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What us ESD testing?
When any digital product is manufactured, it is an essential requirement of the EMC directive that the product should be immune to ESD. ESD is the acronym for Electrostatic Discharge. Electrostatic Discharge may cause electrical devices to
malfunction, by causing an electrical short or a dielectric breakdown. Large scale ESD events are thunder and lightning. ESD causes sparks that can harm the device and its user. It causes failure of solid state electronic devices like integrated
circuits.
Therefore, in the industry, electronics are manufactured in areas free of electrostatic charges. Expensive manufacturing devices are protected by grounding the humans and providing anti-static devices. ESD testing devices are used to simulate ESD
and test the model devices.
What is ESD?
An ESD phenomenon begins when two materials, which are non-conductive, are rubbed together and separated. This causes electrons from one device to be transferred to another. The conductivity of the surface determines the rate at which the charge is
bled off the surface. The relative humidity determines largely the conductivity of the surface. When enough electron transfer takes place, a potential builds up between the two bodies and charge transfer takes place. This charge transfer or,
discharge of the body is the ESD. With proper ESD testing equipment, it is possible to immune a device against such situations.
Types of EDS testing setups
ESD testing setups can be of various types. They can be table top testing setups, or wall amounted, and they can be also floor standing test setups. The table top setup is placed on an insulated table, which is usually a wooden table, with a
horizontal coupling plane or a HCP. A HCP is usually an aluminium sheet. But the HCP is not a ground plane. It is connected to the ground reference with 470 kilo ohm resistors. This is done to isolate the HCP from the ground plane. The EUT in
the ESD testing setup is isolated from the HCP with a plastic sheet. The insulation needs to be continuous over the HCP so that there is not spark over the metalwork of the EUT and the HCP. Also, there is a Vertical coupling plane (VCP) connected to
the ground reference close to the EUT. There should be considerable space between the edges of the HCP and other metallic structures.
ESD testing setups can be floor standing too. These setups stand on a 10cm high pallet and s similar to the wall mounted setups. It allows easy movement of the EUT.
What are tested?
The test procedures include testing the device using air or contact or both. It is done by applying the charging probe to the horizontal and the vertical coupling planes. The points which should be tested should be available to the user during
normal use of the device. The points that are excluded from ESD testing are the following:
Points that are accessible during maintenance only, which will not be done by the end user.
Places that are not accessible after device installation
Shielded connectors.
Places that cannot be made ESD immune. They should however have an ESD warning label.
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