking if you are using the right type of ionizer. More important, you should be asking about the impact on personnel from the air
quality that results in daily ionizer maintenance.
I hope you will publish my comments to give your readers a more balanced approach to the issue of ionizer maintenance.
Thank you.
Sincerely,
Arnold Steinman
Chief Technology Officer
Ion Systems
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The Silicon Valley EOS/ESD Society
370 Altair Way
Box 222
Sunnyvale, CA 94086
www.esdsiva.org
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Prepared by Ryan Money