quote:

Originally posted by Excam_Man:
What brand is your electrical panel?

That I have no idea of.

Companies like Square D have surgebreakers, they simply plug onto the buss like a normal breaker and then you connect the white wire.

With a surge breaker you’ve only got 20-50,000A surge protection. With the Siemens FS140 you have 140,000A surge protection.

I live in SWFL so we get lightning strikes. I had an electrician install full home surge protectors on t=all main boxes per his recommendation. We took a hit nearby two weeks ago while away. It knocked out our home cameras and our garage electric outlets meaning my garage freezer and refrigerator were off. What a rotten mess, literally. The surge protectors work but electricity is unpredictable. My electrician surmised that a nearby ground strike back fed the ground and fried the garage outlet. The refrigerator came back to life but the freezer was DOA.

Just following up on this thread for anyone interested. The Siemens surge protector was close to $200 with tax, the electrician charged me $325 to install it..including a couple of small parts I needed. I’m sure I overpaid for the installation, he was here for maybe an hour. They are a very reputable company though and I had to pay a service call fee to get them out so there was no point in canceling at that point. I’m glad it’s done at any rate.

I thought I would throw this in, as it is related...

One year, we had a power outage at our home. There was no storm, the power simply went out in our neighborhood - I never knew what the cause was.

When the power came back on, our furnace would not turn on. We called the HVAC service company, and they determined the blower motor was bad, apparently as a result of a surge at the time the outage happened. It was one of those fancy variable-speed blower motors, and it cost us $900 to replace.

We had the HVAC repair service document the cause on the service receipt. My wife, who worked for a power company (but not the one that services our area), decided to submit the receipt to the power company to see if they would reimburse for the repair. We indicated in the letter the exact time and duration of the outage. At the time, I laughed and told her, "Good Luck"! as I never expected to hear anything.

Lo and behold, a few weeks later we got a check from the power company for the full $900!

As I said, this was just an outage not due to a storm. You might give this a try if you have a similar experience.

^^ Good advice

I'm used to installing lightning protection in High Voltage Substations . Explain how they can rate this thing for 140ka while being wired with what I'm going to assume is #12 wire and a 20 amp breaker . Also , what is the clamping voltage of this unit ?

quote:

Originally posted by Excam_Man:
Companies like Square D have surgebreakers, they simply plug onto the buss like a normal breaker and then you connect the white wire.

That’s what I have. It wasn’t that expensive. Don’t remember the specific amount but it was turnkey by my electrician, about $200 hardware/labor combined.

Irony: Someone asks about home surge protection, and the first response is some guy whose screen-name is PowerSurge.

Thanks for the update. Glad you got it done.

While we are on the subject, the utility company here will add one at the weather head for no up front cost and add $5 a month (last I knew) rent for it to your bill. They use their preferred device. A couple times a homeowner wanted one and I was able to purchase the same one outright and get the linemen to install it at the weather head when they tied up the service on a new house.
They claimed at the weather head was better than putting it in the breaker panel.

quote:

Originally posted by cparktd:
While we are on the subject, the utility company here will add one at the weather head for no up front cost and add $5 a month (last I knew) rent for it to your bill. They use their preferred device. A couple times a homeowner wanted one and I was able to purchase the same one outright and get the linemen to install it at the weather head when they tied up the service on a new house.
They claimed at the weather head was better than putting it in the breaker panel.

They just let it dangle in the air? Seems odd. For surges from the power company, probably a better install, but less protection from internal microsurges (motors turning on).

Can't think of any code compliant way to do that but the PoCo doesn't need to follow code. Around here when they used to do the same program it was a collar style one on the meter.

quote:

Originally posted by Skins2881:

quote:

Originally posted by cparktd:
the utility company here will add one at the weather head

They just let it dangle in the air?

Yup. Tied directly in with the crimp connectors they use to tie the triplex to the house wiring stub out. It may be purpose made for that application.

EDIT to add: Well my Google fu didn't turn up anything like they used, maybe no longer a thing?

EDIT again... They now use a ring surge protector that plugs in first, behind the meter. Easier to add/remove I guess. Still 5 bucks a month + $25 install fee.