Good afternoon, I’ve got three POE switches and 8 hardwired cameras on them. Lightning struck here around midnight. I lost all my hardwired cameras that were spread amongst the three switches around 3:30am. I’m unable to ping my cameras from my laptop connected directly to the switches. The switches that have cameras on them have their usual amber/green lights. However, when I connect a data only cable such as my pc or laptop no lights come on. I connected my laptop to the other end of my Ethernet cable and am receiving a signal from a NON Poe switch in the house. How often do multiple switches go out at the same time? These are TP link SG1005P switches.
Desperately need help. Switches lost or all cameras lost
- Thread starter International784
- Start date
I buy the netgear pro switches with lifetime warranty because I lose at least 2 of them per year.
If they are chained together it could be just 1 out or a wire interconnecting them or both. Check the switches at the switch itself.
I lost both switches’ data capability in my shed and a switch 250’ away in the house single port. I was able to take the switch in the house and power/operate the other cameras. I bought a Netgear to put in my shed. I’m not sure if I need them grounded better or what. I’ve started the warranty process with TP link already.
grounding will help or you can ise a wireless transmitter receiver. I ran 3 sets of cat 5 to my gate as one switch has 4 cameras on it and the other has 6 plus if I lose one switch I still have the other se of camera watching the gate, mailbox and street
Problem is not caused by not grounding POE switches. The problem is lightning found a ground potential. Go get a small lab bench isolation transformer and use that at the shed. Even if its a two prong ac adapter, most bond the DC ground to neutral with a Y capacitor. Which is the path lightning would seek.
I’m going by to keep this simple:
Type 4 is installed inline prior to the device like your cameras. The other end is protected at the Switch, Patch Panel, etc. In all cases there must be a minimum of 2-3 feet of Ethernet cable prior to the SPD!
Lots of this could be avoided by using fibre that isn’t armoured. Armoured fibre cable must be properly bonded and grounded to the electrical systems single point earth ground.
Lastly, don’t Just assume because something is bonded to the home’s electrical earth grounding system everything is fine.
You won’t know until you perform a leakage test on the grounding system. You want to see zero Ohms but that is near impossible to achieve so NEC / CEC shoot for below 25 Ohms.
If you forego any sort of ground testing you can simply add extra grounding rods spaced appropriately based on NEC / CEC codes. Doing so will easily half what ever the resistance was prior!
As an aside, if you’re one of the poor souls who live on rocks / sand. You need to keep the ground rod system wet at all times!
Lastly, if anyone is going to build a new home spend the extra money to have a uFer grounding system installed.
- Shielded cable, connectors, patch panel
- Grounding: Everything must be properly bonded to the homes single point Earth ground.
- SPD: A Surge Protective Device must be installed and present on at least Type 1-3. Type 1 is at the Service Entrance (Meter), Type 2 is at the Service Panel (Breaker), Type 3 is Point of Use at the outlet which can be a SPD Outlet, SPD Strip, UPS, etc.
Type 4 is installed inline prior to the device like your cameras. The other end is protected at the Switch, Patch Panel, etc. In all cases there must be a minimum of 2-3 feet of Ethernet cable prior to the SPD!
Lots of this could be avoided by using fibre that isn’t armoured. Armoured fibre cable must be properly bonded and grounded to the electrical systems single point earth ground.
Lastly, don’t Just assume because something is bonded to the home’s electrical earth grounding system everything is fine.
You won’t know until you perform a leakage test on the grounding system. You want to see zero Ohms but that is near impossible to achieve so NEC / CEC shoot for below 25 Ohms.
If you forego any sort of ground testing you can simply add extra grounding rods spaced appropriately based on NEC / CEC codes. Doing so will easily half what ever the resistance was prior!
As an aside, if you’re one of the poor souls who live on rocks / sand. You need to keep the ground rod system wet at all times!
Lastly, if anyone is going to build a new home spend the extra money to have a uFer grounding system installed.
I’ve got type 2,3,4 SPD(s) installed. What I don’t have is shielded cable. I’m using OSP that’s gel filled. I now know I messed up. I’ve got two runs outside that are about 200 feet each. One is a PTZ on a wooden pole, the other a PTZ on a steel pole. Should these be considered isolated and therefore have a ground rod installed at each pole? Or, is the ground at the POE switch enough?
