Protecting electrical equipment against power fluctuation

Many gadgets we use can be fairly sensitive against power fluctuation, let's take a look at ways of protecting them

Written by Tomas Lyngen

Published: 12 Jun 2024

Power fluctuation

Power fluctuation can be caused by many different factors, often outside ones home and it's not always easy to remove the root cause, but there's many ways to protect the equipment inside your own home

How big issue this is, will depend on where you live and the quality of electricity and equipment

Power strips with surge charge protection

For most equipment, the surge charge protection in power strips with them can be enough to protect the equipment. I always pick power strips with surge charge protection and reusable fuse (button that needs to be clicked, instead of fuse you need to replace)

I have noticed the equipment gets less hot when using a powerstrip with surcharge protection, compared to straight to the wall

Just remember that not all power strips has surge charge protection, so check the table before making your decision

Automatic Voltage Regulator (AVR)

For more expensive equipment, you might want to go for an AVR instead of a power strip

AVR provides the same coverage as an surge charge protection, in addition to also active work to regulate the voltage to desired level. They often also offer delayed start, so should power be gone. It will wait to send power to the gadgets a certain amount of time. When you abruptly loose power, it's not uncommon it might come and go. So this will protect your equipment from rapidly going off and on, which often comes with pretty decent power spikes that can easily blow fuses and damage sensitive equipment

Safety Switch

For aircons and hot water showers, you should consider installing a safety switch. Which is basically a fuse you install between the equipment and the power outlet or source. So if there's sudden power spikes, the fuse should blow before the equipment take the hit

Depending on where you live and the equipment in question, this might be an requirement to install. My newest aircons required this, otherwise you can loose your warranty and some countries also required by law certain equipment to have extra protection

Lightning protection in fuse box

Depending on where you live in the world, you might be able to also buy extra lightning protection that's installed in your house's fuse box. This is mostly something that's installed with new house, but can be after installed

Main benefit of this approach, is that it will provide protection for your entire home. Meaning all power sockets, light bulbs and other power connections has some kind of protection

Inquire with your local electrician for what options are available in your area

Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS)

Beside providing protection to sudden power loss, UPS also will provide power for an period to either allow you to safely turn of the equipment or keep it running until power is back (for shorter outages)

How long an UPS will last, depends on the battery size and what load you are having on it. Smaller UPS are often design to last for around 30-60minutes after an power outage and to allow you to safely shutdown the connected equipment

Unplug equipment

During lightning storms, your safest bet is to unplug equipment to protect them. No matter what other protection you might have setup in your home, very little can protect against a direct enough lightning strike and why it's common with blackouts during and after an lighting storm