Bobbo wrote:
Of course, nothing will protect from lightning.
Every telco CO has been doing that for over 100 years. Telco COs are connected everywhere in town. It suffers about 100 surges with each storm. How often is your town without phone service for four days while they replace that surge damaged switching computer? Never. Because direct lightning strikes without damage have been routine when humans learn what Ben Franklin demonstrated over 250 years ago.
Electronics atop the Empire State Building suffered about 23 direct strikes annually without damage. How is that possible when urban myths, wild speculation, hearsay, and emotions know otherwise?
Anyone can read numbers. Most, instead, entertain their emotions. And declare that a fact.
A direct lightning strike is typically 20,000 amps. So a minimal 'whole house' protector (that costs about $1 per protected appliance) is rated at least 50,000 amps. It must not fail for many decades after many direct lightning strikes. Well proven science routinely found and demonstrated in every town. And still a majority only hear lies that promote emotions. Then assume nothing can protect from direct lightning strikes.
Cell phone towers are routinely struck - and keep working. Unfortunately that contradicts emotions.
Another example from people who make conclusions AFTER learning facts:
Well I assert, from personal and broadcast experience spanning 30 years, that you can design a system that will handle *direct lightning strikes* on a routine basis. It takes some planning and careful layout, but it's not hard, nor is it overly expensive. At WXIA-TV, my other job, we take direct lightning strikes nearly every time there's a thunderstorm. Our downtime from such strikes is almost non-existant. The last time we went down from a strike, it was due to a strike on the power company's lines knocking *them* out, ...
Since my disasterous strike, I've been campaigning vigorously to educate amateurs that you *can* avoid damage from direct strikes. The belief that there's no protection from direct strike damage is *myth*. ...
The keys to effective lightning protection are surprisingly simple, and surprisingly less than obvious. Of course you *must* have a single point ground system that eliminates all ground loops. And you must present a low *impedance* path for the energy to go. That's most generally a low *inductance* path rather than just a low ohm DC path.
Lightning damage is directly traceable to human mistakes - such as listening to fables rather than science and numbers.
A simple and fundamental fact even demonstrated by Ben Franklin. A protector is only as effective as its earth ground. It has not changed in over 250 years.
Damage from lightning is a less threat in campground. But protector that can protect from that anomaly must be connected low impedance (as short as possible) to earth ground. That means connected at the pole.
