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LIGHTING!!!! oh no!!! DAMN!!!!!

jeanmarie

jeanmarie

AK Subscriber
Subscriber
LIGHTNING!!!! oh no!!! DAMN!!!!!

My house took a lighting hit the other night. I lost a but load of electronics. I was told it hit the tree just out side the house and then spread to the house from the tree. I know it hit the tree it is toasted and will need to com down. I lost every TV in the house all 5 of them! it blew out my Klipsch suba computer my sleep number bed computer, my Denon AVR and my denon Cd player. Another weird one is all my tubes in my McIntosh MC-75 amps are toast but the amps are fine from what I can see. and test. How is that possible?? it took out the tubes but not the amps. My air conditioner also took a dump. I am looking at just under 7K in damage all in a split second of activity. Wow what a trip. Any ideas on how the amps survived when the tubes didn't is appreciated. Thanks Jean.
 
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This happened to my parents a few years ago. About half the electronics got zapped. It even ruined some breakers in the panel. Surge suppressors are not often helpful in a close strike situation.

PS. Please correct your spelling of lighting to lightning. I thought you had issues with some fancy lighting system when I read the title :)
 
Sorry to hear of your losses--hopefully, your insurance company won't try to screw you and take care of the losses.

My guess on the tubes is that the filiments in the tubes were the "weakest link" in terms of ability to handle the spike and they basically acted as "fuses".

Now about spreading some of that insurance money around on power conditioners/surge protectors?
 
Last weekend I got hit too. It was a light hit, not too traumatic. The lightning spike came in though my cable modem, blew my router and my magic jack, heh. Somehow it tripped the overload on my security camera power supply too. I was able to reset that and it was ok afterward. All of this was plugged into a UPS, so I am certain the cable was the culprit.

When I was doing electronics repair for a living, I saw lightning damage come in via the cable and telephone lines much more frequently than through the power lines.

I have since added a suppressor inline with the incoming cable line, and the outgoing data line from the modem.
 
I have and have all ways had surge protectors on it all. It still got zapped. I have to admit it was a hell of a strike my whole house shook and it is a 100 year old 3 story Victorian, it takes a lot to make it move .
 
I live in the lightning capital of the word and have armed all my "goodies" (except the ones I really *want* to replace - heh, heh) with surge protectors and UPS units (computers).

I also have a whole house surge protector.

Last time I had a near strike it took WEEKS to find all the affected components...

LESSON: NOTHING protects from a direct strike.
 
Its a krillion volts, or more. Its enough energy to theoretically initiate a wormhole (but I dont recommend attempting that)

Surge protectors work pretty good when the power line spike is upsteam at least a transformer and a few grounded poles away.

But, in your case, a nearby strike ELIMINATED your house ground (and hence neutral - it is locally derived), and in the case of 220v customer power vs krillion volts god power, essentially reversed the potential of your house. Surge protectors are good to about 10kv, krillion-10kv = a sizeable crap load. nuttin you can do except have insurance. which in most cases without a rider, does NOT cover.

good luck.

PS - I always say that you can never have too many grounds. 8ft copper rods all over the property help, except in this sitch.
 
Surge protectors work pretty good when the power line spike is upsteam at least a transformer and a few grounded poles away.
g.png
 
WOW - sorry about all your equipment loss

a fortnight ago our farmhouse took a direct strike to TV antenna
i was 50feet away ---- nigh pooped myself
luckily my TV and Home Theatre were all unplugged due to lounge decorating

and a telephone overhead pole about 500m away
which fried my router, microfilter, PC network card and a phone
all easily replaced and small potatoes compared to yours

but a lesson learnt...Telecomms Engineer said nowt could withstand a direct strike surge..........:no:

i now check the weather forecast EACH day and DISCONNECT ALL electronics at the plugs each evening if thunderstorms are forecast

a massive PITA but i sleep easy.........:music:...............john
 
I'm sorry to hear this OP. I know how you feel, because I went through it as well, about 15 years ago.

I had a lightning strike on a Ham Radio Antenna, the lightning came in on the RG-8U Coax, and toasted my Rig, my Auto Antenna Tuner, and my Power Supply. It also toasted a few other components.

This was the ONE ANTENNA that I did NOT have Lightning Arrestors on! AGH! To this day, I can't believe Murphy's Law struck me like that. Probably $2,000 in damage.

I also have lost answering machines and modems (back when we used them) from lightning strikes. Never lost a TV or Stereo, but I have lost a Bose Wave Radio. Fried it up pretty good.

My sympathies. They say it never strikes twice. Hopefully, you are out of the woods for life now.
 
Yea, that is so sad to hear about your loss. Had a DVD/VHS combo unit to take a hit once. Only the DVD worked afterwards.

I see why the old folks would tell us as kids to turn off the lights & be still during a vicious thunderstorm.

Hopefully, you can get some other gear.

Rome
 
Sorry to hear about the lightning strike. Hopefully, they can all be fixed or replaced.

quaddriver said:
nuttin you can do except have insurance. which in most cases without a rider, does NOT cover.
Click to expand...

Plus, if you have vintage components, the insurer will likely only pay its depreciated value today (e.g., pennies), not the replacement value or value it would be sold/bought/traded today. That's a drastic difference.
 
edwyun said:
Sorry to hear about the lightning strike. Hopefully, they can all be fixed or replaced.



Plus, if you have vintage components, the insurer will likely only pay its depreciated value today (e.g., pennies), not the replacement value or value it would be sold/bought/traded today. That's a drastic difference.
Click to expand...

Depends on what sort of insurance coverage you're paying for. If all one has is basic coverage then, yeah, one might take a beating.

One should get replacement value and extended coverage or increased personal property coverage in some cases. But that will cost extra so each must decide if it's worth the extra. Case in point, sometimes there are category limits on certain items like computers or guns. If you have lots of guns, for example, it would be wise to see what the policy limit is for guns. It would be a shame to have only $1000 worth of coverage for that closet full of guns.
 
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Man that sucks! Sorry to hear this.

About a year ago we had a REALLY bad storm - maybe the worst I've seen since I lived here. Woke me up out of a sound sleep as I had two 100 pound dogs standing on my head. I raced around the house and unplugged all phone, network, cable, and AC plugs on all the electronics. Even though everything goes through surge protectors and line conditioners I wasn't taking a chance.

The next day, all my stuff was fine but my neighbor to the West didn't fare as well. He slept through the storm and lost several TVs, cable boxes, and a PC.

Thanks for sharing this - time for us all to check what our insurance really covers should any of us fall victim to this. In the meantime, I wish you luck in getting your home back in order sir.
 
I have a replacement cost coverage plus a million dollar umbrella so it all will be covered. It is just a pain in the butt waiting for things.
 
sorry about the situation.. glad it sounds like you have your insurance situation in order

there was thunderstorms here all weekend.. I unplugged my Sony ES stack and some other stuff... till it died down.
 
A surge protector might not do a thing forya if it hits really close. There is a mini EMP around a lightning strike and every conductor becomes a generator. Grounding won't help, even disconnecting everything won't help.

Had a couple of components from the ame customer once that had a near strike. It did not hit the power or any other ines but it was very close to the house. His autoreverse cassette deck was the older type with the stacked heads and a relay to switch beetween them. Relay would not activate. (in side B it played side A backwards) Put in a new relay driver transistor and the coil was not open. Still had to replace it. Same thing with the protection relay on the guy's amp. Not open, just would not pull. No other bad components, no burned out light bulbs, no switches welded together, no bad across the line or switch caps. The only thing I can conclude is the energy that did this did not get there by wire.
 
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