David Pratt wrote: >In a recent message, Kjeld Holm <[email protected]> writes >>I am about to install my subreceiver and would like to finish before the >>weekend but I have no ESD work place. How can I best protect the parts? Or >>do I have to wait until I can get the needed ESD equipment?
>Wear cotton clothing rather than nylon or highly static material; avoid >walking around on static-prone carpets. Wrap a length of bare copper >wire around your wrist and solder a 2 megohm resistor to it. Well, maybe do the soldering first... The resistor can be 1 megohm or anything else in that region. It purpose is to limit any ESD current surge, and also to limit any accidental shock current in your body. For both of those reasons, the resistor should be at least 250V rated, and the wrist band must be insulated from any accidental contact (except to yourself). >Connect >that to a nearby ground connection. Just ensure that the K3 is always >at the same potential as yourself by touching its frame regularly. > NO - that is completely the wrong way around! A "ground" connection to the Mother Planet will NOT ensure ESD protection. If done without proper understanding, it is more likely to *increase* the risks to both the equipment and yourself. The whole purpose of ESD protection is to minimize all voltage differences and current surges between your body and the electronic components, so connect your home-made wrist strap directly to the K3. Since you do not have a proper ESD mat, place the K3 and KRX3 on a sheet of aluminium foil. Before opening the anti-static bag containing the KRX3, leave the bag on the foil for a short time to allow any static potentials to equalize. You will then be working with a reasonable level of ESD protection. As it isn't necessary to connect any other mains-powered equipment or use a soldering iron while installing K3 option boards, grounding of the K3 and the sheet of foil is purely optional. -- 73 from Ian GM3SEK http://www.ifwtech.co.uk/g3sek ______________________________________________________________ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:[email protected] This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
