whole house brown out protection

House Repair Talk

Help Support House Repair Talk:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

rokosz

Well-Known Member
Joined
Jun 21, 2013
Messages
171
Reaction score
34
I understand surge protectors and the equivalent for a whole house. But...

In another post someone mentioned that lightning is not the same as a surge. (or its a truly massive, immediate surge).

Are there whole house minor and massive/lightning surge protectors?

Will some of the same do whole house brown-out protection?

brown-outs can be as damaging as surges and perhaps a bit more stealthy over time.

I presume a brown-out protector would reduce the juice to zero so units aren't damaged by lo-v?

finally, on average it seems like whole house protectors are in the $800 range yes? Is installation more _convenient_ ie less $ if done when a gennie is installed at the same time? Seems like it would be...

Hah! which begs another question: if the brown-out occurs, and the protector reduces juice to zero into the panel -- does the genny then kick on? Whoa, and is the protector in-between the genny and panel too? or is a 2nd unit needed? wow, this is getting very circular, sorry & thanks if you can help. B
 
I have never heard of brown out protector other than a UPS. A whole house UPS would be rather expensive.
 
I looked at them from Emerson, the cost was rather cheap (200 bucks). You put right in your panel. Ill try to find the model and post it here
 
I looked at them from Emerson, the cost was rather cheap (200 bucks). You put right in your panel. Ill try to find the model and post it here

$200 for a whole house UPS? Post a link.
 
Thanks for the ideas. A quick search leads me to think Emerson leans more toward data center up-time. Nooutage.com does list a few "whole house" items (all over $1K).

If it isn't out there, seems like a marketing/engineering opp: whole house surge protectors are common (What about the lightning question in the OP?) but a brown-out
protector could be as valuable given the electronics that are in _everything_ these days. Maybe Homeowner's ins would provide a small discount for having one...
On the other hand: My K appliances' clocks all work fine during brown outs....
 
Its not a UPS, its more of a whole house Surge protector. The place i libed before would lose power and have surges all the time. A few electronics couldn't handle it so I started looking into options.

If i lose power, it wont supply any power but it will protect everything in the house
 
Still like to see a link to know exactly what it does.
I suspect it has some sort master relay that cuts all the power to the house it the voltage drops below a certain threshold to avoid applying low voltage to your home.
 
EMC-240B


I also use a monster power center that regulates the power coming in so when it dips, the power center keeps it at 110.
 
That is a surge suppressor. There are many versions of that available.
We were discussing whole house brown out protection. Brown out by my definition is low voltage, below 100 volts.
 
Back
Top