In general, it is not a problem. The thing with static electricity
and vacuum cleaners is, though.
What happens is the dust inevitably has a charge, and when it gets
dragged through the hose, it deposits its charge in the vacuum
cleaner bin. As time goes on, that charge builds up, and discharges
to the motor, and if there is lots of dust, <<BOOM>>!
I was cleaning up sawdust from my basement floor one day, and
there was quite a lot. I was doing the area around my bandsaw,
and <<BUZZAAP>>! The largest bolt of static I have ever seen,
jumped between my elbow and the bandsaw's bed. It seemed to be
5 or so inches long. Plastic hoses are the pits.
I had a coworker once that wanted to clean up his TRS-80, and
asked about using a vacuum. I told him don't. He didn't listen,
and the next day came telling of how the TRS-80 was showing a
complete memory failure. Imagine.
Air passing through the hose potentially could deposit charge too,
but usually doesn't because the blow gun is metal, and you are holding
it, returning the charge back to ground. It would be quite different
if your compressor was passing quantities of dust... but most have
air filters.
-Chuck Harris
Dave Daniel kc0wjn@... [hp_agilent_equipment] wrote:
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I looked around for something similar a while back. I was thinking of the vacuums
used to clean out toner from printers (we used to have these when I worked for STK
Printer Ops). They had small nozzles and were very effective at cleaning up toner. I
wasn't able to find anything remotely affordable.
I've always wondered about using compressed air on static-sensitive electronics. It
seems to me to be a bad idea, ESD-wise, but I have no real experience.
DaveD
On 10/20/2017 9:31 PM, David Smith w6te@... [hp_agilent_equipment] wrote:
Greetings,
I was working on an HP 438A Power Meter yesterday which was absolutely filthy
inside. This thing must have been run 24/7 in a filthy environment over the years.
I had to replace the fan, as usual, so I went ahead and pulled the power supply
unit out to clean the dust and crap out of it. But, really, there was a layer of
thick dust all over the unit.
This got me to thinking… I need a better way of vacuuming and cleaning equipment
that comes in that I won’t be fearful of damaging the cmos devices. Mind you I have
a grounded ESD pad across my bench that equipment sits on when it is being worked
on and I always use a grounded wrist band on my wrist. I investigated some handheld
vacuum cleaners and discovered a few models that are electrostatically safe. The
cost was a bit of a shocker as they sold for around $375 USD!!! (They must be very
proud of their equipment.) What are the recommendations of the group for a hand
held vacuum cleaner that would be safe to use around sensitive electronic
equipment? I don’t mind spending $100 or so on something but $375 is a bit out of
the question.
Best regards,
Dave W6TE
Sent from Mail <> for Windows 10
