ESD and Static Control Questions

Q: I have read the White Paper 1: A Case for Lowering Component Level HBM/MM ESD Specifications and Requirements and found the ESD Control Programs and Resulting Data (Chapter 1, Page 20-23) particularly interesting.

Assuming a production environment with ESD flooring, footwear (and clothing), by the time a person walks to a workstation and sits down, the voltage of this persons should not exceed 500V (or even 100V as seen in Figure 3). That would mean even a seated operator in this case would not need to wear wrist strap, that theory would be correct right? After sitting down and this person sits on a stool (feet off the floor) with resistance to floor < 1.0×10exp9ohms, any HBM risk would be further reduced wouldn’t it?

A: Hello ****.  Nice try.  Even if you have an ESD flooring system and even if you have ESD footwear and even if you have an ESD task chair with ESD casters or an ordinary task chair with an ESD chair cover (very effective as well), ESD smock on… you STILL have to wear the wrist strap when seated at an ESD workstation.
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The only time, per ANSI/ESD S20.20-2007 page 4, 8.2 Personnel Grounding, that personnel in the EPA (ESD Protected Area) should be without a wrist strap is when doing standing or walking about operations, and then two conditions must be met;
·         “When the total resistance of the system (from the person, through the footwear and flooring to the grounding / Equipotential bonding system) is less than 3.5E7 Ω…”
·         “When the total resistance of the system (from the person, through the footwear and flooring to the grounding / Equipotential bonding system) is greater than 3.5E7 Ω and less than 1.0E9 Ω and the BVG is less than 100 v per 97.2…”
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This is what is said about seated personnel:
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“When personnel are seated at ESD protective workstations, they shall be connected to the grounding / Equipotential bonding system via a wrist strap system.”
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Hope this helps.   I guess you could say redundancy is good in the realm of ESD.  It’s the weak link in the chain that will cause an ESD event.  If someone lifts their ESD footwear from the ESD flooring system while seated, they can tribocharge to above 100 volts.  It takes only 0.3 seconds of charge time to exceed 20.20 requirements.  If personnel is seated and getting up to go to break, it seems best to stand up, remove the wrist strap from the wrist, carefully set it down and walk away from the ESD workstation.  Worst case is to take the wrist strap off while still seated, set it down, put your hand on the ESD workstation and near ESDS devices, then stand up out of the task chair before leaving the work station.  Under proper conditions and with good bench mats, clean ESD floors, ESD task chairs, etc. in place, no ESD event.  The problem with ESD events is that we cannot see, hear, feel them.�
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The only alternative to not wearing a wrist strap while seated may be the used of a smock with a grounding coil cord attached to it.  You can see the footnotes on the 20.20 document at the bottom of page 4 for further details.
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 We adhere to and meet or exceed requirements put forth in ANSI/ESD S20.20-2007 or IEC 61340-5-1, which assumes a target HBM of 100 volts and less.

Q: Does anybody know the reason behind the upper limit resistance (3,5×10E7Ohms)of a grounding system (personnel+conductive shoes+conductive flooring)? Why not 1×10E8Ohms?
We have tried many waxes and all of them either give an overall reading for the system that is barely, when it is, within the limits above (IEC 61340-5-1 Table 1 - Note 2.

A: That reading is for ANSI/ESD STM97.1-2006 Floor Materials and Footwear- Resistance Measurement in Combination with a person.

So make sure you’re measuring a clean spot on the floor, someone wearing good clean heel grounders, sole grounders, or static dissipative shoes with one probe from a megger in the palm of their hand to earth or machine ground and the voltage on the meter set for 100 volts, as the resistance is greater than 1.0E6 ohms. Now if they fail this test and are less than 1.0E9 ohms, then they pass if they generate less than 100 volts as per ANSI/ESD STM97.2-2006 Floor Materials and Footwear- Voltage Measurement in Combination with a person.

Sorry so long for the response time.

Q2: Many thanks for you help.
What you are actually saying, if I understand it correctly, is that “if the combined resistance of an operator wearing whatever shoes over a a conductive flooring is greater than 1 x 3,5E7Ohms he will generate more than 100 Volts” and
currently in many electronic plants static generation above 100 Volts is not tolerated.

A2: No, that’s not what I’m saying.  I’m saying, as per ANSI/ESD S20.20-2007, that if you fail the < 3.5E7 ohms test, you may pass the less than 100 volts test and still be compliant to 20.20
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Look on table 2 of page 4 of 20.20 and you’ll see what I mean.
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Let me know if that helps.

ADD: I guess what needs to be understood with 20.20-2007 is that the < 100 volts and the < 1.0E9 Ohms still stands as well.  But if you’re testing per 97.1 and you get >3.5E7 ohms, then you can still pass 20.20-2007 if you have < 1.0E9 ohms per 97.1 AND < 100 volts per 97.2.

If you go to the table 2 chart on page 4 of 20.20-2007, it makes more sense.

Q. What is the importance of having the personnel within an EPA to wear ESD footwear on an ESD Flooring system?

A. Thanks for the inquiry. It was good speaking with you earlier. You had stated that you had concerns about the grounding of your flooring system and my first question to you was about the use of ESD footwear. I believe that you had stated that not everyone was using esd footwear.

You pose a situation here that needs to be addressed as a top priority at all levels of ESD Awareness for every client that we come into contact with. I don’t mean to over-simplify this but I am seeing a common trend in the ESD industry; your ESD system is only as strong as the weakest link in the chain. Another way to say this is; If you buy a Plasma TV, it needs to come with a power cord and you need to plug that in.
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