Safety footwear for electricians

What is the best safety footwear to work as an electrician? If you've ever wondered which footwear works best to protect yourself against electrical hazards. I'm going to tell you that there are several types of footwear for electricians but first I'm going to tell you what electrical conductivity is:

When we speak of electrical conductivity, we refer to the ability of a material to let electrical currents pass through it. This electrical conductivity defends us or not from electrical risks at work, these risks could be:

• Electrocution: is the one that occurs when contact is made with a material in electrical tension.
• Burns: they are produced by short circuits.
• Explosions: which occur due to the accumulation of electrostatic charges that generate sparks.

There are also levels of electrical conductivity, and each safety footwear has different ones, today we will talk about conductive, antistatic, ESD and dielectric footwear.

Conductive footwear

Conductive footwear is one that has a low level of electrical resistance, although sufficient to protect against the accumulation of electrostatic charges. What it does is reduce the chances of explosions, fires ...

That is, since their electrical resistance is low, the use of these is only recommended when the possibility of coming into contact with live materials is zero.

Antistatic footwear

These shoes are what prevent or reduce the accumulation of static electricity on a surface. This type of electricity is not dangerous by itself, but it can generate sparks that can be dangerous.

They created this type of footwear to avoid the risks of conductive footwear since the antistatic has an electrical resistance greater than the conductor.

The materials of this type of shoes are usually rubber and polyurethane for their antistatic properties.

The disadvantage of these shoes is that they have little resistance to the passage of current and therefore the wearer could receive an electrocution. Therefore, it is recommended only for those who have to face possible leakage currents or static currents that can be produced by inadequate earth connections. I for those who are charged with static electricity due to the work area in which they are, such as toilets, they need to wear shoes with antistatic properties

ESD footwear

This type of footwear is similar to antistatic but with protection taken to the extreme.

ESD footwear is one with a maximum level of protection against electrostatic charges. They are used in work with printed circuits or those carried out in clean rooms, in which a minimum static charge can cause a serious accident. What this type of footwear does is divert loads to the outside.

Dielectric footwear

Finally, we are talking about dielectric footwear or also known as insulator, which is one designed to protect the worker who works with electricity, so these shoes have a very high electrical resistance to prevent electricity from circulating through the worker's body.

To make sure that this type of footwear works perfectly, they carry out their tests on water since water is the greatest conductor of electricity that exists.

The materials of these boots are usually rubber or polymeric materials.

So what footwear should I buy?

If you have come this far and want to buy some electrician shoes, I recommend that you visit our website, I also leave you here 8 recommendations of our best shoes.

 

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