[nylug-talk] Cleaning dirty power

[mylar]

On Wed, 2006-06-07 at 10:55, plut0248crat at isp.com wrote:
> > How do I turn this monster called wall power, complete with
> > hardware frying power drops and lightning surges into something
> > that will never harm computer equipment again?
> 
> Depends on the power of the lightning strike.
> Actually lightning travels from the ground into the sky instead of the
> reverse, as most people are led to believe. The best you could do is to
> install lightning rods on the building, and invest heavily in property
> insurance. Creating off-site copies of your software.
> 
> If you were to get a direct hit there's no way to completely protect
> yourself or property, short of tunneling underground and completely
> insulating all electronics, telephones, wall sockets and all metals.
> 
> Those nine dollar power strips with surge protection are worthless for the
> protection they mention. Take one apart some time.
> 
> 
Very true, I've been a ham radio  and broadcast radio operator for well
over a decade and believe me, one thing that is on every ham operators 
mind esp during summer months is preventing equipment damage due to
lightning. And  lightning protection is just as important to the
computer or data center operator as it is to a radio operator as
expensive equipment is at stake. And while things like surge
protectors,  UPS's, lightning arrestors, lighting rods, and grounding
are important and very helpful there is no sure fire protection against
a direct or nearby lighting strike. I have heard of many cases where
people have had several levels of lightning protections installed and
still suffered loss of expensive equipment, fires, etc. due to direct or
nearby strikes.

The following link also offers an extensive discussion about lightning
protections. It's geared  primarily for the radio operator but  much of
the info can apply  to people operating computing equipment as well.

http://amwindow.org/tech/htm/lightning.htm

mylar