Those with lightning storms, how do you protect electronics?

[EddieWalker]

You cannot protect a house against lightning. Every thing you buy is just a waste of money that might make you feel good, but will not do anything to stop lightning. The only preventative thing that you can do is buy insurance to replace what is destroyed.

Client of mine had some trees hit by lightning in her back yard in the middle of Tyler. The lightning traveled down the trees, across her lawn, to her natural gas pipe line, and then through the ground wires into her pane, and then to her electronics in her house, frying everything. Multiple breakers melted inside her box, yet the lights and outlets where fine. TV's, computer, phones, microwave, dryer and a few other things all died. She had surge protectors on the TV and Computer. They didn't do anything.

 

[Industrial Toys]

Appliances that have electronic controls have switches that I can turn them off. It's a pain to get up in the middle of the night to shut stuff off, when lightning storms approach, and then dealing with the stupid microwave that needs to have the time and date put back in. But I have no insurance. And really, if you do use insurance, they get their money back out of you anyway.

It's amazing how many perfectly good and fairly new appliance you see at the dump just because the electronics got blown up. Yup, that's progress! It would be fine if you could buy them (the circuit boards) for what they cost (maybe fifty bucks) and not 800!

 

[txdon]

You cannot protect a house against lightning. Every thing you buy is just a waste of money that might make you feel good, but will not do anything to stop lightning. The only preventative thing that you can do is buy insurance to replace what is destroyed.

Client of mine had some trees hit by lightning in her back yard in the middle of Tyler. The lightning traveled down the trees, across her lawn, to her natural gas pipe line, and then through the ground wires into her pane, and then to her electronics in her house, frying everything. Multiple breakers melted inside her box, yet the lights and outlets where fine. TV's, computer, phones, microwave, dryer and a few other things all died. She had surge protectors on the TV and Computer. They didn't do anything.

When you get a direct hit I totally agree, nothing will help. I have seen lightning hit a tree jump to the house jump to the wiring in the attic and go out of the outlet in a bedroom and catch the bed on fire. I think the surge protectors are just that, surge protection , not direct hits protection, probably for lightning in the distance (miles) that by the time it travels on the wire it has simmered down a bit.

Even in just a surge
My stove was turned off and so was the washer but without surge protection the circuit boards were still fried. The only way is to disconnect the wiring, not just turn the electronic switch off.

I complained to the electric company that They should not advertise to used energy efficient products if their supply only destroys the products in a simple electrical storm. That is when they sent a crew out with the top of the pole surge protector.

 

[Fuddy1952]

As a kid my brother and I saw ball lightning in the 1950s. We were downstairs and this spinning fireball came out of the sky, landed on the power lines and came into the house. It was about soccer ball sized, moved slowly along, then we smelled smoke. Went upstairs and his mattress was smoldering. We called fire department. He had a tube AM radio by his bed, antenna wire went down behind bed.
I still have radio and it works.

 

[Industrial Toys]

Should have called Mulder and Scully for that one!

 

[Arky217]

If you're rural, don't forget about your well pump !

It's one thing to simply buy another TV or computer,
but if lightning fries the well pump, well, those of you
that have had to pull a deep submersible pump for
replacement know what I mean.

For my well pump I bought a quality brand (Gould)
and I specifically got a 120 volt model and wired it
to a plug end and wired the breaker to a plug receptacle.
So when a storm is approaching, I simply unplug
the pump. This method eliminates all wiring paths
to the pump, even the ground.

The 120 volt pump also made it convenient to operate
with my Hondi 2000 generator when the electric
goes out (ice storm, etc.).

 

[Fuddy1952]

From what I've seen, and also lots mention here, lightning is not attracted to ground. My farmhouse when I bought it in 1980 had aluminum siding, never had lightning problems. Then I had it replaced with vinyl and problems started.
The garage is very tall on a hill, never had lightning problems, but it's steel panel and well grounded.
The next roof I put on house I'll really consider steel and ground it. My old tall tobacco barn I had a new roof put on a few years ago, galvanized, and I connected both roof sections with bare copper wire going to a copper driven ground, same ground for electric fence charger ground. The output wire goes around buildings about 5" off ground, insulators every corner to keep groundhogs away.

 

[JPRambo]

If you are serious about surge protection you need to spent $2 - 300 for a whole house panel mounted surge arrester. Read the instructions and follow them. Make the connecting wires as short and as straight as possible. Here in SW Florida we get lighting with every rain. I have not lost anything in 25 years.

 

[JRobyn]

I installed whole-house suppressors in each of our SquareD panels, and have sensitive electronic stuff powered through inexpensive UPSs. But I think the BEST thing I did was to drive in THREE ground rods connected out at the meter base.

I'm not sure I care all that much anymore about the "sensitive electronic stuff" when it's 3am, the power went out at 1am and we've listened to "beep-beep.....beep-beep....beep-beep....beep-beep" from the helpful UPSs for 2 hours!

 

[k0ua]

Again, I have decades of experience trying to protect telecom equipment from lightning surges. Good quality surge arrestors do work. The cheap and simple ones containing MOV's don't do much. Anything made by polyphaser is top notch. Of course anything that comes in and melts wires and blows out pipes and makes big holes in your roof. Heck no, your dang surge arrestor is not going to help. But for all of those surges that come in on power and communication lines, yes the proper surge arrestors work and work very well. I know I have solved hundreds of problem sites with the proper application of these arrestors, and proper grounding. The best arrestor in the world will not work without proper grounding. How do you all think cell phone sites stay on the air? Think about it.

Lightning Protection For Industrial Applications - PolyPhaser