Whole House Surge Protectors
What are whole house surge protectors
Whole House Surge Protectors are just that – protection for your appliances and computers against electrical power surges.
What is a power surge?
An electrical power surge is a sudden increase in voltage that rises above standard voltage levels.
What can cause a power surge?
There are a few things that can cause electrical surges:
- lightning
- faulty wiring
- high-powered electrical devices
- Hydro’s own equipment
Electrical surges can happen at any moment, without first giving any indication that it’s about to happen. If you are experiencing frequent surges, call a local Winnipeg electrician as the problem may be more serious than you realize.
Plugging your electronics directly into your home’s outlets is not a guaranteed way of protecting your stuff. At the very least, you should plug in the more important or costly electronics into surge protectors that you plug into the sockets.
Power surges can overload your home’s capability to handle all that extra electricity, which then gets passed on to your plugged-in devices, potentially damaging them.
How do surge protectors work?
Without getting too technical, a surge protector works by pulling electrical currents from one outlet so it can pass them through the electronics that are connected to the surge protector.
The metal oxide varistor (MOV) is one of the most crucial components of a surge protector. It is designed to divert the extra voltage, delivering a consistent level of power throughout all of the devices.
When the MOV senses high voltage levels, it reduces the resistance. Alternatively, when it senses voltage levels are too low, it creates a higher resistance.
Unfortunately, MOV’s life-cycle is limited and they can burn out after time. If you are already investing in a surge protector, get one with an indicator light that tells you if the surge protector is working properly.
Where to install surge protectors?
Buying a few outlet plug-in surge protectors is one option. But it doesn’t give you that extra layer of security. The best way to install a surge protector is through your breaker panel.
Whole house surge protectors can be installed directly to your breaker panel to protect specific circuits from electrical surges.
For example, if you have a gaming computer that cost a ridiculous amount of money, and which requires a lot of electricity to run, you could put a surge protector on that circuit in your breaker panel.
That is your first layer of protection, which should leave you at ease. However, if you’re still paranoid that something might get through, which does happen from time to time, you can take the extra precaution of plugging your gaming pc directly into an outlet surge protector as well for a double layer of protection.