Test for Surge Protector?

I've got a collection of surge protector around, and I want to find a valid and somewhat simple method of testing that they are still providing some protection, without trashing them in a destructive test.

I've searched the net for some kind of reference to help with this, and found only proprietary information of specific brands, usually at the manufacturers site on capacity, waveform, etc...test results for that product, but little info on how the test was actually done.

1.) I'd assume with MOV based devices (most of the consumer devices) I'd be able to "see" a blown MOV, but I'm not sure. Is there a simple electrical test?

2.) Some of the better devices, like Brick Wall and others...that advertise "never fail", well, do we take them at their word, or is there some way to see if they are still ok after some years of hits. Really, at $200 ~ $1,000

  • per item...they should last forever...

Not many folks seem to be into surge protection / UPS / line filtering, but I'm developing an interest for both business & personal reasons...and I'm looking here to learn a bit more about them...

Any views? Comments? Good URL's to get info from?

Rich

Reply to
Rich Gosselin
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A first good step would be to research the importance of the earth ground in 'surge protection' and assess the extent to which the surge protectors you have actually meet those needs.

Without suffering a direct lightning strike, and despite the usual array of "surge protectors", the electronic equipment in house (AV, security, telephone, computer, GFI's etc) has had major damage from 'surges'. My partial solution has been to improve the house's earth ground and to provide for electrical disconnect during storms. We like in the center of th NA continent in a region that is typical with respect to lightning strikes.

Google all groups (including comp.home.automation) for " W_Tom ", and comp.home.automation for "earth ground" and "lightning".

You may conclude that the surge protectors you have been depending are less useful than you thought even when new.

HTH ... Marc Marc_F_Hult

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Reply to
Marc F Hult

for electrical disconnect during storms. We like in the center of live

See

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for picture and description of the power disconnect controlled by my home automation system.

HTH ... Marc Marc_F_Hult

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Reply to
Marc F Hult

Two things can happen with a MOV device. Professional equipment will SHORT to ground and blow the feeding circuit breaker if the unit has "done its job" with a huge surge. The MOV pack is robust enough to survive even lightning strikes (at least the kid I deal with). You can test the MOV device for its resistance. It should be very high (like >100k ohms? but I'm not the exact value for your device). Anything less, the leakage current will start to climb and become an issue. Eventually, the device gets hot and will fail. If it is a cheapo MOV package, it may have already failed short, and an internal fuse, or the MOV leads have blown. Hard to say without visually inspecting your MOV or knowing the characteristics.

There are some companies that transfer critical loads to generator when a storm approaches. I'm not a big fan of disconnecting the loads from the utility. Kind of like sticking your head in the sand and playing roulette with the symptoms rather than dealing with the root cause. You still have other copper "tethers" like your phone line and cable TV. Like others have said, the ground system is all important. Surge protection without connection to an effective (low impedance) ground is like a car without gasoline. Not much use.

Here is a product that I have deployed many times over:

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The device gets installed next to your mains disconnect.

Reply to
RF Dude

First, if the protector does not have a dedicated connection for a 'less than 10 foot' connection to earth ground, then it was not doing anything. This is why so many plug-in protectors are less than 3000 joules. No sense making the protector minimally sized when the idea is to have it vaporize

- to promote myth of protection.

Second, effective protectors don't vaporize. Only the grossly undersized fail by blackening. Effective protectors degrade after many direct lightning strikes. One test is to put a 1 ma current through each MOV and measure the resulting voltage. Do you really want to remove each MOV and measure it? Probably not.

Third, two factors that determine ineffective protectors: 1) no dedicated connection to the building's single point earth ground, and 2) manufacturer does not discuss the most critical component in any protection system - earth ground.

Brickwall, Surgex, and Zerosurge forget to mention the safety ground wire that bypasses their protector AND that is required by codes. These series mode protectors (not to be confused with shunt mode protectors that use MOVs) are effective as supplementary protection IF you have first installed a properly earth 'whole house' protector. Series mode protectors are quick to cite no MOVs but forget to mention that burned out MOVs are directly traceable to the human who failed to purchase a protector with sufficient joules. Effective shunt mode protectors earth direct lightning strikes are remain effective.

