On Sun, 16 Oct 2005 15:59:24 -0700, Eric R Snow
wrote:

On Sun, 16 Oct 2005 17:15:14 -0500, Andy Asberry
wrote:

Do you leave your welder, grinder, drill press, lathe, mill, etc.
plugged in all the time?

We had a lightning strike. Luckily, it hit the house instead of my new
shop! It blew everything EXCEPT light bulbs. Some things were
turned on but most were not. That indicates to me that there was a lot
of arcing across switch contacts.

So, how great is the danger of burning some shop equipment? Has it
happened to you? Or even one of Steve B's mythical friends?
Here in WA state north of Seattle all my machines are either left
plugged in or are permanently wired. My building is all metal and all
the machines are properly grounded but I know that's no real
protection if powerlines are struck. We just don't seem to get that
much lightning. I did visit a fellow in North Carolina who had his
phone blow off the wall when the lines outside were struck. The
scorched wall was pretty graphic.
ERS

No doubt, I use to live in South Carolina and they have some unreal
lighting storms that seem to come out of the clear blue sky.

All of my machines were always hot, now the horizontal band saw gets
unplugged cause I can feel from the hair on my arms that it leaks.

I warn my 7 year old girl that they are on. After watching I robot she
came into the shop a couple of days later looking over her shoulders
and asked me if my machines would turn on her. ) I reassured her
that they are my best friends and they would never come after her
cause she's my daughter. BTW she knows the machines are there to make
robots, but obviously hasn't quite figured out that they themselves
aren't.