Understand the Decade Scale

How to read a Surface Resistance Meter.

The Decade Scale is shorthand for electrical measurements, displayed in powers of 10

SRM500K – Surface Resistance Meter

and described in “Ohms”. A Surface Resistivity Meter is used to take these electrical measurements on all types of surfaces and materials, and the results are displayed in the Decade Scale.  Most meters will display results using colored LEDs that brighten according to each decade.  These measurements are important in ESD control because this is how to classify a material as Conductive, Dissipative or Insulative.

Ohms are the units used to describe the  measurements of electrical resistance and has a symbol that looks like this “Ω”.  Depending on the value, measurements can be in “kilohms”, or “meg ohms”.  The decade scale can be written in several ways and mean the same:  10⁵ , 10^5, 100 kilohms, or 100megΩ etc. The table below shows all the values important as it pertains to ESD or Static Control:

Decade Scale

10^3      =1 kilohm
10^4      =10 kilohm
10^5      =100 kilohm
3×10^5  =300 kilohm
10^6      =1 meg ohm
3×10^6  =3 meg ohm
10^7      =10 meg ohm
3×10^7  =30 meg ohm
10^8      =100 meg ohm
3×10^8  =300 meg ohm
10^9      =3000 meg ohm
3×10^9  =1000 meg ohm
10^10    =10,000 meg ohm
10^11    =100,000 meg ohm
10^12    =1,000,000 meg ohm

To learn more about the Decade Scale and Surface Resistivity Meters visit Transforming Technologies or call 419-841-9552

Reliable performance of ESD matting and ESD wrist straps is critical for your product’s integrity and reliability. But the hand testing and hand logging of wrist straps and tabletop material performance that is required is a cumbersome, labor-intensive paperwork nightmare. Use of our ESD wrist strap and ESD bench mat monitors continuously verifies the effectiveness of your ESD protected workstation, simultaneously satisfies ISO logging requirements and insures outstanding product quality.

Operators plug their ESD coil cord into the grounding jack of the constant monitor right at their workstation. The constant monitor grounds the wrist strap and simultaneously monitors for faults in the ground path from the strap to the earth ground, including proper contact with the operators skin. A proper working ground path results in the LED on the constant monitor to glow green (indicating GOOD). If a fault is detected, the LED will blink red (indicating FAULT), and the unit will repeatedly beep.

Types of Constant Monitors

Capacitance (or single wire) constant monitors
This type of monitor is simplest and most cost-effective constant monitor. When a person is wearing the single wire wrist strap the monitor detects the person and puts the monitor in the unalarmed state. The monitor circuit detects a person (a conductive object) and its relationship to ground (another conductive object).  View our Capacitance Monitors.

Impedance (or single wire) constant monitors
The impedance monitor uses a detection circuit designed to reduce false alarms and eliminate adjustments. It uses the phase difference between current and voltage to detect changes in impedance of the cord, band and person. A very low AC voltage is used for constant sensing. Any standard wristband and coiled cord can be used.

Resistance (or Dual Wire) constant monitors
This type of monitor is used with a two wire (dual conductor) wrist strap. When a person is wearing a wrist strap, the monitor observes the resistance of the loop, consisting of a wire, a person, a wristband, and a second wire. If any part of the loop should open (become disconnected or have out of limit resistance), the circuit will go into the alarm state. An important feature of the Dual Wire Wrist Strap is that even if one conductor is severed, the operator has reliable path-to-ground with other wire.  View our Resistance Monitors.

Thank you to all who made the 2013 Apex Expo a success!  In case you missed us in San Diego, we took lots of pictures!

Welcome to the 2013 Apex Expo

LED light technology saves money, time and benefits workers well being.

Image Source (Orphek.com)

While you won’t find LEDs in too many household lighting  fixtures these days, there are a several great reasons why you will want to use them in your business.

First, there’s the reduced energy use. The LED method of producing light loses far less energy to heat than do other lighting technologies. It’s dramatically more efficient than the vacuum/filament method used in incandescent bulbs — sometimes around 85 percent more efficient; and it’s even about 5 percent more efficient than the CFL’s plasma-tube approach [source: Taub].

