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Not from a direct lightning strike, unless you are quite lucky.
Not from a direct lightning strike, unless you are quite lucky.
True true! But we have been near lightning strikes a number of times in our lives - even a hundred yards or so can take out things like computers and TVs - we have lost several pieces of electronic equipment over the years - not in the RV but in various residences - we did not have protection.
I had a house in Colorado with a high TV antenna and the it got hit several times - first time it took out the TV but then I got a signal booster thingy from Radio Shack to improve antenna strength and each lightning strike took out that booster but nothing else - I would just go buy a new booster - didn't know about surge protectors back then.
A tree strike about a hundred yards away took out our stereo receiver once.
We once did a remodel/restoration to a house that had a fire due to a lightning strike - it came into the house through a wall clock - inspectors said lightning goes to point of least resistance which in that case was the wall clock. That was over 40 years ago.
I have been close enough to lightning for the hair on my arms to stand up. With today's sensitive electronics that could be enough to get to some devices. It doesn't take a direct hit and a surge protector can provide some level of protection. But our main reason for having the protector on our Bus is chances of line voltage weirdness.
http://www.briansue2.blogspot.com
Good idea for pulling grounding rod.
Reed and Elaine
briansue wrote:
To the best of my knowledge ground and neutral are always common as they are connected to the same bar in the main panel - I don't know of any other way of doing it.
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ground and neutral are common.
ground and neutral are common.
To the best of my knowledge ground and neutral are always common as they are connected to the same bar in the main panel - I don't know of any other way of doing it.
I have seen NO earth ground in many Mexican campgrounds. To fool the testers, the earth ground terminal is shorted to the neutral at the post!
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To fool the testers, the earth ground terminal is shorted to the neutral at the post!
To fool the testers, the earth ground terminal is shorted to the neutral at the post!
You may be correct but I am not absolutely sure. I think a good tester would know if the neutral was common at the outlet otherwise any and all circuits in any house could fool the electrical inspector in the USA when he walks through the house randomly checking outlets with the same tester we would use - I have seen this done and they don't open outlets to physically check the outlet - they use a tester. I think there has to be a specific ground wire going from the main panel to any and all outlets. I think in Mexico there are people who will tie the ground slot of the outlet to the neutral wire but I don't think this would fool a tester - otherwise testers would be pointless anywhere. Testers are designed to recognize cheaters. But I am not 100% certain.
We had problems in Yucatan several years ago and son (in solar business) and family flew down to spend time with us. He brought down a battey charger so that intermittant power/voltage fluctuations would not damage electronics. He designed and fabricated this into both of our solar/LFP rigs. We just use a 15 amp 120 V power cord to the pedestal which goes to battery charger (which is apparently happy from 60 to 220 V). This supplies 48 V to LFP bank in our 5th wheel and 12 V to LFP bank in Roadtrek.
We have purchased a recepticle/outlet checker. These runs $6 to $10 and let you know if recepticle is safe. A multimeter will give more specific results but these do let one know if outlet is safe: grounded, proper polarity, GFCItest, neutral/ground reversed. Improper wiring can cause a hot chassis resulting in annoying to fatal shocks. Somone on this forum mentioned grounding the chassis with a cable and a copper rod stuck in the ground. We shall be installing this on Roadtrek before we got to Yucatan, southern west coast, and Patzcuaro...
Had hot chassis twice after Patzcuaro and we just relied on solar after that. We had sunny days for six weeks.
Reed and Elaine
We had problems in Yucatan several years ago and son (in solar business) and family flew down to spend time with us. He brought down a battey charger so that intermittant power/voltage fluctuations would not damage electronics. He designed and fabricated this into both of our solar/LFP rigs. We just use a 15 amp 120 V power cord to the pedestal which goes to battery charger (which is apparently happy from 60 to 220 V). This supplies 48 V to LFP bank in our 5th wheel and 12 V to LFP bank in Roadtrek.
We have purchased a recepticle/outlet checker. These runs $6 to $10 and let you know if recepticle is safe. A multimeter will give more specific results but these do let one know if outlet is safe: grounded, proper polarity, GFCItest, neutral/ground reversed. Improper wiring can cause a hot chassis resulting in annoying to fatal shocks. Somone on this forum mentioned grounding the chassis with a cable and a copper rod stuck in the ground. We shall be installing this on Roadtrek before we got to Yucatan, southern west coast, and Patzcuaro...
Had hot chassis twice after Patzcuaro and we just relied on solar after that. We had sunny days for six weeks.
Reed and Elaine