On Friday, May 20, 2016 at 2:39:51 PM UTC-4, westom wrote:

Obviously a millimeters gap in a relay does not block what three miles of sky cannot.

Obviously only a tiny part of the energy of a lightning bolt traveling through 3 miles of sky is going to make it to an appliance in a house.



Appliances contain robust protection from a type of surge that a power strip might protect from.

Yes, and it almost always uses MOVs as I showed you with the Littlefuse
reference, app notes, etc. You deny that MOVs are used in appliances
period. So, we're all still waiting to hear exactly how this "robust" protection
is accomplished in your world?

Poor W Tom. Supposed to be an expert on surge protection, but doesn't
know what's in an appliance power circuit.



Concern is for a completely different type of surge that actually does damage - will even blow through a millimeters gap inside a relay.

That means that surge must be connected low impedance to earth BEFORE entering a building - so that it does not blow through millimeter relay gaps and other robust protection that already exists inside each appliance.

That "robust" protection inside the appliance has no low impedance path
to ground. So, how can it possibly work? And note that you rant on about
impedance in one direction only and ignore it in the other direction.
The same wiring impedance also limits the surge that can reach an appliance.