Some have come to me and asked me this question with the preface, “I have a dumb question to ask you.” I prefer to think that there are no such thing as dumb questions. Actually, I believe that if a person is thinking about the issue to this degree, then they really are in problem solving mode and are genuinely trying to get to a reasonable answer which is great. They are actually trying to learn the ins and outs of static elimination. And so, that is what we are here to do. Educate the customer and help to find the solution to their problem.

So what is the answer, you ask?  The answer is yes you do need to put a static eliminator on both sides of a sheet material which is being stacked or un-stacked for that matter. The reason is that static is an imbalance of electrons that cannot move (i.e. static = stationary). And so, when you eliminate a given charge on one side of a material, that does not eliminate the charge on the opposite side (again, because the static charge does not move from one side to the other if one side is neutralized). Also, static elimination does not work “through” a material to achieve the desired effect. Electrostatic fields are a phenomenon that manifest themselves only on the surface of a material due to its non-conductive nature.

Please feel free to contact us if you have any questions whether you might think they are dumb or not. We will do our best to help you out.

Neal Raker
Application Engineer
nealraker@exair.com