I recently had a lighting strike and lost about $1000 worth of equipment. I’d like to reduce the chance of that happening again so I’m looking for advice.
I have a UDM in my house, with a 125 foot run underground in conduit to my barn. In the barn, I have a POE switch that feeds 10 cameras and an Ubiquiti AP. I’d like to add a ground somewhere. I just purchased a surge protector with ethernet for the barn, since the switch is currently plugged in directly to an outlet and should be protected anyway. I also bought this from APC for my equipment in the house. I was going to install that between my UDM and POE switch in the house, then ground it to an outlet.
I’m reading so much information about how to go about this. My barn is powered with 220v from my house, so 4 wires go to the barn H/H/N/G. the ground on the barn is the same ground as the house. If I use both devices can that create a ground loop in the event of a surge? I’m also reading that I can use the APC at any point on my network to provide protection. Is this correct?
Please don’t suggest fiber runs, as the cable is already run and I don’t plan on redoing it. Thank you all in advance.
Years ago when I was an alarm guy I had a building on 35th Street that was constantly hit by lightning and thus burning my alarm panel out. I did everything in the manufacturer recommended to earthing diodes and surge suppressors and the like ,nothing worked. A conversation with a telephone person resulted in the solution. This was in the day when the alarm systems were tied to the phone line. He told me just to tie a simple knot in the telephone cable tying my alarm to the phone, on the basis that it would slow down the surge so that it could ground elsewhere. I went from replacing the alarm control every 8 or so months to not having to ever replace it again for the next 3 years.
