Schaumburg Epoxy Flooring installs ESD flooring in Schaumburg, IL, serving surrounding cities including Wood Dale, Bensenville, Barrington, Prospect Heights and Winfield. An ESD floor is a resin floor with a job beyond durability: it carries static electricity to ground in a controlled way, so a person walking across the room does not deliver a damaging discharge to a circuit board or a server.
Static-dissipative and conductive floors are built from the same family of epoxy and urethane resins as our other commercial systems, with conductive primers, copper grounding strips and carbon-loaded or specially formulated topcoats. The difference is that the finished floor is measured with a meter and must land inside a specified resistance range. Our more than 20 years of preparing and coating slabs is what makes that measurement come out right.
We install ESD floors for electronics assembly and repair areas, server and telecom rooms, labs, clean manufacturing spaces and other rooms where an ESD control program governs the floor. Each of those spaces brings its own range, traffic and schedule, and the floor is specified around all three.
How an ESD Floor Works
Static Charge and Why the Floor Matters
Walking across an ordinary floor builds up static charge on the body, and touching a sensitive component can discharge it with no spark anyone notices. That discharge can damage or weaken electronics without obvious signs. An ESD floor, paired with grounded footwear, drains the charge continuously so it never builds high enough to cause harm.
The floor is one part of a system. Workstations, wrist straps, footwear and the building’s ground all have to work together, and the floor’s resistance range is set to match the rest of that system. We work from the specification your ESD coordinator, equipment vendor or design engineer provides.
Conductive and Static-Dissipative Ranges
Conductive floors have a lower resistance and drain charge quickly. Static-dissipative floors have a higher resistance and drain it more gradually. Which one a space needs depends on the components handled, the equipment in the room and the standard the facility follows, often ANSI/ESD S20.20. We do not choose the range by guesswork; we install to the range written into your program.
Grounding Points and Conductive Primers
An ESD system starts with a conductive primer that spreads charge across the floor, connected to copper grounding strips tied to the building’s ground at planned points. The topcoat sits over that layer. If the grounding layout is wrong or the primer coverage is uneven, parts of the floor will test out of range, so this step is planned before the first coat is mixed.
The number and spacing of ground points depend on the room’s size, its layout and the product’s instructions. We mark them on a plan before work starts, confirm the building ground they will tie into with your electrician, and photograph the strips before they are covered. That record matters later, when someone has to trace a reading that has drifted.
Building an ESD Floor on Concrete
Surface Preparation
Every ESD floor starts with diamond grinding or shot blasting to open the concrete, remove old coatings and contamination, and give the system the surface profile it needs. Cracks and joints are repaired so the conductive layers stay continuous. Poor preparation causes the same failures here as on any coating, plus electrical readings that drift out of range.
Moisture and the Slab Beneath
Moisture moving up through the slab can blister any resin floor, and on an ESD floor it can also change how the system conducts. We test with in-situ relative humidity probes or calcium chloride kits before installation, and where readings are high, a moisture-mitigation primer goes down first. Moisture is also the first exclusion on nearly every coating warranty.
Topcoats, Color and Wear
ESD topcoats come in a range of colors, often lighter grays that show the small conductive fibers or flecks in some products. They are chosen for the traffic in the room, from carts and chairs in a lab to pallet jacks in an electronics warehouse. Some systems add a dissipative wear layer that can be renewed without disturbing the grounding below.
Testing and Handover
Measuring Resistance on the Finished Floor
When the floor has cured, we test resistance point to ground and point to point with a calibrated meter, using the method your program calls for, such as ASTM F150 or ANSI/ESD STM7.1. Readings are taken across the floor in a grid and recorded. Areas that read outside the specified range are corrected before the floor is handed over.
We give you the test record along with the product data, so your ESD coordinator has a baseline to compare against during periodic audits. A floor that drifts later can then be traced to cleaning, wear or damage rather than to its installation.
Cleaning and Maintenance
Waxes, floor polishes and many general-purpose cleaners leave insulating films that raise the floor’s resistance over time. We provide the coating maker’s approved cleaners and methods and recommend periodic testing. Following that routine is the simplest way to keep the floor working as designed.
Where ESD Floors Are Used
Electronics, Server Rooms and Labs
Electronics assembly, repair benches, server and telecom rooms, testing labs and some medical and research spaces use ESD floors. Many sit in office and light-industrial buildings across the northwest suburbs, where the work has to fit around operating hours. We schedule installation during shutdowns or after hours and sequence rooms so critical equipment stays online.
Planning an ESD Floor Into a Fit-Out
In a new fit-out, the ESD floor should be planned with the electrical contractor so ground connections are where the layout needs them. Coordinating early avoids drilling through a finished floor to add a ground point later. Every product we use is selected within Illinois’ VOC limits for floor coatings as well.
- 20+ Years Coating Floors
- Moisture Tested Before Coating
- Written Contract on Every Home Job