MOV lightning protection [RE-wrenches]

[Bob Ellison]

As it happens on this system the lightning suppression consists of the
factory cans on the Jake turbine and I believe one on the tower disconnect
box. The customer told me there was a "bunch of ground wire" coiled under
the tower. I expect it does not do much if it is truly coiled. Putting a
heap of copper in one place does not seem productive to me. I would (and do)
do a ground net so to speak that radiates from the tower and if there are
guy wires involved interconnects all of them with the base. Deep and damp
helps, rock is a problem. I have actually ran a ground wire into a lake when
there was nothing else available that was any good. I like steel well
casings if I can get to one.

Most of my lightning problems come on existing systems that I have taken
over (so to speak) and seem to come from the grid side. At least that is the
side with the blown breaker and the side of the inverter with the damage.
One school just took it's 3rd strike in 2 weeks,  2 were within 2 days of
each other! The new fellow in charge of the process is seeing some benefit
of up grading his suppression system to at least having one on the grid side
of the system and changing out the old ones on the turbine. This poor fellow
can't win. On the job 3 days and all this starts..

Good night,
Bob 

-----Original Message-----
From: David Palumbo, Independent Power & Light [mailto:ipl at sover.net] 
Sent: Sunday, July 09, 2006 10:42 PM
To: RE-wrenches at topica.com
Subject: RE: MOV lightning protection [RE-wrenches]


Conrad,

I have been using SOV's (Delta LA's) for the last 12 yrs or so. Used a few
MOV's prior to that - but had one catch on fire ,which scared the homeowner,
(did not burn anything else, thankfully) and put me off those.

I can't say what the Delta's actually do. I ground the sh__ out of the
system, put those LA's on and don't have many problems at all. The lightning
problems I have seen have mostly come on systems that I did not install.
They all had mediocre to poor grounds.

Our local Lightning expert is good (UL Certified, I have learned a lot about
grounding from him) and he thinks the Delta LA's are a joke. He cut one open
to show me that they are simply sand in a can with the wires. Yes we know
the theory behind it, but we aren't necessarily buying that it can actually
do it. Mr. Lightning protection (Will Priestley - Priestley Lightning
Protection (there's a great trade name for ya)) uses "Zone Defender's" by
Atlantic Scientific and lots of #2 braided copper ground wire and as many
driven ground rods as needed.

David

-----Original Message-----
From: Conrad Geyser [mailto:conradg at cape.com]
Sent: Sunday, July 09, 2006 10:23 PM
To: RE-wrenches at topica.com
Subject: MOV lightning protection [RE-wrenches]



Is there anybody that has had lightning protection (MOV style) actually save
a system?
Conrad
Cotuit Solar

----- Original Message -----
From: "Bob Ellison" <ellison at gisco.net>
To: <RE-wrenches at topica.com>
Sent: Sunday, July 09, 2006 6:48 PM
Subject: Outback dealer protection? [RE-wrenches]


>
>
> I had an experience the other day that the longer I think about it the 
> more it irritates me, here goes.
> I got a call from a customer that had a pair of VFX3648 inverters and 
> took a
> 2 1/2 hour drive to the site,
>
> He had no lightning cans and took a bad lightning hit, the inverters 
> were already off the rack and opened up.. Both inverters were down and 
> he had an insurance inspection the following day. Real bad timing. I 
> did not supply or install the gear and low buck wholesale never 
> suggested lightning protection.
> My regular supplier is at a show so I called Outback to get the boards 
> and was informed that we had to send the inverters back. Also the 
> board prices were up from $700.00 to $1200.00. and we needed all of 
> them, 2 sets. There was no doubt that all the boards were bad, the burns
were obvious.
>
> I was not having any luck getting the boards sent and asked the tech 
> to explain to the customer that they had to be sent back. I  found out 
> after he got off the very short phone conversation that he had been 
> sold all the boards at my cost, and on my dime for the phone call!
>
> It just ticked me off, I guess the dealers don't have an advantage 
> over the customer any more at Outback.
> I didn't expect the customer to get dealer pricing. I could have 
> gotten a verbal PO easily or just put it on a card and actually made 
> some money on the process instead of the way it worked out.
> 5 hours drive time and a couple on site add up fast towards wasting a 
> day real fast.
>
> Back to packing for Solarfest,
>
> Bob
>
>
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
>
>
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