Big Squeegee and static

[acothran]

I received my first Big Squeegees this week (26" yard sign model and the 54" laminator model) and used the 54" for the first time yesterday. I was mounting non-laminated Oracal 3951RA to 4' x 8' sheets of coroplast. The Big Squeegee worked wonders and took no time to learn but I had one issue.....static electricity. I notice about halfway through the sheet, it became very hard to push and this was mainly caused by the backing paper clinging to the coro due to static cling. I did a search and someone mentioned rubbing the substrate with dryer sheets but they didn't say if that works.

I was just wondering if any of you have had this problem and if so, is there a remedy that works for you?

 

[The Big Squeegee]

Half the battle in the fight against static is knowing what causes it. Rubbing paper or plastic against plastic will generate an excess of electrons. This causes an imbalance of charge in regards to ground. The excess also causes a build up of attraction to one another.

I have found that if I set up a ground wire so that the plastic rests on it, the excess electrons will bleed off through the wire. Increasing humidity also works.

 

[Salmoneye]

Hey Dale, I was thinking about doing something similar, do you gust let your wire go down the table and touch the concrete or do you actually have the wire grounded securely? I also thought about running a copper wire from the top of my printer so that it hangs off the back to the ground. It would lightly contact the roll of media and I wondered if that would dissipate the static that screws up some of my prints and makes dust want to stick to everything. What do you think?

 

[TheSnowman]

Dale made a good point on the video I posted the other day. I used a metal pole to hold the board from pushing away from me while I pushed towards it...and that pole also probably served as some kind of grounding method, because I don't have too much trouble with static. Yes, I get some...but it's not too bad. I never gave that a thought.

 

[The Big Squeegee]

Static

As I mentioned before, understanding static is half the battle. I will attempt to provide an answer to where it comes from and ways to get rid of it. Hopefully this understanding will help you to choose the best way to deal with the particular static problem you're having.

Production of static is from moving an insulated storage device along the earths magnetic flux. Our bodies act as a storage device because it is insulated from the earth through rubber soles and carpet. When we rub plastic together, the molecules line up to act like many tiny magnets. It holds the electrons in the magnets until the electrons have a path to ground.

There are several ways to combat static:

Direct ground. The best ground is one that has a metal connection to the earth. Grounding to conduit or a wall outlet is the most used for this. Printers should be well grounded to eliminate static.

Humidity. The moisture in the air is enough to provide a path to eliminate most static. The higher the humidity the less static you will have to deal with.

Indirect grounding. This grounding method is useful when the other two methods are inconvenient. The object is to make a ground through insulators with a moving object such as a work table or yourself. You may also have a situation like the vinyl in the printer producing static. The method is really quite simple. High strength magnets are placed so that the magnetic fields intersect both ground and the object needing grounded. I have tried the iron Ferrite magnets and they do not do the job. They have to be the high strength ones.

I have placed them on the bottom of my shoes and it has eliminated the shock treatment at the light switches and such. This may be one way to get away from the build up of electrons while mounting vinyl. I also put them on the bottom of trash cans so the plastic dust don't go circus act on me.

You should also avoid keeping the magnets on you without a ground as the magnets will absorb the excess electrons and store them to the capacity of the magnet. When you touch something, the shock will be much greater. This is not a problem with iron ferrite magnets.

Hope this helps.