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Update: Our $8000 whole-house surge protector just paid for itself
We had a direct lightning strike on a transformer two houses down in our new build near Charlotte. The electrician said it sent a huge spike through the grid. Our neighbor's new fridge and garage door opener got fried, but our place was fine. The electrician showed us the logs on the Eaton unit, and it blocked the surge. Has anyone else had a major electrical event test their protection like this?
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parkera225mo ago
That Eaton unit is good, but I'm not sold on the price. My uncle had a direct hit on his house in Florida. His $400 Siemens whole house protector took the hit and saved his TV and AC unit. The electrician there said the real key is the ground rod setup, not just the box on the panel. A lot of those high end units are paying for the brand name and fancy logs you'll never look at again.
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fox.derek5mo ago
My buddy in Tampa had a similar thing happen, and his electrician said the exact same thing about grounding. The main job of that box is to shunt the surge to ground, so if your ground rods are old or the wire is too small, even an $8000 unit can't do its job right. It's like having a big drain pipe but a clogged sewer line. I'd be curious what the ground setup looks like on that new build, because that's probably the real hero here, not just the price tag on the surge protector.
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blake6915mo ago
Honestly, people forget about the water pipes. If the house has copper pipes going into the ground, that's a second path to earth that can help a ton. A lot of older places have that, but new builds might use plastic and rely only on the rods. That extra metal in the dirt can make a big difference during a surge.
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