Spring time brings April showers and the summer brings thunder storms and power surges! First a FLASH, then THUNDER, then BANG! Your air conditioner just Blew Up!
We receive calls from concerned homeowners when their home AC system stops working after a storm passes their home. Lightening is the most obvious source of a power surge, but not the only cause. Utility events such as a transformer going offline, local construction, cycling of air conditioners, generators, and appliances can also produce damaging surges.
If your home experiences a power outage, power surge or lightning strike, some items in your home might be damaged or fail to turn on, such as the air conditioning. If the air conditioning fails to turn off, the cause is most likely a safety feature preventing excess electricity from entering the air conditioner compressor. Keep your equipment operating during the summer storms by protecting your equipment with a Surge Protector.
Are you protected? Did you know there are many different types of surge protectors? Some are cheap and not worth having and some are more expensive and offer you another layer of protection for your electronic products such as TV’s, stoves, washing machines, computers, and your HVAC system.
Many homeowners already use surge protection everyday, for example with personal computers. With the proven instability of the national electrical grid, the addition of surge protection for an HVAC system is a logical, low-cost solution that helps keep air conditioning systems up and running and prevents unwanted damage.
By getting this protection from an HVAC contractor, you get professional installation and reliable operation. In addition, some surge protectors handle up to 100,000 amps of surge current, offer a lifetime warranty, and include a $1,000 connected equipment warranty.
Be sure the surge protection device is UL approved for safety purposes. Do not buy it if not.
A question that comes up is that if power surges are a regular occurrence, unavoidable with our current system of providing electricity to homes and offices, why didn't we need surge protectors in our homes 50 years ago?
The answer is that a lot of the components in sophisticated modern electronic devices (such as computers, microwave ovens, DVD players etc.) are much smaller and more delicate than components in older machines, and are therefore more sensitive to current increases. Microprocessors which are an integral part of all computers as well as many home appliances, and today’s HVAC equipment are particularly sensitive to surges. They only function properly when they receive stable current at the right voltage. When a surge occurs beyond what is acceptable in tolerances, they fail.
Get protected today if you are not already.
