With the continued load shedding taking place there is no appliance that is safe due to continuous power surges. We have a generator as back up along with a power inverter that runs the internet and a few other key items. This has only been used for the extended outages like what we experienced over the weekend having only 3 hours for Saturday and Sunday.
Tonight there was a few beeps followed by a loud popping sound and then we could all smell and see the smoke. The inverter blew up having been hit by a power surge and the beeps were the warning signal. From my understanding the motherboard was fried and the costly part being the batteries are safe.
My first thought was we cannot claim anymore as the insurance company have changed their policy about load shedding and power from the grid. Thankfully this inverter is only 6-7 weeks old and has only been used for a few hours each day and the marathon session over the last weekend.
This should be covered by the supplier/manufacturer as this falls well within their warranty/guarantee period. These are not cheap items as this was more of a back up for the generator as that is showing signs of wear and tear with oil spots on the garage floor. When you first purchase these items it was for the days you have load shedding as no one expected them to be used multiple times every day.
If you don't have back up power in South Africa today you will lead a frustrating life as even though they have down graded for having lost only 6 hours tomorrow we are back to the 8-10 hour power cuts. Work is borrowing our first generator that supposedly was irreparable and the company technicians bought it back to life. This gives us peace of mind knowing we have another form of back up if and when this generator we use currently needs a service which it will do looking by the oil stains on the floor.
The number of appliances breaking is starting to rack up as this is item number 5 in the last 6 months and I don't expect this to be the last load shedding casualty. I stopped replacing my outside security floodlights after they literally lasted a week before they were all blown up by surges.
The hidden cost we don't think about is not the fuel we burn every day but the number of appliances that are replaced over this time period as this is seriously starting to add up.