Our condo building is having problems with the alarm panel blowing out. I think we've been through 4 or 5 in the last few years. I have heard of this being a problem in other buildings around the area, and going to a wireless monitoring system to the fire dept. seems to have solved the problem for others.

My question is do you guys think it would be advatagous to put surge suppresion on the conductors that run throughout the building (the monitoring zone)? There seems to be what I would call misinformation foating about concerning static electricity possibly bringing unwanted voltage back to the panel. If lightning were to strike nearby, but not a direct hit, would that possibly induce voltage in these wires?

I have a hunch that voltage coming in from the phone system do to local strikes is the culprit. But that opinion is based completly on what kind of makes sense to me.

Any ideas on what the best way to protect this panel would be? I wish our system monitoring people were of more help, but they said they never heard of a surge supressor for the zone conductors. (Of course it only took a couple of calls to find http://www.northern-tech.com/TVSS_Products/datalinepowerline_protection.htm )

I'll talk to them next week, but I value the opinions here as much if not more. Thanks.