this post was submitted on 06 Jul 2023
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Electronics in fabric
I built my computer on my bed. It's not a big deal. If its ESD damage you're woried about then you need to know that the risk for the average person is way overblown. I used to work in an electronics plant where doing in depth ESD audits was a regular part of my job. We has ESD coatings/mats on the floors, ESD coatings/mats on the tables, ESD bags, ESD carts, ESD trays, a 3D printer with ESD resin for making tooling, ESD smocks, ESD training for all employees, wrist straps, foot straps, humidification systems, and daily testing of all equipment. I still just built my computer on my bed. ESD damage is only really a big concern when you're doing mass production of electronics where things are being repeatedly handled and the rare failures will actually amount to something. If you're just working on something on your own then most ESD measures aren't worth it. Just be sure the first part of the component you touch is a ground plane and touch the case before doing anything inside it. If you do that then you're fine.
I agree, 99% of the time you'll be fine but.... I have had a bed sheet come out of the dryer with so much static that once it was on the bed you could move your hand over it and see spark discharges like mini lightning. Freaked me out, was late enough that at first I just noticed a weird faint blue glow.
At the same time though I once arced nearly 2000 volts at 10mA directly through an IC multiple times before I caught it due to some fucked up wiring durring a hi pot test. The IC was still perfectly fine afterwords and passed all tests. Of course I still replaced it because there's no way I would ship that to a customer. But you would be surprised by the amount of abuse modern electronics can take.
Static is definitely easy to come by but the odds of it actually doing any harm are very low.
It's free anyway. Probably no ESD damage either. People always overexaggerate the risk of it.
this linus + electroboom video shows them actively trying to kill hardware with a electrostatic discharge gun, while they succeed a few times, it's not that easy, but of course you should still be careful
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nXkgbmr3dRA