On Monday, February 10, 2014 1:23:22 PM UTC-5, Bob_Villa wrote:
On Monday, February 10, 2014 12:11:59 PM UTC-6, wrote:



The destructive surges that destroy equipment almost always



originate from outside the house, with lightning being the prime



cause. Lightning striking the utility lines somewhere in the



vicinity results in a surge. You want to stop those before or



just as they are entering the house. A panel mounted whole house



surge protector does exactly that, by diverting the surge current



to ground. Additional protection via plug-in protectors should be



at any appliances that are connected to more than just AC, ie cable,



phone, etc. It's a tiered approach, and a whole house unit is



the first line of defense. But, it's not always possible either,



eg folks living in apartments, rental properties, etc. In that



case plug-in is all you can do.







As for expensive, a good whole house surge protector costa about



$125.



This sounds like a sales pitch...there is virtually nothing that will prevent damage from a nearby lightning strike. Mainly because it will "jump" over, or burn-out any device.

That is simply not true. A typical case is lightning striking utility wires
down the block from a house. Most of the lightning energy is going to be
dissipated to ground right at or near the strike. Just a small portion will
reach the house. If it were large, it would flash over before even reaching the panel.
Bud on here has posted the numbers from studies, but the highest surge
even from a nearby strike that makes it to the panel in like 99%
of the cases is like 10K amps.
That is within the capacity of a good $125 surge protector.

And if a surge protector at the panel that can handle 20K amps
isn't going to work, then how are the plug-ins that you suggest
going to protect? Again, the destructive surges are virtually
all coming from outside the house. It's not the washing machine
blowing up the TV.

Here is the IEEE guide that discusses the subject:

http://www.lightningsafety.com/nlsi_lhm/IEEE_Guide.pdf



Again, this is my .02 (Another thing that might help and is free...keep your fingers crossed! *L* )