But manufacturers are ones that pushed it to be in code so they can get some return on their investments even though they don't really have a fully developed product, plus they possibly gave a false impression that it has the ability to do more than it really does to further push their product
Pretty much. Supposedly it was Cutler Hammer that got the ball rolling. But in any case take a new house that has say 32 circuits requiring AFCIs would have taken a $2 breaker now take a $36 breaker. $64 vs $1,152 bucks per new home, on average adding about several thousand dollars to a new home. Thats 18 times more per house, and at the very least 18 times more revenue for the residential circuit breaker division. That equates to at least 18 times more houses being built in the US in terms of profit. Even an economic boom couldn't do that.
So without a doubt AFCIs will be held as something great.
I have not seen any real evidence that self sustaining arcing faults can even exist at dwelling unit voltage levels. I have seen evidence of glowing connections that make excessive heat, but the AFCI does not have any way to detect that fire causing problem.
Self sustaining arc faults at 120 volts are almost non existent. At a loose connection there is some chance but loose connections are more likely to go to a glowing fault than an arc fault. Glowing faults are the real issue that needs to be addressed if we wanted to eliminate electrical fires.
The major fire prevention feature in AFCIs is actually the 30ma ground fault protection rather than the arc fault circuit. Its far more likely to catch the driven in nail, over driven staple, failing equipment or the miss wire than the arc fault logic since most of the time these conditions will cause the neutral to fault to ground or the hot to leak to ground rather than showing an arcing signature. Unfortunately one maker has taken the 30ma GFI out of them:roll:
Arc fault logic does
theoretically help in a real arcing condition, but at this point manufacturers dont have AFCIs that accurately differentiate between normal arcs and dangerous arcs. The end result is AFCIs tripping on completely safe UL listed equipment making for some very frustrated electricians and home owners. From what I gather/guess, manufacturers are faced with then having to make the arc detection logic less sensitive, which ultimately sacrifices the dangerous arc fault detection feature they brag about.
Cmp requirements that will have made electrical installations safer would have been more circuits and if they really wanted to 30ma GFI protection on general use outlets (which is good idea IMO). 30ma gives great protection against NM pierced by nails and accurately catches neutral/hot ground faults without the nuisance tripping of AFCIs. 30ma GFI protection is the norm on most circuits outside of the US and Canada while AFCI breakers are unheard of all over the world under the IEC standards without issue. Yet somehow the US and Canada are the only countries using AFCIs.
More circuits would help many times over AFCIs, such as increasing the va per foot requirements. One of the best fire prevention measures was adding dedicated 20 amp circuits to bathroom outlets. Normally the upstairs bathrooms were fed from a 15 amp circuit tapping off a bedroom. People would plug 1800 watt hair dryers into bathroom outlets fed from a circuit with lights already on it, sometimes a space heater running in the bedroom as well in colder climates. Since the inception of this I no longer hear of new houses tripping breakers when a hair dryer is being used in the bathroom and supposedly 2nd floor electrical fires have gone down because of it.
Ironically, since AFCI requirements electricians have started to wire houses to the code minimum circuit requirements to off set the cost of AFCIs. 2 bedrooms that might have been both on separate circuits are no one:happyno: So now, we have fewer circuits, under more stress, protected by an unproven device, that easily fails under a voltage surge, that often just ends up being taken out because its a nuisance:rant:. CMP has developed an excellent fire prevention technique:happysad:.
Solution - start using medium voltages in dwellings, then arcing faults will be easier to detect
:lol: That would help with copper prices. LV, MV aside its more the logic used to detect arcing signatures than the voltage. From the loads MV feeder serve accurate fault detection/isolation is a must. I dont think pocos would be to happy having a 13.8kv substation breaker dropping 3000 customers every time a CNC machine starts up or someone has an arc welder going in a hobby shop. Or a dropped primary on concrete going unnoticed. Thus the requirements drive arc detection software in these devices to be well thought out. Plus, a good chunk of breakers and recloser with arc detection software will often tell you what phase (s) were involved and approximate how far down the line it has taken place. Beats the heck out of meggering then divide and concquer
