Do you have a whole house surge protector?

[dennis thompson]

I’m thinking about getting a whole house surge protector. I’d appreciate any input from those of you who have one or anyone who has any info on them.
Thanks

[Ralph Okonieski]

I had one installed this past February. It has not tripped yet so can not testify to its effectiveness. I am happy I did have it installed and would do it again. Had some other electrical work done so the cost was part of that.

[Bill Dufour]

I actually installed two. One in the garage panel and one in the sub panel in the garage. Both Square D QO panels so easy to install. Bought on ebay for about $40 each. Install as close to main breaker as possible for maximum protection. Mine is a simple snap in breaker style with one neutral wire. takes up a twin breaker slot.
Other panel makers may have similar.
Main house pnael is Zinsco so no luck there. Hope to replace that panel in two years.
Bill D
Bill D

[Lee Schierer]

When we installed our new central geo-thermal heat pump a whole house surge protector was required for the full warranty. I installed it myself on the main panel, I think it took about 20 minutes. So far all the lights are green and we've had no issues with any electronics.

[Bill Dufour]

[QUOTE=Ralph Okonieski;3206122]I had one installed this past February. It has not tripped yet so can not testify to its effectiveness.
I have no idea how I would know if it tripped or not. It does have green LED. If that is not light it has tripped too many times and the MOSFET is burned out.
Bill D

[Bill Dufour]

It i highly recommended that you have one for the shop panel. Every time a big machine is turned off there can be a back surge into the house wiring. That and a vacuum cleaner cause most surges in the house here. We get very little lightening that strikes the ground here.
Bill D

[Dave Zellers]

The warranty required that we install a surge protector when we had our mini split installed a bit over a year ago. Both lights are still green so like the others, it looks like it has been all clear since then.

I think it is a good idea given how many circuit boards are now in the average home.

[Jason Roehl]

I put one in because my wife works at an electrical supply business, and was able to get one at almost half of retail, so I bought one of the biggest they sold. I figured it was well worth it, considering we have quite a few electronic devices in the house—not just TVs and computers, but appliances and the like can get wiped out by a lightning strike on the grid, too.

Simple to install—just have to piggyback the two hot leads onto either the main breaker, or a large 240V breaker, like for an electric dryer or range. My only tricky part was that I had to drill a hole in the breaker panel box to mount the unit and run the wires—it’s an old Pushmatic panel, and didn’t have knockouts where I needed one.

[Ole Anderson]

I installed an Intermatic over ten years ago. Still has two red lights.

[Stan Calow]

The power company here has been pushing them pretty hard. I signed up last month after we had several outages and lightning storms in a short period of time, and a pretty spectacular display of arcing and transformer explosions a block away. They offered three levels of protection, which is really about how much insurance for damages. I picked the lowest. They installed it while no one was home. All work on the outside at the meter. I didnt think I could reset myself if it trips, but will look into it.

[Monte Milanuk]

At a previous job, the utility company I was working for was starting to promote those. The caveat was, that 'we' (the 'distribution' substation technicians) had to do the install, since we did actually have the gear to build and and test equipment grounds. I don't mean like 'clamp a wire to a water pipe and call it good', I mean build a substation ground grid and test the ground resistance (in micro ohms) at a precribed distance to ensure that the fault current would follow the desired path.

The problem was that around there (western Nebraska) the soil was so dang sandy that it was a massive PITA to get decent grounding at a substation. For some random house... pretty sure they'd have to put in *multiple* ground rods (all cad-welded together) to get a low enough resistance. Luckily, I moved on before that project took off. Not my monkey, not my circus.

That's not to say that I'm not generally in favor of the concept. It's just that if someone is peddling it as a quick fix, they're either snake-oil salesmen (aka marketing), or don't know WTF they're talking about - or both.

