grounding and surge
 

Greetings all. As of late we've been getting some incredible thunderstorms
with enough hits to think it's a war. Anyway some of my equipment has
suffered and I'm looking for ideas to better protect everything in my house.
Is a whole house surge protector the answer? Do I have to wrap the house in
a metal grid? Any help or ideas would help. Everything is properly grounded
just to start. I haven't had a direct hit but close enough....
Thanks for any input.

There are four main entry points for ligthning.
Radio antennas
AC main power
Telco
CATV/Satellite

http://www.polyphaser.com/ppc_ptd_home.aspx
Is a good place to start.

Good protection won't be cheap. And according to some
who live in FL, the strikes there are intense enough to
defeat even good protection.

I have survived on direct strick that vaporised coax and
antenna, and several near by strikes that took out nearby
trees with no damage.

Good protection will also require a good, low resistance
ground. Not a casual project.

Terry

I use a Brickwall surge filter,model 8R15 www.pricewheeler.com
www.brickwall.com For my computer,I use an APC model 1000 battery
back up. www.apc.com Your phone company can add a lightning strike
protector where your phone line enters your home or building,there might
be a monthly charge added to your phone bill for that.
cuhulin

On Tue, 02 Aug 2005 09:22:01 GMT, "finalquest"
wrote:


Greetings all. As of late we've been getting some incredible thunderstorms
with enough hits to think it's a war. Anyway some of my equipment has
suffered and I'm looking for ideas to better protect everything in my house.
Is a whole house surge protector the answer? Do I have to wrap the house in
a metal grid? Any help or ideas would help. Everything is properly grounded
just to start. I haven't had a direct hit but close enough....
Thanks for any input.


Move to the desert.

Hello.

I have whole-house protection as well as individual surge protectors
and/or UPS units on each and every one of my electronic components.
These certainly offer adequate protection except, of course, against a
direct lightning strike such as a "bolt from the blue," for which there
is no advance warning. (My antennas are all indoor types; my main
antenna, a Wellbrook ALA330S, is mounted in my attic. So these antennas
do not have to be physically disconnected from my radios during a storm
as it is imperative to do with outdoor ones.)

Even so, when my equipment is not in actual use, everything is
unplugged (including the power supply to the Wellbrook antenna). I have
written about this, and its importance, before. While it may seem a
"pain" to unplug all the time, believe me, you soon get used to it and
the peace-of-mind it affords makes it well-worth the small effort
required.

Best,

Joe

I'd like to thank everybody for the help..... I won't be moving to the
desert though. After speaking with the local electric utility I'm going for
the whole house surge protector with smaller plug in units for all
electronics. The APC units are under consideration.

Thanks !





"finalquest" wrote in message
ink.net...
Greetings all. As of late we've been getting some incredible thunderstorms
with enough hits to think it's a war. Anyway some of my equipment has
suffered and I'm looking for ideas to better protect everything in my
house. Is a whole house surge protector the answer? Do I have to wrap the
house in a metal grid? Any help or ideas would help. Everything is
properly grounded just to start. I haven't had a direct hit but close
enough....
Thanks for any input.

www.lightningstorm.com A few years ago I saw a science or discovery
tv program that said lightning starts at the bottom and travels up.
cuhulin

cuhulin:

absolutely, with ultra-high-speed-cams you can actually see it...

John

wrote in message
...
www.lightningstorm.com A few years ago I saw a science or discovery
tv program that said lightning starts at the bottom and travels up.
cuhulin

On Tue, 2 Aug 2005 17:59:42 -0700, "John Smith"
wrote:


cuhulin:

absolutely, with ultra-high-speed-cams you can actually see it...

John

wrote in message
...
www.lightningstorm.com A few years ago I saw a science or discovery
tv program that said lightning starts at the bottom and travels up.
cuhulin



There's a strike in each direction, no?

I believe you have completely missed the point made by
. Somehow you think a surge protector
is surge protection. During the surge, a wire or a surge
protector does the same thing. And both are only as effective
as the earth ground they connect to. Even the world's best
'whole house' protectors is no better than a plug-in
protectors without the most critical component in a surge
protection 'system'. Single point earth ground defines the
quality of that protection.

Why is a 'whole house' protector effective? If it makes a
short connection to earth, then the protector is doing as Ben
Franklin demonstrated in 1752. What do plug-in protectors
(especially APC) forget to mention to sell their grossly
overpriced and undersized protectors? Earth ground. What did
define when he was discussing effective
protection? Earth ground. What did the utility customer
service rep (who probably has no experience with what another
division of the utility deals with often) not mention?
Earthing.

Take the money mostly wasted on plug-in protectors to
address the one component required in every protection system
- earth ground. First and foremost, every incoming utility
must make a connection to the same earthing point when
entering a building. This connection is either using a direct
hardwired connection (ie CATV, satellite dish) or via a 'whole
house' protectors (AC electric and telephone). The telco
already installs a 'whole house' protector for free. How
effective is it? What kind of earth ground did you provide
for the telco to connect to?

Notice CATV has no protector nor is a protector needed. A
connection to earth ground is via a hard wire. No protector
required because that wire does the same function.

This figure from the NIST demonstrates why improperly
earthed incoming utilities result in fax machine damage. Even
the protectors are not effective. Why? Earthing defines
protection (or in this case, lack of protection):
http://www.epri-peac.com/tutorials/sol01tut.html

A surge protector is only as effective as its earth ground.
Earthing (not a protector) is the protection. Those who
promote the protector instead of earth ground clearly don't
know why or what makes protectors effective. Better spent
money is on the earthing system; not on undersized,
overpriced, and ineffective plug-in protectors.

finalquest wrote:
I'd like to thank everybody for the help..... I won't be moving to
the desert though. After speaking with the local electric utility
I'm going for the whole house surge protector with smaller plug in
units for all electronics. The APC units are under consideration.