ESD advice at Nepcon

The British Electrostatic Control Association (BECA) will be on hand at Nepcon to advise on measures to combat ESD.

The British Electrostatic Control Association (BECA) will be on hand at Nepcon to advise on measures to combat ESD.

BECA was formed in 1987 and is the national body representing the major organisations concerned with the electrostatic control industry.

The aims of the association are to promote the awareness of the need for effective electrostatic monitoring and control procedures within industry.

BECA encourages good technical and commercial electrostatic procedures and actively supports interaction between members.

It has worked closely with the British Standards Institution to define and develop new standards.

The cost implications of unchecked static damage are considerable although there are no firm figures because every company has different cost structures.

But there is a rule of thumb guide to static damage costs.

If the damage is found at the single device stage, the cost to the company will be the accumulated costs of purchasing the device, its price, purchasing staff time, cost of raising orders, shipping, goods receiving costs, booking into the stock system, testing to find the failure, and so on.

For illustration purposes this cost is one unit.

However if the damaged device is not found until PCB test then the cost has increased ten-fold.

If the failure is found at system test then there is an increase in cost by a further factor of ten.

For a device that fails in the field, in front of the customer, then the cost is at least 1000 times that of finding it at goods in.

It may be considerably more, depending on where the device is when it fails - in a satellite, perhaps - not to mention the cost of goodwill and reputation.

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