On Thu, 24 May 2007 07:06:31 -0500, DK wrote:


I thought the compressor was ruint after the lightning storm knocked
it out. That's about $400 repair on a $700 fridge.

The compressor was overheating and shutting down within a few
sseconds. I pulled the starter relay off the compressor and took it
apart. There was a ceramic disk about the size of a nickel inside
that was broken into several pieces. I ordered a new starter relay
kit off of ebay for $20 and meanwhile patched the ceramic disk and
put it back together. It worked until a year later when another
lightning storm knocked it out again. I installed the new one from
ebay and it is working again.

I suppose I need a surge protector on my fridge to stop the lightning
stikes from destroying my ebay starter kit.



Are you on or near the end of the power line feeding your
neighborhood? It seems that houses on or near the end get zapped by
lightning more than others. I once lived in a house that was the
second last house on the line, and I got zapped several times. The
neighbor (last on the line), had even more problems. I installed a
whole house lightning protector on the breaker box (across the mains),
and never had another problem with lightning. From what I recall, it
cost me around $30 to $40, but that was 1979 or 80. These days it
would probably cost $100, but well worth it, and easy to install for
anyone that knows wiring. It just goes into one of the knockouts on
the box and has 3 wires. One is ground, the other two go to the
mains.