On May 12, 6:08 pm, Jim Yanik wrote:
Nate Nagel wrote :

Hi all,

I was awakened last night shortly after going to bed by what I assume
was the sound of a transformer exploding, followed shortly thereafter by
the gentle beeping of every UPS in my house. Power was restored about
half an hour ago, after I returned home from work, and I found that
several items were not working. I found three tripped breakers; one for
the general basement receptacles for which I have no explanation (the
only items plugged into that circuit was a surge suppressor for the
stereo

the surge protector shunts the overvoltage to ground,acting like a
temporary -short-,thus it snapped the breaker.That's why many surge strips
have an integral breaker or fuse.
Depending on the particular surge protector,they should be replaced as they
suffer some damage when they absorb surges.The bigger the surge,the greater
the damage.They may seem to work,but their surge protection will be
diminished or gone.

Is this true even if the "protected" light is still lit? this
protector was switched completely off until the power was restored and
steady, so I am writing that breaker off as a fluke.

and TV, which I'd switched off last night, and a lamp.) That one
reset OK. Another was a utility circuit in the basement; it would not
reset. I unplugged all devices and reset it. Everything went back
online OK except for of course the most expensive device plugged into
it; an electrostatic air filter for the furnace. Attempting to start
that back up resulted in an alarming blue flash and a tripped breaker.
I assume it's fux0red.

It could be just a dirt problem and the elements need cleaning.
I'd try that first.

I will; and truth be told I was just thinking this past weekend that
it was due for a cleaning, but I think it's schmoked based on the huge
flash I got when I tried to re-energize it. I seriously doubt a
little dirt on the grids could cause something that dramatic. I'll
try it anyway though.

Last was the upstairs circuit, same procedure,
found everything OK save for a surge strip in the bedroom. Don't have a
spare to reconnect everything but the odd thing is that it had one of
those Ionic Breeze things plugged into it. (yes, I know they're
somewhat useless, but I didn't buy it, and I can't throw it out.) The
surge strip itself smells suspiciously like smoked electronics.
Finally, I had a Siemens TVSS breaker installed in my breaker panel; it
did not trip but the "protected" light for one leg is now completely out.

It sounds like one branch of the transformer let go,and the second branch
fed an unusually high voltage to your house,on one leg of the feed. Thus
the failure of the surge protectors;they did their job the best they could.

I suspect you're correct; I am also wondering if I should investigate
the grounding situation at my house, although I'm not really sure how
to assess whether my grounding is sufficient or not. Unfortunately I
ordered the TVSS breaker from Dale Electric because I was unable to
find a local source, so I will be without protection on that leg until
I can source another. Or is there another good option for whole house
protection that might be available locally?


Two questions; first, are electrostatic devices especially susceptible
to power surges, or is it just coincidence that I happened to have two
problems directly related to electrostatic devices?

They have a power oscillator circuit to step up the line V to high
voltage,a few 1000 volts,and that circuit may not have much input surge
protection. so,it's likely a diode or bridge rectifier shorted,and possibly
the power transistor itself.(very likely,IMO)

As it turns out, I just got back from buying another surge strip and
everything in the bedroom is good to go. The Ionic Breeze was
apparently switched off, and appears to be functional still, so the
only damage there was to the surge strip.

Secondly, has
anyone had any luck with going through the power company to pay for some
of this damage (the air filter is maybe 6 mos. old) or is homeowner's
insurance the place to start? If the latter, I might be tempted to pay
out of pocket to avoid a rate increase.

No experience here,but I would contact the power company first.

Yeah, I will do that tomorrow once I have a chance to try all the
major appliances, I still haven't tried the dishwasher, washing
machine, or dryer, although the only failures so far seem to be the
air filter and the one surge strip, which based on the date on the
back was over 10 years old anyway.

Fortunately, my (laptop) computer seems to have survived OK, and I
assume that SWMBO's did as well as it was plugged into a UPS which was
switched off. Also fortunately, my basement appears to be dry even
though it's been raining for several days and last night's storm was
somewhat torrential (the road to my office was flooded this AM if that
gives you any idea.)

...a somewhat unhappy
nate

Meanwhile,here in central Florida,we have a drought and several nasty
forest fires burning up people's homes.

We coulda used that rain!

I've got two overflowing cisterns, feel free to send a tank truck by
to load up!

nate