UPS's vs surge protectors in thunderstorms

Phil2008

Phil2008

Phil2008

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So there has been a good few storms due to the heat this week and was wondering who has had damage to their pc's due to the storms? This got me thinking which is better the UPS or Surge protector during thunderstorms?

I have had UPS's for quite a few years now and I think a UPS will protect you from a storm much better then a surge protector would. Because the mains power can be all over the place during a storm, and the UPS will do its best to keep the power flowing constant and stable.

But a UPS or no other device, accept maybe a lightning rod will protect you from a full blown lightning strike. But then again, you have to be really unlucky to have a lightning strike directly on your house..

So in my way of thinking UPS's are better then surge protectors during thunderstorns, plus I dont wrorry too much if a storm kicks off if Im not around to unplug everything. (famous last words:D)
 
UPS would be better than a surge protector but as you said if there is a local strike not much will help you atleast as far as consumer devices go.

If I'm around - as our power here comes on overhead poles - I unplug everything and switch over to battery power for what I am using.
 
Rroff said:
If I'm around - as our power here comes on overhead poles - I unplug everything and switch over to battery power for what I am using.
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We get the tail end of storms nowadays and havent had to unplug my stuff since the windows XP days. But I have noticed a few seconds before a large crack of thunder our power goes off for whatever reason, causing the UPS to switch over to battery power. I have no dea why the power goes off before a large crack of thunder, but its kind of good as it protecting stuff, thats if the power goes off before the lightning gets to the power lines.
 
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Phil2008 said:
We get the tail end of storms nowadays and havent had to unplug my stuff since the windows XP days. But I have noticed a few seconds before a large crack of thunder our power goes off for whatever reason, causing the UPS to switch over to battery power. I have no dea why the power goes off before a large crack of thunder, but its kind of good as it protecting stuff, thats if the power goes off before the lightning gets to the power lines.
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You sure it's some few seconds and not precise delay between flash of light and sound?

Next higher voltage than 240V power line could have spark gap protectors, which shunt voltage to ground when voltage exceeds certain level.
Like when lightning hits the power line.
(guess similar could be used on 240V "end user" line)
That causes short power cut.
 
Known Lightening strikes to jump across open contacts on far heavier stuff than pc bits!
It's bad enough playing with 11.000 volts that jumps across big gaps
but it's also down to atmosphere also as dry won't flash as far if moisture/humidity present
 
EsaT said:
You sure it's some few seconds and not precise delay between flash of light and sound?

Next higher voltage than 240V power line could have spark gap protectors, which shunt voltage to ground when voltage exceeds certain level.
Like when lightning hits the power line.
(guess similar could be used on 240V "end user" line)
That causes short power cut.
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I dont really know, but its usually a good few seconds before the bang, then the power comes back about 5-10 secs after. The power never use to go off, it would either trip the switch or stay on.

chrcoluk said:
surge protectors wont do anything from a lightning strike. They not really designed for that. They more so for power surges.
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No, but you still see surge protectors and UPS's claiming to protect from lightning,, and that totally wrong, because if lightning close by, got in to the main power line it would take out anything.

But I did read somewhere that as lightning/surges travel down the power line, they do get quite weak by the time they are in your home, depending how far away when they strike.
 
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Phil2008 said:
I dont really know, but its usually a good few seconds before the bang, then the power comes back about 5-10 secs after.

But I did read somewhere that as lightning/surges travel down the power line, they do get quite weak by the time they are in your home, depending how far away when they strike.
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Spark gap protectors cause way below half second power cut for single strike.
Though high multiplicity could cause longer duration.
Those are actually very easy to detect in 20kV power line.
It's basically grounded connector set at certain air gap distance from wire and at least in here they seem to be installed into pole about every half km.

So that's definitely something else.
I wonder if they could be using some kind "pro active" protection.
Like using electric field mill to estimate when lightning strike is going to happen, then cutting power/connecting power wires to ground before strike happens.


Distance will decrease current/voltage surge of lightning strike, because of more impedance in current's path and possible partial discharge to other things along the way.
Especially if you're in power line's "side branch".
But if you're in absolute end of power line, that's where energy tends to again "pile up" when running out of easy propagation path.
 
So with my power going off and on during bad storms, will this make stuff safer to use during a storm? Im guessing things connected to the UPS will be the safest as it will keep the stuff running when the power goes off.