[Kev Williams]

I've often wondered about the effectiveness of any surge protector- especially considering there's been 3 lightning strikes in 2 different houses I've lived in, where in 2 instances individual surge protectors did nothing at all to save the equipment connected to them. When we got our first computer controlled engraving machine back in 1981 it came with a plug-in surge protector, the machine and the Apple IIe computer that ran it were plugged into it. Lighting hit the CB antenna, and we ended up replacing the microwave, mom's small stereo, two TV's, and the Daughter-Board in the Apple. The machine proper showed no ill effects but the computer wouldn't load fonts. The surge protector, which was a one-use-only thing, its light was still on like nothing happened. In August of '91, during my first ever phone call with my now-wife who called me back after our first meet, while I was on a cordless AT&T phone with a long metal antenna no less, and my 2 'weekend' kids were sitting in the living room, BOOOOMM!! And for the next 5 seconds, my entire stereo system which was OFF, was lit up all kinds of bright, the four overhead florescent tubes in the fixture above the kitchen table that were also OFF, were lit. My daughter was scratching her arms from the tingle she felt. My son yelled 'it's like a laser light show in here!' -- Best I recall my TV and stereo system was plugged into a protected power strip, and it didn't seem to help. Or maybe it did and prevented a fire? But the power strip was none the worse for wear. However, to this day my Carver C2000 Preamp has an always-on power switch and a fried time-delay circuit board. How I didn't get zapped on the phone I don't know?

Best part of the story, we looked at the lightning strike during our first phone call as serendipity; we ended up getting married 6 weeks after we met, going on 31 years ago :D

Oh- back on topic ;) - does anyone have a story where a surge protector did work?

[Jason Roehl]

I installed an Intermatic over ten years ago. Still has two red lights.

Mine (also an Intermatic) has a single green light. When that goes away, there is no resetting, just replacement.

[Frank Pratt]

There is a class of surge suppressor that, in the event of a surge that it can't handle, has fusible elements that will completely clear the load from the utility. I installed one on a 600A, 3 phase service once that fed an installation that was critical and had the essential loads on battery back up.

[roger wiegand]

Never had one. I put sensitive loads (like our server) on a UPS that incorporates low level surge suppression then plug it into a standalone surge suppressor. Haven't yet lost anything, either on or off the UPS. A lightning strike can be a million Joules. How do you decide how big is big enough? I'm pretty sure my system would get fried in a direct hit.

[Ole Anderson]

A whole house surge protector is an inexpensive first line of defense in case of, well, surges in power. Nothing will stop a direct lightening hit. Second line of defense is surge protectors or UPS at critical components.

[Jason Roehl]

A lightning strike can be a million Joules. How do you decide how big is big enough? I'm pretty sure my system would get fried in a direct hit.

I don’t think anyone is trying to protect from a “direct hit.” But, many times a strike that is a little ways away can be easily attenuated, when it would fry unprotected equipment. I’ve definitely lost a few items over the years that I suspect went bad during thunderstorms, but nothing since I’ve put in the whole-house surge suppressor, and have never lost anything on a UPS. Most electronics end up on 6-port surge protectors anyway, just because they tend to be clustered with other electronic items, and I need the extra receptacles to run everything.

[Bill Dufour]

When we replaced our refrigerator I installed an surge protector outlet to protect the computerized controller. Under $20 and as easy as replacing an outlet. I would not have bothered unless we were pulling the fridge anyway. No room for a extension cord type protector. I also did one for the tv wall mount outlet.
BillD

[Stan Calow]

This reminded me that a couple of years ago, a surge took out my garage door opener (and only that). The repairman stronlgly suggested putting an outlet surge protector on that as he said they were pretty sensitive. He'd been working on those (replacing circuit board) all week. I'd have never thought of that on my own.

[Jim Becker]

This reminded me that a couple of years ago, a surge took out my garage door opener (and only that). The repairman stronlgly suggested putting an outlet surge protector on that as he said they were pretty sensitive. He'd been working on those (replacing circuit board) all week. I'd have never thought of that on my own.
This is even more important for those of us that have "connected" door opener systems...they are computers. The surge units are not going to help with a major hit, but as Jason mentioned, they will help with a lot of the smaller ones. Those occur more often than many folks realize.

[Derek Meyer]

I have Siemen's breaker-style surge suppressors in both my panels. In 19 years I've had to replace one of them. They were about $130 when I had to replace one.

I've never lost anything to surge and never had a lightning strike near enough to cause damage, but I've lost a couple of Tivo DVR units when the power went out. Undervoltage is a real problem for electronics, as they then try to draw more current to use the same power. I try to keep all of my sensitive equipment on line-interactive UPS units (I prefer APC). The line-interactive units monitor the incoming voltage and correct it up to line level, going on battery as needed. I might try out on of the double-conversion units for my expensive computer, which runs the equipment off the battery at all times, effectively isolating it from the line voltage. They are more expensive but it is the best protection for sensitive/expensive electronics. The voltage output is also a true sine wave, so it is good for high-end audio components.