A single light fixture stocked with a 60-watt incandescent bulb consumes about 525 kWh of electricity in a year; put a GeoBulb LED bulb in that light fixture, and the annual energy use is more like 65 kWh [source: Sundance]. The annual CO₂ reduction is in the hundreds of pounds for a single lamp.

But energy-efficiency is just part of the story. The other part is time-efficiency: You could go 20 years without having to change an LED light bulb. Solid-state lights like LEDs are more stable light sources than incandescent or fluorescent bulbs, and the difference is startling: A typical incandescent bulb lasts about 750 hours; a Geobulb lasts 30,000 hours [source: Sundance].

Layton, Julia.  “How LED Light Bulbs Work”  23 July 2009.  HowStuffWorks.com. <http://science.howstuffworks.com/environmental/green-tech/sustainable/led-light-bulb.htm>  27 February 2013.

Transforming Technologies acknowledges the advantages of LED lights and have incorporated them into the BFN Overhead Ionizers.  More information on the BFN LED ionizers here.

Top 10 Benefits of LED Lighting

1. Long Life

Long life time stands out as the number one benefit of LED lights. LED bulbs and diodes have an outstanding operational life time expectation of up to 100.000 hours. This is 11 years of continuous operation, or 22 years of 50% operation. If you leave on the LED fixture for 8h per day it would take around 20 years before you’d have to replace the LED bulb.

LED’s are different to standard lighting: They don’t really burn out and stop working like a standard light, moreover the lighting diodes emit lower output levels over a very long period of time and become less bright.

LEDs are extremely durable and built with sturdy components that are highly rugged and can withstand even the roughest conditions. Because LED lights are resistant to shock, vibrations and external impacts, they make great construction or manufacturing lighting systems for rough conditions and exposure to weather, wind, rain or even external vandalism.

2. Energy Efficiency

With traditional incandescent light bulbs who operate at 20% energy efficiency only, 80% of the electricity is lost as heat. Imagine the following scenario:

If you use traditional lighting and have an electricity bill of US$ 100, then US$ 80 of that money has been used to heat the room, not to light it! Using LED illumination with 80% efficiency, the electricity costs would be around US$ 20 and you’d have saved around US$ 80.

The long operational life time acts as a multiplicator and helps achieve even more energy efficiency, especially large scale and when thinking in terms of urban infrastructure projects, such as cities, railroads and airports.

Think for example, an airport using energy efficient LED lighting exclusively and achieving a 30% power consumption reduction in comparison with an airport using conventional lighting technology. You’ll see that you can make significant energy savings also when it comes to maintenance and replacement due to the long operational life times of LED lighting. Think of all the work and energy it would take to purchase, stock and change the conventional light bulbs of an airport

3. Workplace Lighting Issues

Eyestrain is the number one health-related complaint of office workers and improper lighting levels are associated with vision problems such as eyestrain, dry eyes, and itchy/irritated eyes. This can be alleviated with proper task lighting which becomes much more important as our eyes age, especially for precision work.  Also, there is a human benefit to LED task lighting:  Improved productivity and improve mood and energy levels are reported at business with proper lighting

4. Ecologically Friendly

LED lights are free of toxic chemicals. Most conventional fluorescent lighting bulbs contain an abundance of materials like mercury that are dangerous for the environment.

LED lights contain no toxic materials and are 100% recyclable, and will help you to reduce your carbon footprint by up to a third. The long operational life time span mentioned above means also that one LED light bulb can save material and production of 25 incandescent light bulbs. A big step towards a greener future!

5. Zero UV Emissions

LED illumination produces little infrared light and close to no UV emissions. Because of this, LED lighting is highly suitable not only for goods and materials that are sensitive to heat due to the benefit of little radiated heat emission, but also for illumination of UV sensitive objects or materials such a in museums, art galleries, archeological sites etc.

6. Design Flexibility

LEDs can be combined in any shape to produce highly efficient illumination. Individual LEDs can be dimmed, resulting in a dynamic control of light, color and distribution. Well-designed LED illumination systems can achieve fantastic lighting effects, not only for the eye but also for the mood and the mind:

LED mood illumination is already being used in airplanes, classrooms and many more locations and we can expect to see a lot more LED mood illumination in our daily lives within the next few years.

