Green handle on Sq D breaker

[K8MHZ]

View attachment 12472

I ran across an old Sq D breaker panel and many of the breakers, both single pole and two pole, had green handles. The rest had black.

Noting on the green handle breakers indicate anything special and they didn't feed anything special.

Does anyone know what the green handles are supposed to indicate? The only thing I could find on the Internet was the picture I posted.

Thanks

 

[kwired]

View attachment 12472

I ran across an old Sq D breaker panel and many of the breakers, both single pole and two pole, had green handles. The rest had black.

Noting on the green handle breakers indicate anything special and they didn't feed anything special.

Does anyone know what the green handles are supposed to indicate? The only thing I could find on the Internet was the picture I posted.

Thanks

Is entire handle green or just the end face?

I have seen stores that use breakers daily as switching devices for lights and other items that get turned on daily get field marked to indicate which breakers are to be turned on/off but never seen one factory colored like that.

What is amp setting of the breaker - green is a color standard for 30 amps in some circumstances - but again never seen this in the QO line, and there is a lot of QO old and new in this region being used.

 

[jim dungar]

Does anyone know what the green handles are supposed to indicate? The only thing I could find on the Internet was the picture I posted.

The green handle was used to indicate a breaker with a "higher" AIC rating. The green color coding was dropped in the early 70's.


edited to remove incorrect value, see new post.

 

[K8MHZ]

The green handle was used to indicate a breaker with a 22kAIC rating (i.e. a QO-VH). The green color coding was dropped in the early 70's.

They are labeled "Interrupting Rating Max R.M.S. Amps 10,000 SYM."

 

[K8MHZ]

Is entire handle green or just the end face?

I have seen stores that use breakers daily as switching devices for lights and other items that get turned on daily get field marked to indicate which breakers are to be turned on/off but never seen one factory colored like that.

What is amp setting of the breaker - green is a color standard for 30 amps in some circumstances - but again never seen this in the QO line, and there is a lot of QO old and new in this region being used.

The entire handle is green. I have a 15A single pole and a 40A double, the EC has the rest and there are 20A singles and some other doubles.

 

[jim dungar]

They are labeled "Interrupting Rating Max R.M.S. Amps 10,000 SYM."

You are correct - it meant 10kAIC, back when the breakers were standard at 5K. They stopped using this color in 1975.

So much for my memory, but at least I knew it was a higher AIC.

 

[Jraef]

You are correct - it meant 10kAIC, back when the breakers were standard at 5K. They stopped using this color in 1975.

So much for my memory, but at least I knew it was a higher AIC.

This is correct. And also what changed at that time was that the 5kAIC version went away, that's when 10kAIC became the "standard", so there was no need for the different colored handles.

I was an apprentice then working for a small contractor. DIY homeowners kept putting their green ground wires into those breakers, so when they turned them on and they instantly tripped with a flash-bang, we would get the call from the wife to come out and take over from the hubby! I distinctly remember one guy looking like a puppy that had been spanked with a rolled up newspaper for peeing on the floor, poor guy...

 

[Sierrasparky]

Funny!:lol:

 

[K8MHZ]

You are correct - it meant 10kAIC, back when the breakers were standard at 5K. They stopped using this color in 1975.

So much for my memory, but at least I knew it was a higher AIC.

Thanks!!

 

[K8MHZ]

This is correct. And also what changed at that time was that the 5kAIC version went away, that's when 10kAIC became the "standard", so there was no need for the different colored handles.

I was an apprentice then working for a small contractor. DIY homeowners kept putting their green ground wires into those breakers, so when they turned them on and they instantly tripped with a flash-bang, we would get the call from the wife to come out and take over from the hubby! I distinctly remember one guy looking like a puppy that had been spanked with a rolled up newspaper for peeing on the floor, poor guy...

Thanks and great story!!

One of the circuits that had a green handled breaker was connected to a pump with a locked rotor and tripped, so it has a nice pretty red indicator below the pretty green handle.

It looks like a Christmas decoration breaker!

 

[jim dungar]

They stopped using this color in 1975.

The most recent one I saw was in the new weight room in a high school. It was installed in 2012.
Of course, the contractor said everything he installed was new and unused.

 

[K8MHZ]

They stopped using this color in 1975.

The most recent one I saw was in the new weight room in a high school. It was installed in 2012.
Of course, the contractor said everything he installed was new and unused.

Did he also get paid extra to 'go green'?

 

[kwired]

They stopped using this color in 1975.

The most recent one I saw was in the new weight room in a high school. It was installed in 2012.
Of course, the contractor said everything he installed was new and unused.

It could be ~40 years old and never used before.


I guess the easiest way to distinguish difference between a 10 kA breaker and a 22kA breaker today is to look at the billing papers.:happyyes:

 

[norcal]

It could be ~40 years old and never used before.


I guess the easiest way to distinguish difference between a 10 kA breaker and a 22kA breaker today is to look at the billing papers.:happyyes:

For a crazy price on a high AIC breaker, found this by accident, odd place to be selling them too.



http://www.walmart.com/ip/Siemens-B...h=cse&sdc_id=1430444478z369404z3c073b0a9525zz

 

[kwired]

For a crazy price on a high AIC breaker, found this by accident, odd place to be selling them too.



http://www.walmart.com/ip/Siemens-B...h=cse&sdc_id=1430444478z369404z3c073b0a9525zz

And it is a bolt on breaker on top of that. There is something that will move in high volume in a typical Walmart store:happyno:

Maybe Walmart specifies that line for use in their stores though they likely don't hardly sell any of them.