Statguard Flooring - Questions And Answers

What happens if you staple ESD Bags shut? Does that damage the ESD Bag's effectiveness? What if the ESD Bag is heat sealed shut & a staple on the seam is used to attach paperwork?

Statshield® ESD Shielding Bags have a layer of metalized film which creates continuous conductive enclosure or Faraday Cage to provide electrostatic shielding protecting the ESD sensitive devices placed inside the Bag. The use of stapling to close ESD Bags is counter productive and not recommended. The metal staple provides a conductive path from the outside of the ESD Bag to the inside. The use of a metal staple would undermine the effectiveness of the ESD Bag making a conductive path for charges outside the Bag to charge outside the Bag to charge or discharge to ESD sensitive components inside the Bag.
To close the ESD Bag, it is recommended to heat seal, use ESD Labels, or antistatic Tape after the opening of the bag has been folded over.
Carefully locating the staple to only the seam of the Statshield® Bag would theoretically make it part of the "continuous conductive enclosure" and be acceptable. However, we are not aware of any end user using this method and cannot recommend it. The staple would be an exposed conductor that could charge or discharge to ESD sensitive devices.

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