Paradise ponders: electrical phenomena and gorgeous fall color edition...

Paradise ponders: electrical phenomena and gorgeous fall color edition...  Saturday evening, my brother Scott contacted me to let me know that there had been a lightning strike near his cabin (just outside Newton, Utah) and that he'd lost power.  By 8:30 pm, power was restored, so I wasn't worried.  Then on Sunday morning he contacted me again: he had no water and his refrigerator had died.  Yikes!  I grabbed my trusty DVM and headed his way...

The 30 minute drive to his place was spectacular: a mix of blue sky and rain squalls turning into rain near his place, views of the red and orange fall color that blankets our mountains.  As I drove, I listened to an NPR reporter trying her level best to get a Puerto Rican citizen to condemn the US (and by inference, Trump) response to the hurricane.  The citizen kept insisting that the response was good, much to the frustration of the NPR reporter.  It was a pretty clear example of media bias, though I doubt most listeners would even realize that.  It was a strange juxtaposition to the beauty around me...

Once I got to Scott's place, I did a little diagnostic work.  The refrigerator's circuit board was easily accessible (thank you, LG), and I spotted a soldered-in fuse on there.  A quick test showed the fuse was blown.  Then I started checking out the well pump (a fancy variable speed pump and controller).  The controller had no LEDs, not a good sign.  The cutoff switch was open, cover missing, and some quick testing there showed 240 VAC on the line side, and 0 VAC on the load side.  At first I couldn't figure out what the heck could be wrong with the switch – not much to go wrong on them.  Later I figured out what had happened: that switch was fused, but the fuses had quite literally exploded.  The explosion damaged some of the internal switch components and blew the door off the switch box (door and box made of sturdy steel).  Scott wasn't home when this happened, or that noise would most certainly have scared him! 

So off we went to get parts.  At home Depot, we bought a replacement fuse for the fridge, and a soldering iron to install it.  At Lowe's, we bought a replacement cutoff switch, fused.  Then we went to Herm's and had a great breakfast: carnitas skillets all around.  Man, those are great!  With properly fortified tummies, we headed back to his place to do the actual repairs.

First up: the fridge.   I soldered some brass wire to both ends of the replacement fuse, then soldered it piggy-back on the blown one.  We plugged the fridge back in and it worked.  Yay, fuse!

Then down into the basement, and I replaced the blown-up cutoff switch.  That was a straightforward exercise, and afterwards we turned on the power ... and the pump controller still had no lights.  Dang.  So I opened up the controller and looked for an internal fuse – no joy.  On closer inspection I saw char on the board, near the switching power supply transformer.  Looks like the controller blew up, too – the cutoff switch fuses must not have blown quickly enough.  Scott will be calling the pump folks this morning, and hopefully they've got a replacement controller in stock.  If not, Amazon has them.  For the moment, he's without running water.  At least he has food. :)

After that I headed back home, again treated to a glorious drive.  I drove all the way down to Wellsville on State 23, paralleling the eastern side of the Wellsville Mountains.  The entire length of that trip I had spectacular views of fall color up the slopes...