Whole House GFI

Status
Not open for further replies.

360Youth

Senior Member
Location
Newport, NC
I had a customer ask me about a whole house GFI. If I understand correctly, this is different than surge suppression. His setup, wired by another electrician, we just did existing generator hook up, is 400a with 2 ATS with disconnect. I am not familiar with the equipment and am just starting my research. Any help with direction would be appreciated. Thanks.
 

bphgravity

Senior Member
Location
Florida
To me, "whole-house" gfci would either be all the overcurrent devices / breakers installed are the gfci type, or the main itself has a gfci component.

I would guess the homeowner is really asking about "whole-house" surge protection, which I feel would serve a more important function.
 

360Youth

Senior Member
Location
Newport, NC
It seemed to me I have heard of the whole house gfi component and the HO seemed to make a distinction between the 2, but I hold to, "Believe half what you see and none of what you see." :grin: Surge supressor is probably what he wants.
 

acrwc10

Master Code Professional
Location
CA
Occupation
Building inspector
If I were going to GFI a everything in the house I would go the route of individual GFI branch circuit breakers. It may be pricey but atleast everything doesn't shut down if there is a single fault on a bad vacuume or some other POS appliance.
 

pete m.

Senior Member
Location
Ohio
Another thing to consider would be that the ground fault currents would be additive on a "main" gfci device.

Pete
 

winnie

Senior Member
Location
Springfield, MA, USA
Occupation
Electric motor research
In Europe, it is quite common to have an 'RCD' protecting the entire service. In concept, this is similar to a GFCI, however the trip current level is much higher (30 to 300mA) than a GFCI.

My opinion is that a 5mA GFCI as the main breaker in a home would be a _bad_ idea.

-Jon
 
winnie said:
In Europe, it is quite common to have an 'RCD' protecting the entire service. In concept, this is similar to a GFCI, however the trip current level is much higher (30 to 300mA) than a GFCI.

My opinion is that a 5mA GFCI as the main breaker in a home would be a _bad_ idea.

-Jon
Exactemente.

The higher trip current is to allow for system capacitance 'leak'. You have to tweak it to adjust the setpoint after installation just above the system 'leakeage' current. You can still run into problem if you have an area that can get periodically humid, such as your laundry room, that would acuse variable tripping. In Europe the houses, apartments are smaller and the voltage is higher. They are also much more state regulated then us, so rules that cause inconvenience to the user find little public opposition.

They accept and expect the State to boss them around...
 

LawnGuyLandSparky

Senior Member
weressl said:
They accept and expect the State to boss them around...

And that would never fly here...

dhs-threat.jpg
 
Let me step in for a min,..

I used to live in France so i should able know the details on realted to the " RCD "

not all the circuits are on the RCD aka GFCI the lighting circuits are not on RCD and some appalince circuits [ this is espcally true if hardwired and over 16 amp requriement ]

i know someone did mention it kinda hassle if the whole house is on the GFCI,.. yeah it will be overkill for primary reason.

but for european codes they are not the same as NEC codes is.

Merci, Marc
 

LawnGuyLandSparky

Senior Member
bcorbin said:
I fail to see the connection between the chart itself and "the state bossing you around".

"The state bossing you around" is a metaphor for "listen to and believe everything any government authority tells you."
 

dbuckley

Senior Member
Different countries have different ideas.

In the UK you now need RCD protection on sockets.

In Aus and NZ the lights and sockets need to be protected by a RCD.

A "whole house" RCD (which means - literally - one RCD, usually as the main disconnect) is a spectacularly bad idea, but mandatory as a minimum in some places. You can improve over the minimum by using multiple RCDs (which in the UK is known as a "split load" panel), or combo MCB/RCDs, the latter now verging on affordability due to their widespread use.

In Europe RCD trip currents are no lower than 30ma, whereas US GFCIs are 5ma. I dont know why the difference, but 30ma has proven sufficiently good to prevent people being electrocuted, and thats on 240V. I dont know if its still the case, but a few years back we were told there hadn't been a reported electrocution of anyone protected by a 30ma RCD.
 

360Youth

Senior Member
Location
Newport, NC
Sounds to me like he needs standard surge suppression. He seemed fairly speciffic of GFI over surge and it seemed I have heard/read discussion of such a beast so I thought this was one of the first places to check. Internet research hasn't turned up much, either.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top