Additional problems with plug-in protectors is demonstrated in these pictures:

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Do not locate a surge protector or power strip in any area where

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An employee arrived at the Greensport Yard in Houston this

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From February 1994 to February 1995, two families on Brainbridge

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On August 28, 1999, a Kensington Power Tree 20, model # 62162

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The second edition of Underwriters' Laboratories standard 1449,

Plug-in protectors that have MOVs removed and still claim they are OK:

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Upgrade the building's earth ground to meet or exceed post

1990 National Electrical Code requirements AND install an effective 'whole house' protector from responsible electrical manufacturers such a Square D, Leviton, Intermatic, Leviton, Cutler Hammer, Siemens, or GE. These are even sold in Home Depot and Lowes - not in Radio Shack, Circuit City, Staples, Sears, or other sources of ineffective plug-in protectors. Effective 'whole house' protectors cost less than $200 - $1000. In fact, effective 'whole house' protection costs about $1 per protected appliance - compared to how much for a plug-in protector?

This your bottom l> I've got a collection of surge protector around, and I want to find

Reply to
w_tom

was moved to:

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-- Bobby G.

Reply to
Robert Green

Thanks guys,

It's clear to me that good ground is the key to good protectection, and I'm going out later today to purchase the materials for my personal & business situation. I have an Intermatic device that will soon see duty next to my service breakers...and that will be connected to several rods.

My only consideration now is where to locate the rods. I know the closer the better, and #4 to them. I've got a brick over sand patio right outside that wall, so I should be able to remove enough brick to insert the rods close enough to be a good low resistance distance away. My place is on a slab, so there is no deep basement to contend with (unfortunately for my space considerations).

Rich

Reply to
Rich Gosselin

Thanks Marc,

I do understand the value of a good earth ground, and am in the process of installing 2 rods in a location that shold give the proper "whole house" ground. Given that I actually live in what 50 years ago was considered a flood plain (really hasn't flooded due to the ditches installed when the sub was built), I find that the "ground water level" is at or above 6 foot. How do I know this? Next door neighbor put an in-ground pool in and I was very interested in the level they had to start their sump at....I like water table info because somehow...my simple mind thinks water = conductivity = better ground. So, if I have two #4 cables going out to 2 ground rods...each out 5 to 10 foot from the foundation (which is a slab anyway, so I don't think they dig those too deep) I might have a good chance with my "whole house" installation.

I do realize I also need point of use for individual electronics, but that still means I need to know if they are actually still working...or just passing...(gas)....you know what I mean...Actaully, I did all that earth ground research a few years ago, and that's why I'm putting in the stuff now...(I'm a bit slow, but I get there...)

Rich

Reply to
Rich Gosselin

Be sure you bond those two ground rods together and connect all incoming services to them. After the CATV and telco idiots leave, double check their grounds. Some lazy techs will just connect to the nearest whatever and let it go at that. Worst are the CATV and satellite sub-contractors. They're paid by the job so they move like lightning, often don't even ground their work at all and sometimes ground it all wrong. One guy actually connected the telco ground to a gas pipe. :(

Reply to
Robert L Bass

Article 250.52(B) of the NEC:

If two electrodes are used in a single ground 'system', they individually perform better when separated by 6+ feet. Furthermore, if the interconnecting wire is buried, then that wire also enhances the earthing system. For example, the first rod could be right outside the wall. Second rod daisy chained to a point 6+ feet farther from the building. I believe that #4 AWG wire is suppose to be 18" or deeper. One reason why is because grounding remains effective when below the frost line.

D> It's clear to me that good ground is the key to good protectection,

Reply to
w_tom

Appreciate a problem that Cinergy has. For example, I sat drinking coffee with two cable TV installers who had just been given the training. But because (in part) they were so deceived by plug-in surge protector myths, they did not fully comprehend what was taught. First they had to be untaught myths so common with plug-in protectors and with surge damage.

Of course, they are technicians which is why so many big companies tell them what to do - and don't tell them why. One of these installers was sharp. He wanted to know why. As I explained concepts of earthing, the short connection, wire impedance, etc, then he kept saying, "Is that why they said that." Then he kept turning to his partner and saying, "Did you hear that?" His partner was not interested.

