Ernie:
Yes, conductive paints are best reserved for when other factors dictate their use. Adhesion is tricky, the paint provides no gap-filling effect, and mechanical wear is a problem too. The first question to answer is how often the customer will need to open and close the mating surfaces. If the box gets sealed and never touched, you could get good performance from just aluminum foil taping the seams after mating. OTOH, if this is a cover that opens several times a day, they you need to use something mechanically robust, like BeCu fingerstock or a braided gasket I would try to use a conductive chemical treatment first. Most or our enclosures are aluminum, so a conductive chem-film treatment is our preference. You mentioned rust, so I assume the enclosure is steel. For a steel box, you could simply tin the mating surfaces and use a knit mesh braid gasket. Very old-school! You could also fabricate the enclosure from galvanized plated steel. If all you want to do is fix the existing one field enclosure, then there are conductive plating solutions (silver and other), that you can apply to the mating surfaces. Ed Price ed.pr...@cubic.com <blocked::mailto:ed.pr...@cubic.com> WB6WSN NARTE Certified EMC Engineer Electromagnetic Compatibility Lab Cubic Defense Applications San Diego, CA USA 858-505-2780 Military & Avionics EMC Is Our Specialty > -----Original Message----- > From: emc-p...@ieee.org [mailto:emc-p...@ieee.org] On Behalf Of Ernest > Rayman > Sent: Thursday, December 17, 2009 6:06 AM > To: emc-p...@ieee.org > Subject: Conductive Paint > > We had en enclosure built and the sheet metal people powder coated > every metal to metal contact surface. > We have had a couple of systems misbehave in the field and it is an > immunity issue. > > We have scraped all the powder coating off the metal to metal mating > surfaces but we do not like the bare metal because it will eventually > start to rust. > I have looked into a couple of conductive paints that we can use but > the lead engineer has expressed a distrust and dislike of conductive > paints. > > I am looking for suggestions about what conductive paint you have used > with success and if there are other options for rust control this late > in the game. > > Thank you for all your help and Happy Holidays to everybody, > Ernest Rayman - This message is from the IEEE Product Safety Engineering Society emc-pstc discussion list. To post a message to the list, send your e-mail to <emc-p...@ieee.org> All emc-pstc postings are archived and searchable on the web at http://www.ieeecommunities.org/emc-pstc Graphics (in well-used formats), large files, etc. can be posted to that URL. Website: http://www.ieee-pses.org/ Instructions: http://listserv.ieee.org/request/user-guide.html List rules: http://www.ieee-pses.org/listrules.html For help, send mail to the list administrators: Scott Douglas <emcp...@socal.rr.com> Mike Cantwell <mcantw...@ieee.org> For policy questions, send mail to: Jim Bacher <j.bac...@ieee.org> David Heald <dhe...@gmail.com>
