ESD Lab Coat Testing Procedure

A person who wears normal clothing, generates electric fields which emit from his/ her clothing. These electric fields can cause electric charging of objects in close vicinity. Touching these objects after exposure to electric fields, can create an ESD event and potentially cause ESD damage. The electric field of personal garments is effectively shielded off, by using static control garments or even groundable static control garments (with integrated wrist strap function).

The wearer must be connected to a known ground reference point, for static control garments to be effective. Should this be neglected, then the static control garment essentially becomes an isolated conductor, which can just as easily emit electric fields (and thus ultimately cause damage), as the personal clothing worn underneath it.

This means that any person that wears a static control garment must be connected to ground, either through one (or more) of the following connections: a wrist strap, conductive shoes and a conductive flooring system, or through a groundable static control garment with integrated wrist strap function.

Subsequently, anyone who wants to use a wrist strap or conductive shoes in combination with a conductive flooring system in order to work ESD safe, must also wear (groundable) static control garments in order to fully meet the required levels of ESD prevention.  

The ESD lab coat testing procedure mandates measuring the fabric’s electrical conductivity on the Ohms scale to ensure it qualifies as ‘static dissipative’. Additionally, the fabric must be grounded, meaning it is electrically bonded to a grounding system to prevent it from becoming an isolated floating conductor.

As per IEC 61340-5-1, ESD garments fall into three categories: ‘Static Control Garments’, ‘Groundable Static Control Garments’, or ‘Groundable Static Control Garment with integrated wrist strap function‘.