Most homeowners will unfortunately experience a power surge at one point or another; if you haven’t, consider yourself lucky. While some surges are worse than others, we can’t deny the possible outcomes of power surges. Your electronics might get destroyed, you could blow a circuit, and power surges can even start a fire; but what triggers these surges? If you’d like to know the answer, we’re going to break down the top causes of power surges in our guide below, so be sure to read on.
Lightning Strikes
The vast majority of power surges stem from storms, specifically lightning. When a storm rolls through your area, there’s a good chance that you might have a power surge. The problem is, you can’t control the weather—but you can protect your electronics. Every home should have their valuable electronics and appliances plugged into a surge protector. Don’t assume your power strip has a surge protector built-in. You also need to ensure you’re not overloading the surge protector. Most surge protectors have a number of joules that indicate the amount of protection they provide. In general, you should look for a surge protector with at least 400 joules. The more joules, the more protection.
Overloaded Outlets
A lot of homeowners and businesses make the mistake of overloading their outlets, or worse—their circuits. Now, we’re not saying you can’t plug more than one item into an outlet, because you can; that’s what power strips are for. You shouldn’t, however, have a power strip plugged into another power strip—that’s practically asking for a power surge. Alternatively, if you overload and trip circuit breakers frequently, you may need to call an electrician to prevent power surges.
Exposed Wires
It should be obvious that nothing good ever comes out of exposed wires—but exposed wires aren’t typically your fault. If you have wires exposed around an outlet in your home, you should call an electrician to ensure the repair is done properly. Alternatively, there could be exposed wires in your city that need to be repaired. The problem is that you may experience power surges until your local electric company replaces and covers those wires.
Many of the top causes of power surges are out of your control, which is why you must take preventative measures with surge protectors. Don’t forget that a power surge can affect more than a cord; they can also affect your HDMI cables if they’re connected to, say, your television.
If you’re in need of a surge protector or a new high-speed HDMI cable with Ethernet, CableWholesale has you covered. All our products are made with only the highest quality materials. We also offer a lifetime warranty on most of our products. Check out our inventory today and don’t forget to take advantage of our free technical assistance.
