Thor Technologies has released the DIN rail mount DRM 95, giving electricians a greater level of surge protection. Sean Carroll finds out more.

There are several surge protection technologies out there in the electrical market. Some sit on the electrical switchboard, some sit at the socket and some can be purchased by a home owner that’s trying to fit as many 12W USB chargers into one hole as possible.

Thor Technologies, an Australian-owned and operated manufacturer of electrical products, has expanded its SmartBrain line of surge protection devices with the DRM 95 DIN rail mount. Available in 20 and 30-amp versions, the DRM 95 is an EMI RFI filter with an industrial-grade spike and surge protection circuit.

“It has a reaction speed of less than one nanosecond, meaning it reacts to damaging voltage almost instantly,” Thor Technologies WA/SA state manager Shane Reid explains.

“It comes with a whopping 1,330 joules of protection, which means it can defend against the biggest surges and spikes with ease and has our unique Dynamic Active Tracking technology which ‘cleans’ around 40% of unwanted frequency noise compared to similar products.

“Also, it can be used for both single-phase and three-phase installs.”

Unlike most passive filters on the market, the DRM 95 is an active filter, meaning it targets frequencies that others might miss. Passive filters only work at the crest of the sine wave and therefore, miss a huge section of the unwanted frequencies.

This helps get rid of unwanted noise and disruption that some users come across with AV tech like a ‘hissing’ noise through speakers, thumping from subwoofers and possibly even blurred, pixilated and a scrambled picture.

One of the best applications for the tech that addresses a pain point for most electricians is the flickering of LED lights. These are caused by spikes or unwanted harmonics and the Thor Technologies filter ensures a smooth operation as well as reducing programming issues.

By improving flickering from LED or reducing re-programming from PLC and specialised lighting systems like CBUS/Dynalite, the SmartBrain solution stops spikes, surges or electrical noise from contaminating whole circuits. DRM95 is relied on in these and many more similar types of applications.

“We have recently improved our filtering by another 30% and this came about from our local R&D program,” Thor Technologies managing director George Forster-Jones says.

“We did not think we could improve and were absolutely delighted when we were designing a filter analyser and injecting different types of noise into the power and then tried some computer simulation circuits and that is how we found the breakthrough. We then made some prototypes and confirmed our computer simulation. This filtering upgrade is now in several of our board models already.”

Since the Thor Technologies products are designed and manufactured in Australia, they get an advantage that a lot of foreign products don’t.

“We design our products for Australian power, it isn’t adapted from US supply, for example, to work on 240V 50Hz,” George says.

“Innovation in power protection and filtration is all we do. We are proud of being Australian and leading edge in our field, currently holding patents on some of our circuits in Australia, New Zealand and the US.

“Our hardwired range is still manufactured and assembled here in Australia. We have had our hardwired range in the market for over 18 years and have not had one returned to date where the surge circuit has been exhausted. A record we are extremely proud of.”

George adds that the company is in the process of adding its own non-sacrificial patented surge protection technology into the rack models. Thor Technologies has already passed all safety approvals and testing, giving the green light to go to production and releasing in late-2022.