[Scott T Smith]

I live in a rural area and we experience routine power surges. One of my kilns uses PLC's that cost around $500.00 each. I used to have to replace at least one a year due to power surges.

After installing a "whole house surge arrestor" on my primary load center, PLC lifespan improved dramatically. Now I'm getting 5 - 6 years of life out of them.

However, it does not seem to help protect my Pioneer mini-split (the Mitsubishi has not had problems). I'm losing a board on the Pioneer at least once a year after a power surge.

YMMV.

[Alan Lightstone]

Living in the lightning capital of the US, we fear lightning all summer. My son's apartment complex got hit 2 weeks ago, and they are still waiting for replacement parts for the elevator, the entry gates, and the fire alarms that went off constantly for 5 hours the other night.

We had a direct hit about 20 years ago. Fried $52K worth of electronics. All had UPS/surge suppressors. Nothing stops the damage from a direct hit (and we think ours likely entered the house via the cable system, not AC, then fried a number of not plugged in devices through the network cables).

I actually was seriously considering a lightning protection system (emits ionic particles, I think, so that your neighbor's house gets fried instead of yours.) When all my home theater components got fried, I went into Best Buy to look for replacements. They couldn't show me anything, because they were hit by lightning the night before, and that fried lots of things. The salesman seemed confused, as they had installed an expensive lightning protection system on the store, and it hadn't work. That pretty well killed the thought of me buying one...

I gave up using UPS units on everything. The yearly cost of batteries got absurd, and UPS batteries that used to last 5 years, then 3 years, then 2 years, then yearly replacement. I used to put dates on all the UPS batteries. Amazing how they are crap now.

So, long response, but sure, why not put on a whole house surge suppressor. But don't expect them to protect you if you have a direct hit. Probably help with surges, though. And don't forget the cable entry too.

[John Pariseau]

I have one for my shop, but haven't installed it yet. I'm inclined to put it in as we've had two surges in the recent past. One blew a power strip (TVS diode) and tripped several breakers. It wasn't lightning. The other incident blew a TVS diode board in our garage door opener. After replacing the board (~$11.00) it's worked fine since. I'm a firm believer in them.

[Derek Meyer]

Alan, there is a new breed of UPS units that use lithium-ion batteries, which tend to last much longer in use.

I've had APC units for a long time and replace batteries every 3 to 4 years, whenever the unit tells me it needs one. One of my units is about 10 years old now and is on its third or fourth battery. The next time it fails, I'll likely replace it with a li-on model, but as it is a 2U rackmount 1500VA unit, it will be rather expensive to replace.

[Alan Lightstone]

Alan, there is a new breed of UPS units that use lithium-ion batteries, which tend to last much longer in use.

Derek:

Who makes them?

[Keith Outten]

I second Roger's advice that nothing protects against a lightning strike. In a bad electrical storm I unplug the expensive machines in my shop. Can't say that we have ever had a big electrical surge here, the only time we suffered any damage was a lightning strike.

[Bill Dufour]

Never seen one on a house in California but I hear back east lightening rods are no longer used on houses. Theory of a lightening rod is it draws off the charge before it gets hig h enough voltage to arc to ground, so no actual strikes.
BilLD

[Derek Meyer]

Derek:

Who makes them?

APC and Eaton make some, but they look like they are targetted for network server/equipment applications. There is a company called Vertiv that makes a like of Li-on UPS units, the PSI5 series. They look to have a smaller unit that can be used for desktop applications. I have no experience with this company.

Derek

[Alan Lightstone]

APC and Eaton make some, but they look like they are targeted for network server/equipment applications. There is a company called Vertiv that makes a like of Li-on UPS units, the PSI5 series. They look to have a smaller unit that can be used for desktop applications. I have no experience with this company.

Derek
My guess is pretty pricey. I'd personally rather hook it up to my Tesla, but that's a whole other story...

Actually, just looked some up on APC's website. Yes, rack mounted, so really designed for servers.

To cover my computer's power requirements, the cheapest unit they sell would cost $3K, and provide backup power for only 3 minutes. A big no for that one. :eek:

[Brian Elfert]

My parents had the control board in their furnace go out at least once a year. The HVAC tech recommended a good surge protector. I had a real nice (and expensive even open box) SurgeX surge protector I ended up not using and gave it to my father to protect his furnace. No more control board failures since 2014 or 2015 when he installed it.