Posted by w_tom on 11/15/14 11:39

Deke wrote:
> ...
> And they do work, regardless of what you think.
> I live in a very rural area, and last summer a very close lightning strike
> to a tree behind the house resulted in the death of several surge
> protectors, but no damage to the
> items plugged into them (electronics, freezer, refrigerator).

Deke - its not what I think. It is what I know from decades of
experience preceded by professional training. In your example, clearly
every smoke detector, bathroom GFCI, dishwasher, doorbell, clock radio,
and dimmer switch also were damaged. After all, they were not on
plug-in protectors. What protected them if not on plug-in protectors?

They were protected by 'invisible' surge protectors. Those
protectors must be invisible to make your claim.

Returning to reality: appliances already have effective internal
protection. Disconnect those appliances from a plug-in protector and
the "electronics, freezer, refrigerator" also would have been protected
by 'invisible' protectors - or by existing internal protection.

You have assumed that everything was subject equally to a destructive
transient. More electrical concepts. To be damaged, an appliance must
be in a path from cloud to earth. Therefore a VCR may be damaged, but
an adjacent TV not damaged. Been there - seen it. How can this be?
Was TV on an 'invisible' protector while VCR was not?

You did not demonstrate "electronics, freezer, refrigerator" would
have been damaged. For your example to be valid, then literally
everything not on a protector must have been destroyed. So the
microwave oven, garbage disposal, and dishwasher was destroyed? Smoke
detector, recahrgeable flashlight, and electric clocks all destroyed?
If not, then why not? 'Invisible' protectors?

From years of real world engineering, from tracing destructive
transients. from fixing damaged electronics by learning the path from
cloud to ground, and from building protectors that did (and sometimes
did not) provide protection. No way you can claim that plug-in
protector did what even its manufacturer does not claim - without also
citing 'invisible' protectors.

If your reasoning is valid, then I advise you to patent those
'invisible' protectors. No one has been able to prove what you have
just claimed. Using your reasoning, then you have discovered
'invisible' protectors. Or those plug-in protectors did not perform as
you have only assumed.

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