The cameras are connected, powered, and grounded on the home side. You do not want to ground the camera at the other end as this will surely create a voltage (difference) potential.
This is why using shielded cable negates the need to ground anything as the drain wire inside the Ethernet cable provides this single point ground at the service panel.
At 200 feet you literally have a giant antenna just waiting for God to make a collect call via lightning!
Some things to consider for the long term and if and when you decide to upgrade your network. Purchase a switch that has SFP+ fibre uplink ports.
Connecting other switches via fibre will negate surge / lightning damage. Keeping in mind what I stated about armoured fibre cable.
If your switch doesn’t have any fibre ports you may consider adding in a media converter / small switch. This will help isolate the switch from the Ethernet line.
If there was power at either end of the PTZ you could also use a PtP Wireless bridge. This assumes good LOS (Line of Sight) and would negate lightning coming into the homes networks infrastructure.
You may also consider lightning solutions that reduce the incidence of lightning or in the worst case absorb the strike directly and shunting to ground the high voltage strike.
Lightning rods, can be made easily by anyone and than properly grounded. The lightning whiskers that you see on telecommunications towers help to dissipate the charged ions that come.
Proactive lightning solutions generate positive / negative ions into the immediate area. This reduces the incidence of lightning in that specific area because there is no potential for attraction.
As it relates to the steel pole the hardest part to accept is the camera is already at a different potential!
So one of the first steps is to insulate / isolate the camera from the metal pole. Which you’re going to find extremely challenging because it’s connected with metal.
Regardless the pole needs to be properly grounded with a ground bar with at least 10 AWG stranded / solid copper wire based on the NEC / CEC codes that apply to you.
Clean the area where the grounding bolt will be. Apply dielectric grease to the area and all fasteners.
A star washer must be used to attach to the metal pole. Once affixed measure the resistance from the pole to earth rod.
You should see below 25 Ohms if everything is properly installed.
The wooden pole you can simply attach any of the lightning solutions I have suggested.
Lastly, some of the more reputable SPD makers for Ethernet are AETEK, Citel, Ditek.
I sincerely appreciate you taking the time to write this. It’s certainly helped me and I know it will help others. I’ve ordered replacement switches but, they’ll stay offline until I can get better protection.
No worries that’s why all of us are here to learn and to share if and when the time comes.
I would love to see what and how the two PTZ are attached to. How are the SPD (Type 4) grounded ?
This is what I used. I put them on both PTZs’. Something is better than nothing. I’m rethinking retrenching shielded cable now that I know. I’m thinking I can lower my steel pole and use rubber straps between the hose clamps that hold the camera mount and pole itself. The wooden pole is mounted with the same clamps. I guess I’d need a poe injector with fiber converter to my lan? I think I’d need two to keep the two ptz cams separate ?
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That would be a lot of work and financial outlay for sure. Keep in mind shielding by itself is not a silver bullet as I stated earlier.
Everything must be shielded from the Ethernet cable, RJ45, to patch panel / wall jacks.
That’s just to start than everything must be properly grounded to the home’s electrical single point earth ground.
That means the switch, cabinet, patch panel, etc.
As you experienced first hand it doesn’t matter what equipment has or advertised as having integrated surge protection. Almost every camera maker, switch maker indicates X kilovolts surge protection.
You literally have so called IT Professionals who believe just because the switch has some kind of tiny isolation they are immune to a surge / spike event?!?
Grounding, isolation, shielding, are all parts of the system along with the use of quality SPD that use fast acting components such as SAD, GDT, RLC technology.
Regardless of any technology every one of them relies shunting to ground the voltage potential to Earth ground.
As a reminder the use of shielded cable is intended to reduce the impact of induced EMF radiation that is generated by lightning.
Any stray voltage that is able to penetrate the shielded cable is shunted to ground via the drain wire.
Lastly, other solutions are using solar powered cameras that connect via cellular or PtP / PtMtP wireless bridge.
These systems are still properly grounded at their mounting pole. A SPD is also used and grounded to the poles grounding system.
As a direct lightning strike will still take out the system but obviously won’t impact the home’s network infrastructure.