Cinergy would have the same problems.

Cable guy had recently installed the cable directly to the second floor. So he ran a ground wire from that second floor cable to earth. I explained why he must first drop the cable down to earth, then make a short earthing connection, then rise back up. Suddenly this made sense with something they had said in their installer's course. They taught him. But without the reasons why, he just did not comprehend what they had taught him. His partner apparently did not care (recessions sometimes cure that problem).

Cinergy has same problem. Too many people still think a wall receptacle is earth ground because (they assume) wire is a perfect conductor. Wall receptacles are not earth ground - despite so many myths. Appreciate what the training director must confront when Cinergy top management is more concerned with keeping the lights on AND when linemen already know everything they need to know about electricity.

An > Coincidentally this is the very utility that installed the whole

Reply to
w_tom

There are good discussions of comprehensive grounding on the web. Some deal with how to ground a steel radio tower on a mountain top which would likely be good enough for a house built on flat land with a shallow water table ;-) (Eg Google ground radio tower). (Yes, soil moisture increases electrical conductivity and therefore improves ground-rod performance. The water table is, by definition, the upper surface of the earth below which the effective porosity (interconnected pores) are 100% filled with water.)

Another major issue is conduction through communication lines including cable, ethernet and telephone. Part of my approach to coping with multiple lightning-induced failures in our house has been to isolate the communication lines from the HA computer and server. These computers are located on a 19" rack with rubber wheels, powered by 'isolated' 28vdc, and connected to the rest of the world through fiber optic 1000/SC cable.

EBay typically has affordable fiber optic ethernet transceivers. You need a pair of transceivers (or a transceiver and a hub/switch) and a length of terminated fiber optic cable.

search

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in "Computers & Networking" for "fiber sc"

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( I have four like-new/in box 100BT/SC transceivers that I'd like to dispose of -cheep! ).

HTH ... Marc Marc_F_Hult

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Reply to
Marc F Hult

Even after you call and they come out and mark the lawn -- BE CAREFUL! We needed to bury some cables for a pair of ground level light fixtures in front of our church in CT. We followed procedure to the letter. The church's chief electrician decided to start at the fixture ends and work back to the building. He was digging a hole a couple of feet down with a manual post-hole digger at least a couple of yards from the nearest cable markings when there was a really loud explosion. That was the sound of the transformer on a pole across the street exploding when he shorted the underground feed to the building. Fortunately, he was unhurt but the post-hole digger was several inches shorter. :^)

Reply to
Robert L Bass

There are at least two effects here.

The '6-foot' rule of thumb seems to stem from the geometry of the electrical field around a conventional 6-foot-long grounding rod. My understanding of the geophysical principles is that longer 'rods' (such a transmission tower anode wells) would require larger spacing to be optimal.

The increased 'grounding' owing to the interconnecting wire would seem to be the result of decreased impedance between the wire+rods combination and the soil/porous media that the wire and rods are in.

If you goof, it's not pretty ... The FCC has mandated a national "call before you dig" number -- 811 -- which is supposed to be in effect within 18months. In the mean time, check your phone book.

Or look here for your state:

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Coincidentally this is the very utility that installed the whole house ground protector in my house and didn't check the rod, the connection to it, or the adjacent cable and telephone entry -- all of which were deficient. When I pointed out the problems to the utility rep who came to replace it when one of the LED's stopped indicating OK, he said that all he did was install or replace the protector. Seemed to know nuthin and care less. They also provided 'insurance' for which the paperwork was so onerous that I have yet to actually collect ...

Marc Marc_F_Hult

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Reply to
MFHult

... or a fiber optic Network Interface Card (NIC) and a transceiver or Hub/switch ...

Marc Marc_F_Hult

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Reply to
Marc F Hult

Yes. I appreciate the problem that Cinergy has in part because it has become my problem ;-) Part of staffing issued can be attributed to the "Peter principle" ...

And I understand that the problems that cable and phone techs create are mostly beyond the electrical utility's control.

As always, Tom, thank for you for your patient explanations.

.... Marc Marc_F_Hult

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Reply to
Marc F Hult

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