Lightening can ruin your whole day

[newtune3]

Well the biggest oak tree on my home site got hit by lightening early Saturday morning. Took out my photo machine, a second computer, my A/V receiver, my router, modem, the all in one printer, and my HD sattelite box. So I am just now back online, with a new machine and am waiitng for Windows Backup Restore to reload everything to my new Barracuda XT 2 Tbyte. I am glad that works as some 267 DVD ROM's would be bad to reload. New car now has a dented roof from falling debris, wife's car needs now windshield and the broken window on the second floor is fixed. Oh well everyone including the dogs is safe as is the house. Sure miss that oak tree it shaded the west side of my home. But the tree guys are done and the stumps are ground and I have high speed internet again.

Back up your stuff folks. Lucky for me the backup drive that lives on top of my photo machine did not take a hit while the computer did. A word of advice, the surge protector still works just fine. The new battery backup says it is lightening proof. Well not so sure but what the hell. Again backup your images.

[SCone]

Glad to hear your back up and running. Consider an off-site solution for your data files. I use Carbonite for my stuff. And your right, had a sale rep for one of the big surge protector companies try to convince me their unit could stop a lightning strike. Yeah... right....

[markfh]

May I suggest a whole house surge protector? I have one, well, I'm on my second one now because lightning hit the house and the first one sacraficed itself to the lightning gods so that all my electric and electronic stuff could live.

They cost about 2 - 3 hundred installed and I am obviously sold on them.

[mercphoto]

Mark, I've thought about whole house surge protection as well. Stephen, I tried Mozy once, but even with a very fast U-Verse Internet package uploading 1,500 original RAW images from a weekend of track photography takes a really, really, really long time. I just don't see the online backup solutions being practical.

[SCone]

You can the fastest download speed available, but upload is what counts. That's why I only backup particular file folders. After I sort my RAW files on my laptop, I copy the keepers to a portable drive, then those files are copied to a desk top computer that handles the online backup. It not only maintains an onsite backup, but an offsite also.

Works for me........

[Phisch]

Silly question...would a lightning rod help? We grew up with a massive antenna on our property and I was always told it would draw the lightning's energy down into the ground and keep things in the house ok.

[Abel]

oh wow... sorry to hear that... thanks for the backup reminder though.

[TXhummer2]

Originally Posted by Phisch

Silly question...would a lightning rod help? We grew up with a massive antenna on our property and I was always told it would draw the lightning's energy down into the ground and keep things in the house ok.

The best idea is to TOTALLY DISCONNECT all electrical appliances, A/V electronics, computers, and chargers DURING storms.

You'll find those that say "lightning rods work", and yes, sometimes they do. Our data center in Austin was struck by lightning in 2007. It struck the outdoor A/C water cooler, traveled through a concrete wall via conduit, jumped over to the UPS Switching Unit, fried it, took the whole data center offline, and dark.

Just unplug.

[TheFantasticG]

Originally Posted by markfh

May I suggest a whole house surge protector? I have one, well, I'm on my second one now because lightning hit the house and the first one sacraficed itself to the lightning gods so that all my electric and electronic stuff could live.

They cost about 2 - 3 hundred installed and I am obviously sold on them.

Gotta a link to the one you use?

[markfh]

The one that I currently have that replace an earlier model.

Whole House Surge Protector - Intermatic Whole House Surge Protector

[Phisch]

Originally Posted by TXhummer2

The best idea is to TOTALLY DISCONNECT all electrical appliances, A/V electronics, computers, and chargers DURING storms.

You'll find those that say "lightning rods work", and yes, sometimes they do. Our data center in Austin was struck by lightning in 2007. It struck the outdoor A/C water cooler, traveled through a concrete wall via conduit, jumped over to the UPS Switching Unit, fried it, took the whole data center offline, and dark.

Just unplug.

Hmmm...our house was OLD, but my ham radio hobbyist dad had a humongous tower next to it that he said doubled as a lighting rod. I always thought that was his justification to keep it even when my mom said it was an eyesore. But he had a home business and unplugging everything probably wasn't entirely practical. AFIK, though, it was never hit with lightning.

[donlfaulkner]

Originally Posted by TXhummer2

The best idea is to TOTALLY DISCONNECT all electrical appliances, A/V electronics, computers, and chargers DURING storms....Just unplug.

Works for me.

[picman]

I've got these in the breaker box:
Total Residential Package
and
these for critical stuff in the house
SurgeArrest Performance - Product Information
(now includes the washer and refrigerator with their electronics)
they start clamping a 40v over - a lot of surge protectors will pass 300v before clamping.

[KD5NRH]

Originally Posted by Phisch

Hmmm...our house was OLD, but my ham radio hobbyist dad had a humongous tower next to it that he said doubled as a lighting rod.

Yup; the Copper Cactus J-pole is pretty much the ultimate combination antenna and lightning rod, since the whole antenna can be kept at DC ground. Mine was about 15 feet, with another four feet in the ground. Still a good idea to have a lighting arrestor on the feedline, though.