I have heard that brown-outs will cause tremendous harm to your average set of home appliances, h/air cond systems,etc etc.... because of the up and down level of voltage. I know that you can buy the backup power/conditioner for an individual set of computer things. They are pretty expensive it seems. Is there such a thing as a "line conditioner" that would protect the whole house from ups and downs of voltage during brown-out episodes? Are they expensive? Sources???

-- jeanne (jeanne@hurry.now), June 02, 1999

Answers

I bought a "Whole House Surge Protector" for $60 a few years ago to protect my electronics against power surges. I have not lost anything since. It took me 20 minutes and a screw driver to hook it up to my homes electrical distribution panel. Unfortunately the manufacturer seems to have disappeared. You might try Home Depot, Hechingers, Builder's Supply, etc. and electrical parts supply companies.

I intend to

-- Ron Sander (judy_sander@hotmail.com), June 02, 1999.

Can't remember thread, but there was discussion of whole house surge protection two months ago or so and Cook had great (though expensive) recommendation of a particular product.

-- BigDog (BigDog@duffer.com), June 02, 1999.

I called my local power company, which is offering whole-house surge protection. They said it did not protect against brownouts, which is another problem entirely. You need protection from both, evidently.

-- Margaret (janssm@aol.com), June 02, 1999.

Jeanne,

I bought a "Whole House Surge Protector" for $60 a few years ago to protect my electronics against power surges. I have not lost anything since. It took me 20 minutes and a screw driver to hook it up to my home's electrical distribution panel. Unfortunately the manufacturer seems to have disappeared. You might try Home Depot, Hechingers, Builder's Supply, etc. and electrical parts supply companies.

If you intend to power electronic/computer things off of your generator, I would recommend that you also consider buying a small UPS (Uninterruptable Power Supply) unit from a company like APC (American Power Conversion). They are the leading vendor (I have no relationship to them)for products like this for small offices. Their phone number is 800-800-4272. I just noticed that PC Connection (800-800-5555) has a special $150 off sale for $169 (net) + $20 shipping an APC 'Smart-UPS' that provides surge protection and 5-10 minutes of backup power for about 300 watts of power. (I have no relationship to PC Connection either but have used them as my primary computer mail order company for 5 years)

So if the local power company crashes, I will run my refrigerator, microwave, security system etc off of my gas driven 5000 watt generator. I'll first throw my electrical distribution panel main switch to off so I do not transfer any power between the power company (and thus my neighborhood) and my generator while my generator is running. I'll throw to 'off' all of the circuit breakers on my distribution panel for all the non-essential circuits. I'll plug, with heavy duty (10 or 12 gauge) 3 wire grounded extension cords and male-to-male dongles, my carefully grounded (very important) electrical gas driven generator into several standard 3 prong outlets on my home's critical circuits.

If you use your own electrical generator it is crucial to 1. Disconnect your home from the electrical power company by throwing to 'off' your panel's main disconnect breaker. Otherwise you'll be powering your entire neighbor hood and perhaps even electrocute a power company worker. 2. Ground your generator using a pipe driven into the wet ground. 3. Use extreme caution handling the gasoline for your generator. 4. Power off all applliances before you shut off your generator to refuel it. 5. Operate your generator outdoors in a windy area to disperse the deadly fumes. 6. Hope that your generator's noise does not attract unlawful aggressive hungry cold scavengers.

Good luck. Things might be very interesting in 7 months. I hope not.

Ron Sander

-- Ron Sander (judy_sander@hotmail.com), June 02, 1999.

Surge suppressor: Filters-out very short-duration "spikes" above your regular voltage. Good for keeping the A/C from killing your PC.

Line conditioner: A transformer which adjusts for constantly low or high voltage, resulting in a constant voltage output. Good for keeping the voltage steady during "brown-outs" or long-duration over- voltage situations. A side-effect of line-conditioners is that they ALSO act as surge-suppressors.

-- Anonymous99 (Anonymous99@Anonymous99.xxx), June 02, 1999.

I don't profess to understand brownout. But we have them all the time as part of our power providers package. They have a box on the house that will automatically shut down the water heater, AC and Dryer periodically when therer is high demand for power. However, while it happens, I have never been aware of it. We have a 40kw generator and I know the power regulator or whatever that "thingie" is called in order for me to safely use my computer was an extra $960.

Taz

-- Taz (Tassie @aol.com), June 02, 1999.

Get hold of the company at

Quality Power Concepts, 1-800-948-3373, or qpower@ix.netcom.com

They are more expensive than 60.00; but in the tests I've witnessed, th elower end "surge protectors" that were tested simply failed - they did not shield the equipment from harm.

We put in a whole house surge protector 3 years ago - had no problems since then. Before that, lost a microwave. two telephone/answering machines, two TV sets, and the VCR.

-- Robert A. Cook, PE (Kennesaw, GA) (cook.r@csaatl.com), June 02, 1999.

Jeannie

A power conditioner (same as constant voltage transformer) will cost.

I am install a 7.5 kw Sola unit now which will handle all computer and motor equipment in the house.

They are rate in KW and motor loads as well as your electronic loading have to be calculated, placed on a subpanel that is handled through the conditioner.

They will give constant voltage out witha varied range of input voltages.

Contact me privately and I can help you furthur

Bob Pilcher Licesce # 11234 NJ

-- Bob P (rpilc99206@aol.com), June 02, 1999.