Leviton Arc-Fault tripping on LED lighting.

M

makesends

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Location
Oregon
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Electrical/Electronics Tech
In my last job, almost all the lighting the customer wanted is LED, so I ran most of the house lighting on two 15amp lighting circuits. They also wanted the Leviton breaker panel (which, otherwise, I do too). The problem is that though neither breaker is overloaded (RMS current), at some point both breakers trip according to the number of fixtures/ amount of load on Arc-Fault only. It usually happens on starting, for example, undercabinet lights. The inspector says I must have arc fault protection even on the lighting circuit over living areas, even though they have no receptacles involved.

My question is, would a choke/reactor on the line solve the problem, or is there some other suggestion you might have? I'm guessing the breaker is reading the accumulation of switching mode power supplies in the fixtures as arcing. These people also have two bedrooms they will be using as offices (therefore, Arc Fault breakers on the related receptacles. I'm dreading what those computers and servers will do.
 
Do the lighting circuits have dimmers? Sometimes they can contribute to AFCI tripping issues.

I came across a video where a blank face AFCI was used instead of an AFCI breaker because it was apparently less susceptible to tripping on certain loads:

 
Parallel arc and series arc are very easy to distinguish on the diagram, but everything is series in reality. The distinction can get blurry.

Series is something sensed like a bulb that's turned on, but flickering because of a loose connection.
Parallel is something sense as a bulb that's off, but flashing briefly as it makes intermittent unintended connection and causing it to come on.

There is a legitimate arc every time you interrupt a flow of current with a mechanical switch but this should be ignored, but if it happens repeatedly in a small amount of time or it goes on for a long time, the AFCI will trip. The decision making process is depends how each AFCI is designed or configured.

The reason the guy in the YouTube video a few posts up mentions microwaves and clothes washers is that they have a current signature that some AFCIs interpret as one of the arc pattern. His idea is to get around it by using "some other" AFCIs hoping that they don't interpret the signals quite the same way.
 
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