In practice anything that interrupts or affects
the continuous flow of normal power can cause a surge or transient
overvoltage to be induced onto the mains supply to your electrical
equipment.
Lightning discharges an enormous current flow that
in turn creates an electromagnetic field. If power or data cabling
passes through the electromagnetic field, the cable will pick up
a voltage or alternatively an induced voltage will affect the cable
This occurs when lightning discharges close to overhead power or
telephone lines.
For the really technical answers please refer to
the American National Standard IEEE C62.41-1991 and British Standards
BS6651: 1992
Damages caused?
Equipment malfunction:
Equipment being switched on in adjoining offices can cause transient
surges. Any equipment sharing the ring main can be effected. This
can cause computers to crash unexpectedly, and sometimes this can
result in the loss of hours of work. When a computer hangs or crashes
we usually blame the software. This is not necessarily the case.
It is not just computers that suffer, any equipment with electrical
components or circuit boards get damaged. Fax machines, printers,
hi-fi, TV’s and many other electrical devices are equally affected.
Equipment degradation:
This has a more serious side effect in that long term exposure of
lower levels of transient overvoltages will degrade electronic components
and computer circuitry affecting the equipment’s life and increasing
the possibilities of total equipment failure. This can result in
no fault found service call and either the isolated component or
the whole unit being replaced.
Equipment damage:
Larger surges and transients overvoltages can cause serious damage.
The increase in voltage will vary from a few volts to thousands
of volts. Electrical components and circuit boards in the path of
these surges and transients can be burnt out causing instant malfunction
of product, but usually there will be no visual indication of component
failure except that the unit will no longer operate. This can all
take place in less than a microsecond
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