Buy a solar system.

 

Anyone using a whole house UPS?
This would entail an AC to DC battery charger connected to DC batteries then a DC to AC inverter that feeds the home.

Most solar systems have this in addition to solar panels.

This way you temper the electric feed and have battery backed storage to get through the brownouts. Without having to buy and install the solar panels.

 

Yeah, I have something like that: Inverter with battery charger.. batteries to store the electric. Just use it for brownouts.

 

I'd like to invest in something for brownouts, especially the longer ones inevitably coming our way during rainy season. However, everything I read here is gobbledegook. Don't understand about ac/dc (no music puns, ta) or inverters. Is it simplest to just buy a battery pack or fuel generator? Asking because this is my first impending rainy season.

 

Thanks. That's all great safety advice, and I have noticed mini 'shocks' when touching some appliances and plugs.
My point was more about preparation for the inevitable brownouts though. What's the best choice - battery pack, fuel run generator, or go to bed and put the bed-sheets over your head muttering?

 

Could in some cases that be static electricity? But always best to check as I think 'earthing' here is poor.

Or go out for the longer-term brownouts - Oh, of course, you may not be able to!

Anyway, that does not save your appliances - but, as you know, some real tech experts on this Forum who can tell you exactly what you need.

 

I had an instant water heater hooked up to my kitchen faucet and I got little electrical shocks every time I would use the water/touch the stainless steel sink. Come to find out, we weren't grounded. Out came that water heater!!

 

Mini shocks are definitely poor grounding. Any reasonable electrician will know how to put in a grounding rod at the house and connect it the neutral side of the feed of the power connection to the house. (It must be done at the house by grounding the neutral in the power fuse box) If he picks the wrong one he will soon know about it when he turns the power back on believe me so he cant leave you with the wrong side grounded.

The aspect of lights being live when the switch for the light is turned off is a common error in the Philippines where the installer never bothered to maintain proper color coding of the lighting connections and switches. They very often get them mixed up so that the switch actually turns off the neutral leaving the active live and still connected to the bulb socket. This is dangerous and can be corrected easily by simply reversing the connection to the switch but again get an Electrician to do that for you. It's not a matter of removing the switch and turning the wires there round the other way. The actual wire down to the switch must be reconnected so that the active feed is switched and not the neutral, or , if all the lights are affected this way, it will be easier to identify the active at the fuse box and correct it there by altering the connection to the lighting fuse. But again, don't do this yourself unless you know what you are doing. Get an electrician because it is possible that fuse is supplying something else in the house if a bodgey electrician did the installation in the first place.