Comments on Leviton Surge Suppressor?

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kenjsil

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I am bidding a residential service upgrade where the client has asked for a "whole house" surge protector to be installed at the main panel. Unfortunately, I have no experience with these devices.

The client showed me a data sheet on the Leviton 51120 Transient Voltage Surge Suppressor and asked my opinion :confused: . They are apparently planning for future installation of some X10 home automation controls (various hard-wired receptacles and switches or dimmers) and want to make sure these will be protected from transients.

The Levition TVSS specs claim a transient surge capacity of 950 Joules and a maximum surge current of 50,000 Amps. I frankly have no idea how those ratings correlate with any power line surges they'd be likely to experience.

Does anyone have any comments on the effectiveness of the Leviton item or similar devices?
 
Re: Comments on Leviton Surge Suppressor?

Kenneth, I work a lot with TVSS products and might be able to comment if you can provide a link, or model number of the product you are interested in.

For starters ignore "joules" ratings and "total amps", it means nothing. A couple of things to look at for comparison are "SVR", "Amps Per Mode", UL-1449 and ANSI C3 and B3 pulse ratings.

Provide some feedback and I will comment further... Dereck
 
Re: Comments on Leviton Surge Suppressor?

Regarding TVSS:
More is better
You get what you pay for

Install a unit at the service, pay about $200 for it and then plug strips or wall units at each location.

At the service, the best type is one that goes behind the meter if the POCO will let you use.
Also its very important to bond together all the telecom, coax and power tvss's to one common bond point

And some x-10 won't work when plugged into a tvss receptacle.
 
Re: Comments on Leviton Surge Suppressor?

Kenneth, I went to Levitons web site and found quite a bit of info. After looking at their products I would suggest starting with one of their meter plug-in units (did not know they had them) model number 50240 or 50208. This will get you your service entrance taken care of assuming the service is 240/120 @ 200-amps or less.

From there you need to look at point-of-use devices or Class A type TVSS. I like the receptacle types. Leviton makes several in industrial and hospital grades. They are a little expensive, but they have the ratings you are looking for.

For devices like A/V, PC's ect, the receptacle types are not a good choice because they do not provide protectors for the I/O ports like telephone, CATV, etc. You would need to use one of the power strip models offered.

As Tom mentioned, do not overlook the other utility services that enter the house like CATV, telephone, SATV, etc. They all need SPD's installed before the enter the house. Hopefully they all enter approx the same location the the?AC service enters, as they need bonded to the GEC or GES. If not you are looking at digging a trench around the house to get to the AC GES to do it right... Dereck
 
Re: Comments on Leviton Surge Suppressor?

Thank you, Dereck & Tom.

I located the data on the Leviton meter units and have a call in to the PoCo to see whether they'll allow them.

If not, the panel-adjacent model I'm considering is the 51120-1 (or 51120-3R in a raintight enclosure). The specs state UL1449 certification and ANSI/IEEE Categories A, B & C - C-62.41 & C-62.45.

It appears that the MOV's are not replaceable in these or the meter units. Is that a reasonable concern? The only TVSS units I've found with user-replaceable MOV's are 3-phase commercial ones at a much higher price.
 
Re: Comments on Leviton Surge Suppressor?

Kenneth, the 51120 unit you mentioned is a lighter duty unit than the socket type. Replaceable modules come with a price.

TVSS specs are a bit confusing because they will use different terms and sometimes mis-leading terms like Joules and Amps Per Phase.

First thing to look at is the UL SVR rating. The lower the better. The best rating for a 240/120 unit is 330. Leviton is 800 L-N.

The next in line are similar to SVR ratings are the ANSI pulse categories test. These give an indication of how high a voltage the unit will let pass with respect to the amount of energy applied. C3 is the largest so pay attention to it. Again the lower the better. The better units wil be around 400. They look something like this
A3 6KV/200A = 400
B3/C1 6KV/5KA =420
C2 10KV/5KA =430
C3 20KV/10KA = 440

The next and very important rating is Amps Per Mode. Ignore "Total Amps" or "Amps Per Phase", they are only mathematical addition of the all the modes put together and mean nothing. A mode is L-N, L-L, L-G, and N-G. For a service entrance unit, choose a model with L-N modes only. The other modes (L-L, L-G, and N-G) are not needed and only raise the cost of the unit. This range comes from 10KA to 600KA. The larger the better, but for a price.

As Tom and I suggested the meter type is the best for residential. This is because it removes any leads and the installation factor. Lead lengths longer then a few inches and not tightly coupled together (no more than 6) completely renders a TVSS unit useless. My preferred order of selection is:
1. Meter Socket. Easy install, no lead lengths, effective, economical.
2. Built In Panel TVSS. Just as effective as meter socket but requires replacing panel and cost more. Not many choices for residential.
3. Add on panels. Least effective due to lead length. Can be overcome with careful attention to detail and planning.

Here are a few add on models with excellent specs that you can use as a yard stick.

http://www.geindustrial.com/products/specs/FES-162.pdf
http://www.geindustrial.com/products/specs/FES-164.pdf
http://www.geindustrial.com/products/specs/FES-185.pdf

Good luck... Dereck
 
Re: Comments on Leviton Surge Suppressor?

Hello Kenneth,

This won't answer your question, but is simply provided FYI and to others who might be interested.

I'll start off by telling you that we do not use surge suppressors as a matter of policy at our company- we have an office in Washington State and one in Florida, so we pretty much have both extremes coved as far as lightning concerns go.

There is a growing body of evidence that indicates these devices do little or nothing to protect electrical or electronic devices from damaging overvoltages.

I've previously written in this forum about a problem called "blind spot", where a surge suppressor will work at higher transient levels, but at lower levels they don't. In one case, we documented surges of close to 1000v making it through a brand new panel mounted surge suppressor, even though the published clamping level was 330v.

The surge suppressor industry trade group for years has fought successfully against any sort of performance base standard that would allow consumers to compare different brands of products by providing meaningful information. Remember, UL 1449 is a safety based standard, not a performance based standard.

Tom Baker is correct that a higher joule rating is better, but this number is often misleading because manufacturers simply add up the joule ratings available between all conductors, telephone, and CATV lines. This is what dereckbc
means when he says to ignore this number, among other reasons.(For those who don't know, a joule is one watt/second)

Regardless of the total joule rating, if you have expended the rating between any two conductors, the unit is non functional.

I like to use car tires as an example- you can't drive 200,000 miles on four tires rated at 50,000 miles each.

You might consider investing in a Fluke VR101 power quality data logger which you can use to prove or disprove the effectiveness of this surge suppressor and other power conditioning devices for future customers.

We use high end Dranetz power quality monitors, but this little device is well worth the $500.00 investment, most of which you can recoup by making it a billable service.

Good luck Kenneth,

Mark
 
Re: Comments on Leviton Surge Suppressor?

Thank you all for your time and help.

If the rest of the world worked as well as this forum I'd always be smiling.
 
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