7. Operational in Extremely Cold or Hot Temperatures

LED are ideal for operation under cold and low outdoor temperature settings. For fluorescent lamps, low temperatures may affect operation and present a challenge, but LED illumination operates well also in cold settings, such as for outdoor winter settings, freezer rooms etc.

8. Light Dispersement

LED is designed to focus its light and can be directed to a specific location without the use of an external reflector, achieving a higher application efficiency than conventional lighting. Well-designed LED illumination systems are able to deliver light more efficiently to the desired location.

9. Instant Lighting & Frequent Switching

LED lights brighten up immediately and when powered on, which has great advantages for infrastructure projects such as traffic and signal lights.

Also, LED lights can switched off and on frequently and without affecting the LED’s lifetime or light emission. In contrast, traditional lighting may take several seconds to reach full brightness, and frequent on/off switching does drastically reduce operational life expectancy.

10. Low-Voltage

A low-voltage power supply is sufficient for LED illumination. This makes it easy to use LED lighting also in outdoor settings, by connecting an external solar-energy source and is a big advantage when it comes to using LED technology in remote or rural areas.

Heel Grounders and ESD Protection

Heel grounders discharge static from a person to ground by connecting the person to a grounded walking surface. A conductive ribbon placed inside the wearer’s shoe or sock makes electrical contact with the skin through perspiration. The ribbon is joined to a resistor which limits current should acci-dental exposure to electricity occur. The other end of the resistor is joined to a conductive sole. This sole contacts a grounded ESD floor mat or ESD flooring system. Heel grounders should be worn on both feet to maintain ground contact while walking. UL and OSHA recommends a minimum of 1 megohm resistance to ground (RTG) in order to limit current for safety purposes.

Resistors and Heel Grounders

Heel grounders come with either a 1 megohm or 2 megohm resistor. When one foot is on the ground, a 1 megohm heel grounder gives you an RTG of 1 megohm and a 2 megohm heel grounders results in 2 megohm RTG. But when both feet are on the ground, the sum of the resistors yield a RTG of 1/2 that measurement.

For example:

• When you wear two, 1 megohm heel grounders and have both feet on the floor, your RTG is only 1/2 megohm, NOT 1 megohm!
• If you wear two, 2 megohm heel grounders an have both feet on the ground, your RTG is 1 megohm.
• By wearing two heel grounders with a 2 megohm resistor you are com-plying with UL and OSHA at all times.

What is a Resistor?

A resistor is a component of an electrical circuit that resists the flow of electrical current. A resis-tor has two terminals across which electricity must pass, and is designed to drop the voltage of the current as it flows from one terminal to the next. A resistor is primarily used to create and maintain a known safe current.

Most grounding products have a current limiting resistor and it is most commonly one megohm, rated at least 1/4 watt with a working voltage rating of 250 volts. This ensures that the flowing current will be within safe levels.

Types of Heel Grounders?

Heel Grounders come in a variety of styles:

Cup Style

Made with two reversi-ble soles for longer life span.

Foot Grounder

Provides a more complete path-to-ground due to wider contact area and heel-to-toe coverage.

Disposable

Strip of conductive material is applied to shoe. Economical and perfect for one time use.

Toe Grounder

Ideal for high heels when stan-dard heel grounders won’t fit properly.

We hope to see you at APEX 2013 in San Diego, February 19 – 21 – Booth A1

To ensure the most effective use of your time and to have the right people present, please call or email us if you plan on stopping by any our booths and want to discuss your interests or schedule a meeting / demo.
We will follow up and hope to see you in San Diego!

We are proud to announce that Transforming Technologies is the featured vendor for Qsource’s February Social Network Sale! Take 10% OFF select MT4500 Series Two-Layer Rubber ESD Table Mats by clicking the LIKE US button on Qsource’s Facebook and check the Coupon tab for the code.

While you are logged on to Facebook, don’t forget to check out our Transforming Technologies page and hit LIKE as well!

Season’s Greetings
Warmest Wishes for a wonderful holiday.

Learn more about Transforming Technologies EFM115 Electrostatic Fieldmeter.