Apparently we are getting more storms today, but there's none about atm............

AY5JgC3.jpg
 
They were forecasting lightning here from 6am to 5pm but aside from 2 strikes a bit over 5 miles away so far nothing.
 
Phil2008 said:
So with my power going off and on during bad storms, will this make stuff safer to use during a storm? Im guessing things connected to the UPS will be the safest as it will keep the stuff running when the power goes off.
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Certainly better to have equipment staying powered, than constantly getting shut down and started.


chrcoluk said:
Would be funny if we get lightning whilst it isnt that hot and we never get it here when its 30C+.
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High temperatures are often associated with high pressure areas, which have most of troposphere air sinking downwards.
And downward sinking air heats up decreasing its relative humidity, which in general prevents formation of clouds.
Pretty much any kind clouds need air to rise, so that it cools reaching dewpoint.
That condensing water can release enough heat energy to make air move further up, condensing more water and releasing more heat, if there's instability.
Meaning air higher up is cold enough.

And if air is cold enough higher up you don't need that high ground level temperature.
All it needs is strong enough instability and convection.
It's even possible to have lightnings during snowstorm.

It's all in lovely diagrams called Skew-T.
https://wildcardweather.com/2015/02...w-t-diagram-like-a-meteorologist-in-pictures/

For example first sounding of this likely had low level cloud cover, but air higher was warm and really dry.
Then humidity started increasing first above 500 hPa level eventually turning to very high humidity in most of troposphere.
But only one of the soundings had any real chances for some convection.
All others would give only normal rain.
http://weather.uwyo.edu/cgi-bin/sou...AR=2019&MONTH=07&FROM=2800&TO=3012&STNM=03808
 
I was woken at 5am by a power cut that basically left me with enough power for the vape phone and bt modem, Phew! Then i wrote down look into a ups i never knew power could fail where it comes in at a max of 35 to 40 watts. There were certain things i could power and some not so even the meter was unable to turn on and only one lightbulb. This lasted 3 hours and a UPS would that of meant i could have went meh and went back to bed? Because i sleep with a 24" fan on for tinnitus relief and sleep aid and it draws 140watts and i basically go mad without it. :D
 
You need a large wattage beefy UPS if you want it to last a decent amount of time, so your putting a nice light load on the UPS.. Like my UPS is 1800watt, but I put about a max load of 250-400watt, so the load is nice and low and I get a decent amount of runtime, about 90-120mins when running off battery power.

Thats the main reason I bought such a high wattage UPS was for the runtime, but even then I wanted a even longer runtime, so I then bought a generator for infinite runtime:cool:
 
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I kind of had same thinking when I got my 1000 watt UPS. But I cheaped out too much, even with the massive over capacity in operating load, the battery just sucks bad. Officially with the load I put on it I should get about 20 mins if at desktop power loads, But the % goes down by 1% about every 10-20 seconds, so 20 mins is nowhere near realistic. Also during a long power cut one night I thought it would handle my pfsense unit for 4 hours at 8 watts consumption. But didnt quite make it which was very disappointing. However it has so far served its main purpose which is to prevent my PC abruptly shutting off on power cuts, in the past few years I have had a lot of power cuts.

I like the look of that PowerWalker 1800WATT/2000VA UPS you have, 3x the price my UPS was, but you getting 90 mins at 200w load thats pretty damn good (vs my 10-15min at 40-50w load), and the LED panel is nifty.
 
yep that was my mistake going with APC, they are the intel/asus of the UPS market, brand name premium.

my plan is to get something similar to what you have for my PC and consoles in here, and move this APC unit to the modem in my living room so then also my full network has power redundancy as well.
 
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chrcoluk said:
yep that was my mistake going with APC, they are the intel/asus of the UPS market, brand name premium.
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In theory APC is an established name making high quality products with rigorous testing, etc. procedures (you usually get an engineer's signed off checklist, etc. with each one) in reality some of their designs are woeful despite other lines being well engineered high end products and we had an instance back along with a certain model of a high percentage not surviving in transit!

I've not looked it up but I wonder if there is actually two different companies producing UPS that have the APC brand slapped on them and one being a higher actual quality than the other or something.
 
Rroff that wouldnt surprise me one bit, companies like panasonic for example have been known to use cheap manufacturers for low priced units and use their own factories for their premium models.
 
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