05 Dec

Cleaning an ESD Floor

Q: How do you clean the floor, can it be waxed, and if so what type of wax?

A: All our ESD Dissipative and Conductive floors are designed to be wax free, low maintenance with permanent electrical properties. We recommend daily sweeping and damp mopping with our “ZeroStat Clean” ESD, pH neutral, general purpose floor cleaner or equal. These are the two most important factors in keeping you floor looking / performing it’s best, long term.

To keep the factory shine and luster of our floors, we recommend polishing the floor with a floor maintainer and a white pad. Some of our clients choose to incorporate our ZeroStat Buff for this process, but this is optional. The more frequently you dry buff/polish the floor the tighter the surface composition becomes, hence, will require less and less buffing to maintain a high shine as time progresses. We also manufacture a product called ZeroStat Diamond Seal, which is a ESD Polymer Coating used to seal and streamline the maintenance of our ESD flooring even further. Basically, a protective ESD finish developed as a protective barrier over the surface to resist scuff marks caused by chair, carts, shoes, forklifts and other mobility equipment.Applying an ESD Wax, (such as ZeroStat Diamond Coat II) is an alternative to the dry buffing process, but know that it is somewhat of a trade off. The trade off is, that Waxing with give you an instant high gloss and shine, verses dry buffing, but it can lower the electrical resistance by up to a half of a decade in electrical resistance. This drop in the electrical resistance isn’t impacted on static Dissipative floors as much as it applies to static Conductive floors. It really won’t impact the overall performance of our flooring systems, due to our ESD flooring falling into the lower end of our electrical specifications verse the higher end of the resistance specification.

Note: Due to the broad spectrum of ESD wax quality, we STRONGLY recommend ZeroStat Diamond Coat II as your wax of choice, as most of the ESD floor finishes available in the industry don’t perform to the electrical range that is required to keep our floors in our specified electrical ranges.

I hope this answers most of your questions, please feel free to contact us with any further question, comments and/or concerns. I have also attached data sheets for our ESD floor care products for your review and consideration.

More Information (PDF):
» ESD Floors Care and Maintenance
» ZeroStat Buff Specification Sheet
» ZeroStat Clean Specification Sheet
» ZeroStat Coat Specification Sheet
» ZeroStat DiamondCoat II Specification Sheet
» ZeroStat DiamondSeal Specification Sheet

01 Dec

Flooring system suitable for use in a pharmaceutical manufacturing space

Q: I am looking for a flooring system suitable for use in a pharmaceutical manufacturing space where Class I-B flammable liquids and vapors are routinely present. Is conductive epoxy the best choice? Is an integral copper grounding grid needed?

A: Yes, Conductive is the correct choice for this type of environment. I’d recommend glancing through our flooring selection chart as a starting point:

Ground Zero Flooring Comparison Chart (PDF)

I’d start with an ESD Conductive floor, whether it be a, Vinyl Tile, Vinyl Sheet, or Epoxy. If you go with vinyl tile or sheet, it needs to have welded seams so it can be chemically sound and completely resistant to spill, etc.

Vinyl Sheet is the most economical option. Vinyl Tile has the highest rated loading at 2500 psi, while Epoxy is most durable. They all have good chemical resistance and excellent permanent ESD performance.

All of our flooring installations incorporate the copper grounding grid tape, this is important to assure a permanent and mechanical path to A/C electrical or structural ground.

Below are some of our examples currently being used in your industry:

ESD Vinyl Tile (Weldable)
ESD Vinyl Sheet (Weldable)
ESD Epoxy

01 Dec

Controlling static electricity on concrete

Q: Why can’t bare or sealed concrete be used as a method for controlling static electricity in a electronics manufacturing environment verse utilizing a Conductive or Static Dissipative covering and/or coating?

A: I’ve done some studies on ESD resistive characteristics of the several different floor surfaces. In light of the following question, I just snapped some photos of ESD readings on the following surfaces:

ESD reading on Dry Concrete

ESD reading on Dry Concrete

Bare concrete (dry). Results- barely conductive, very humidity dependant; in the insulative range(1E09-1E12)

ESD reading on Asphalt

ESD reading on Asphalt

Asphalt. Results- unacceptable; above insulative.

ESD reading on Dirt

ESD reading on Dirt

Dirt. Results- pretty good, acually comes in at barely dissipative; Upside, cheap; Downside, hard to clean.

Reading on ESD Carpet

Reading on ESD Carpet

ESD Carpet (Ground Zero Information). Results- ESD conductive(2.5e4-1.0E6).

Reading on ESD Tile

Reading on ESD Tile

ESD Tile (Ground Zero Information). Results – ESD dissipative(1.0E6-1.0E8).

Reading on Sealed Concrete

Reading on Sealed Concrete

Sealed Concrete. Results-unacceptable; a sealed concrete is necessary for heavy foot traffic, but the very thing that would make the concrete conductive is sealed out- moisture. This floor could be made dissipative very easily with an ESD chemical (Ground Zero Information).

Reading on Particle Board

Reading on Particle Board

Particle board. See asphalt