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w_tom w_tom is offline
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Default Does as GFCI give you some surge protection?

On Mar 27, 7:19 am, wrote:
GFCI's have some surge protection built in to protect them from surges
in house wiring. Does this same surge protection extend a bit to
protect what is pluged into a GFCI?


All electronic devices contain surge protection. As even shown in
the National Semiconductor application note for their GFCI chip, that
protector is only for one type of surge, very small, and for
protecting GFCI's internal electronics. Protection from which type of
surge? All electronics contain protection that makes that type of
surge irrelevant.

Typically destructive surge seeks earth ground. Surge that
typically does damage is earthed before getting near to household
appliances or GFCI. No protector adjacent to an appliance (or GFCI)
will provide such protection. Anything that would work already exists
inside the appliance (as even defined by industry standards). Worse,
those other surges may pass through appliances destructively to earth
if protector is too close to electronics.

Any protection inside the receptacle 1) is already solved inside the
appliance, 2) is too close to transistors. 3) too far from earth
ground, and 4) is really for surges that don't typically do the
damage.

Learn what telcos do; with $multi-million computers connected to
overhead wires all over town. Telcos also don't use plug-in (useless
'point of use') protectors. Why waste money? Telcos also install
protectors where wires enter the building; connected within feet to
earth ground. How do telcos make protection even better? Money is
directed where protection is made even better - the earthing system.

A protector is not protection. Earthing is the protection. A
protector is a connecting device to protection. What defines the
quality of that protection? How good is the earthing.

Meanwhile, why would a protector inside a receptacle be any safer
than other plug-in protectors? View current technology protectors
that are located where fire danger is greater:
http://www.westwhitelandfire.com/Art...Protectors.pdf
http://www.hanford.gov/rl/?page=556&parent=554
http://www.zerosurge.com/HTML/movs.html
http://www.nmsu.edu/~safety/programs...tectorfire.htm

Do you want this device in a room or inside a plastic wall box?

Learn what the telco also wants and needs to protect their
transistors. Protector must be adjacent to earthing AND protector
must be distant from those transistors. How distant? Up to 50 meters
distant because separation is also part of the protection - and a
short connection to earth is essential.

Those promoting plug-in protectors must promote half truths. That
troll who will arrive to promote for the plug-in industry (and deny
it) will be along soon. Meanwhile, protection is about earthing. No
way around reality. Even the IEEE demands earthing, bluntly, in
standards. Protector in that GFCI makes a trivial type of surge
irrelevant. But it does not even claim to protect from the typically
destructive type of surge.

Protection inside all appliances can be overwhelmed if the 'whole
house' protector is not installed and properly earthed. That same
internal protection has been overwhelmed because an adjacent protector
existed. It's always the same question. What was the path a surge
took to earth ground. That is the path of damage - or why the surge
never entered the building. Provides are the 'whys' that some ignore
to promote myths and, well, look at those scary pictures of protectors
that meet current standards - and nobody asked anything more.