ARC Fault Breakers. Your Experiences.

[Industrial Toys]

And to make matters worse, usually the Utility entry and main breaker occupies the top portion, and it's not allowed to put your branch circuits through there, so you are denied one side of the panel for wiring.

I am building a load shedding system which is in a cabinet adjacent to my load center. I have to run my heating circuits into this new box. But if the wires are not long enough and you can't make connections inside the load center cabinet, sp what is a guy supposed to do? Can you solder connections or something to make them compliant?

 

[grsthegreat]

And to make matters worse, usually the Utility entry and main breaker occupies the top portion, and it's not allowed to put your branch circuits through there, so you are denied one side of the panel for wiring.

I am building a load shedding system which is in a cabinet adjacent to my load center. I have to run my heating circuits into this new box. But if the wires are not long enough and you can't make connections inside the load center cabinet, sp what is a guy supposed to do? Can you solder connections or something to make them compliant?

what brand panel is it. I use siemens and square d panels and you can use top , bottom or sides for wire entry. No restrictions from entry. As for wire nutting that’s not supposed to occur...
But I have seen it done many times. Even our elect inspectors turn a blind eye on it. A lot of gen transfer switches that have a large steel flex with 20+ wires used to be used. You take a wire off of one breaker and wire it it to the red wire from switch, than place the corresponding black wire on the breaker. Units like this still exist and are sold. They meet UL listings.

Technically, you are supposed to move those wires out of the panel and into an adjacent junction box so there are no wire nut connections within the panel. A panel is not a listed junction box.

 

[coldsteelva]

As ridiculous as that is, since the entire electrical service panel is made up of nothing BUT JUNCTIONS. Service in, neutral bar, ground bar, breakers with screw terminals, etc. Who dreams up this stuff? Maybe we should just skip the wire nuts and use un-insulated screw clamps to join wire segments inside a panel; would they be allowed then?

 

[Industrial Toys]

So just list it as a junction box already. Probably just a matter of more money for that listing. Anything to make life more expensive.

 

[grsthegreat]

As ridiculous as that is, since the entire electrical service panel is made up of nothing BUT JUNCTIONS. Service in, neutral bar, ground bar, breakers with screw terminals, etc. Who dreams up this stuff? Maybe we should just skip the wire nuts and use un-insulated screw clamps to join wire segments inside a panel; would they be allowed then?

I agree, and thats why im sure inspectors dont say much about it.

 

[3Ts]

Since we're including GFI breakers in this discussion, what about a circuit that has a GFI and then downstream (farther from the main panel electrically) there is another GFI? I always thought that the first GFI protected the rest of the downstream outlets.

 

[CobyRupert]

Since we're including GFI breakers in this discussion, what about a circuit that has a GFI and then downstream (farther from the main panel electrically) there is another GFI? I always thought that the first GFI protected the rest of the downstream outlets.

I thought they made 2 types of GFCI receptacles, one that protects downstream devices and one that doesn’t. Now I’m not sure if they make ones that don’t. I don’t see any sold on-line that don’t.

 

[aczlan]

I thought they made 2 types of GFCI receptacles, one that protects downstream devices and one that doesn’t. Now I’m not sure if they make ones that don’t. I don’t see any sold on-line that don’t.

Pretty sure every one I have seen will protect downstream receptacles. Some of them don't have an outlet on the front, but they all protect downstream receptacles.

Aaron Z

 

[Chris616]

Since we're including GFI breakers in this discussion, what about a circuit that has a GFI and then downstream (farther from the main panel electrically) there is another GFI? I always thought that the first GFI protected the rest of the downstream outlets.

See the attached diagram. These two setups both have four ground fault protected receptacles. The first way is more expensive, but it has the advantage of not killing power to the other receptacles if either of the first two upstream GFCIs sense a ground fault and trip. That might be important if, for example, a freezer in a garage is plugged into the downstream receptacle but the upstream receptacle has something plugged in that has a history of tripping the GFCI.

Chris

 

[k0ua]

As you can see by the illustration above, the downstream receptacles are ONLY protected when they are connected to the LOAD terminals on the ground fault receptacle. Which MAY or MAY NOT be a good idea, depending on what you are trying to do. The freezer analogy was a good example of that.