near disaster

[STURMJ]

We have been having nasty weather here in the Twin Cities.  After one of the power-outages, I tried to fire up the preebee, and there was nothing  :'( .  I did an autopsy and found sooty residue near the power inlet.  Taking that apart it looks like a short opened up in the power wireing, from the neutral lead to the sheild.  I hoped that that ment that the problem ended there, prior to any sensitive parts.  I made a new wiring harness and installed it. Everything is working perfectly. 
My lesson learned was never leave homebuilt gear plugged in to a unswitched supply.  It will be on my power-conditioner from now on with the others. It wasnt, because I was still testing things, getting my LED power switch wired up ect.

Another interesting problem I ran into was, a shorted rca jack.  It wasnt a dead short, more like a 89k ohm short.  Imagine the fun figureing that out (which to me is the fun of building the kits) a paralled resistance with the balance and volume pot, that was colse to the resistance of the pots themselfs. I thought the balance pot was bad then the volume , then both. After disconnecting everything back to the selector switch, and retesting was fine, I disconected the one rca jack that had to be the problem and it was.  Fortunatly those jacks just come out of the recesses and I had another.

 

[4krow]

  I worked for the phone company for nearly 30 years and trouble shooting was my favorite work. It did however have some strange happenings. I won't go into them here, but I will say that you should pat yourself on the back for the persistence that is takes to find these little demons. You even have to put your gut instincts aside sometimes, and routine the whole damned scenario. You gotta admit that's pretty amazing how much grief that these kits will take from us or 'nature'.

 

[Grainger49]

If you want to be safe from anything on the power system you need to disconnect the hot, neutral and ground.  A triple pole switch will get you there. 

 

[4krow]

  That's the truth. Even the RCA cables in a serious storm can be the end of it all. I saw that happen once after a lightening storm. The surge didn't come through the  electric, which was protected, it blew right through our protection device and attacked the rest of the system anyway. The insurance adjuster ran from the site. Nobody won that day.

 

[Grainger49]

Eric, 

Exactly!  In a lightning strike your ground, and connected neutral, can jump to thousands of volts.  Complete disconnection is the only answer.

 

[STURMJ]

I never thought of the lightning strike comming through the grounded lead makes sense though.

 

[earwaxxer]

Eric, 

Exactly!  In a lightning strike your ground, and connected neutral, can jump to thousands of volts.  Complete disconnection is the only answer.

Granger, you're not getting me mixed up with Greg are you? Although, I'm not sure who should feel offended by that? Or maybe its a complement for both of us? Or maybe... humm.

 

[4krow]

Eric, 

  Complete disconnection is the only answer.

  Hmmm, That's what my doctor said as well.

 

[Grainger49]

I'm old! And probably should never post after a Bourbon and water.  My brain is fuzzy enough these days.

 

[Chris]

Hahaha, you guys are great... Before I moved to Orlando, I bought a Russ Andrews passive purifier with what he calls a megaclamp. All I know is it was a mega expensive clamp and passive. But , I always had good sonic benefits with it so enough said.. Well, when I moved to orlando, I hooked up my custom cd and dac and my EAR V-20 with the Russ Andrews gear... Well,  DAMN glad I did, because, I had NO idea how severe and CLOSE the lightning strikes were there... And so , (naive me) was enjoying my system one night during a hellacious lightning storm when suddenly and without warning,  the entire room lit up like it was day, and I heard a 'snap" on the window metal strips and at the same time a very high pitched SHREEEEK coming from the right side of my audiorack.. needless to say , I jumped for the volume knob and turned it down and switched off my gear.. (20k worth in total). and then sat there thinking what the hell just happened... however, I kept thinking that during all that HUGE surge from an extremely close strike NEVER EVER one time affected the music playing.. the music coming from the speakers were not bothered and never even changed during the flash... So I checked my power plug into the outlet and sure enough (it was a brand new wattgate from Russ Andrews and maybe 2 months old at best) it was charred and pitted like it took a big hit from some sort of electricity... So , with a HUGE sigh of relief and a vow to have learned my lesson and to never do that again, I HAVE to say a BIG thank you to me, and Russ Andrews for that Clamp, because I am surmising that the shreek noise I heard was the excess energy being dissipated off through the transformation into another form being "noise"..... and My PRECIOUS gear just played through it all as if nothing ever happened... It could have kept playing as well.. It was only me, that shut the whole thing down just to be safe.. And when I say , thank you to me, just before I was moving to orlando from the UK, I sent my passive purifier to Russ for the Megaclamp upgrade at something like an extra $250 all the while thinking that it would be a waste of money, but I wanted the feeling that I had the top of the line for the time being.. However, little did I know, that the $250 would save me maybe thousands in damage only 2 months later.................

 

[4krow]

Soooo, the clamp is now, burned in?  heh heh

 

[Chris]

Great point 4k... I read that if the clamp took a hit like that, to send it back for a new clamp. As of now, my gear is stored away in boxes and sleeping as we speak... I kept on using it for 3 more years though with no problems of course. However, when there were storms, I just unplugged it from the wall socket. So no worries. But, when I get up and running again, I will send it back to Russ for a checkup and make it all nice and new again...I do have to say though, that that piece of gear was a MASSIVE lifesaver!! I would have just died if I blew out the entire system based on my stupidity. The shreek noise was just to the right of my component rack DIRECTLY above the passive purifier/megaclamp box so I definitely know it came from the clamp... Wow, just thinking about it now makes me breathe another sigh of relief for buying that piece of gear.... ok I will shutup now...

 

[4krow]

Most everyone has a lightening story. While listening to my system, I actually saw some kind of bolt exit one of the recepticles in my room! Wouldn't believe it if I hadn't seen it. System unharmed. Go figure.

 

[Chris]

You are lucky man... Yes, many people DO have a lightning story unfortunately... When I was living in Orlando (same place I had my episode), MANY people would tell me about losing their TV to a storm.. Now, I am in a different country with a similar rainy season with the exact same electrical storms and funny enough, yesterday, I entered my usual restaurant and they told me the big flatscreen blewout.... And the usual sad fact is, they bought surge protection for it AFTER the fact..  I was dang lucky I bought mine before my "shocking" episode....

 

[earwaxxer]

Yep, gota have the good old surge protector. As Greg knows quite well, we get our fair share of electical storms here in 'The Old Pueblo'. Here is a shot of one from my back yard to give you the idea!

 

[Grainger49]

Eric,

We got to talk about your photography, I'll PM.

I'm not a big fan of inexpensive surge suppressors.  Most of those are MOVs, a $2.02 device.  Too many manufacturers only put in one.  You need them line to neutral, line to ground and neutral to ground for full protection.

The best ones are whole house protectors that go into the first two breaker slots in your service panel. 

 

[4krow]

Eric, EXCELLENT, MAN! I CAN'T GET ENOUGH! WAS EVEN BETTER IN BISBEE(THEY MINED COPPER THERE).

 

[earwaxxer]

Ah yes, the old saying in Bisbee -- "Dont want to be minin' in an electrical storm!"

 

[Chris]

Yeah great photos wax... and what you say makes the most sense MR. G...

 

[4krow]

  The whole house protection is really a great idea. I see that happening more in newly built homes. The sooner you stop the surge, the better chance you have, and the breaker box is the first site you have available. BTW, instead of using the power company ground rod, I attached the power ground directly to the well casing of my pump!, not mention to a rebar construct as well. Yah, I'm a ground hog.