Charlie mentioned this install was "unconventional" and you seconded that. I am just trying to figure out what is so unconventional about it. This was once very common and is still done sometimes, there is nothing done here that violates any codes or wastes materials if a constant hot and switched leg is the result desired. We do similar thing to supply two separatly switched luminaires via a single 12-3 cable.
What
you describe is not unconventional at all. It is garden variety switched receptacles... common. ordinary. nothing unusual.
What
he described was running two conductors of a 12/3 that were hooked up to the same hot
TO a switch. Describing it as being 12/3 says it's a cable. A pigtail is
not 12/3.
Additionally, who would pigtail a piece of 12/3 with the sheath on it in the same enclosure as the switch? Therefore, I think it is only logical to deduce that it is a cable feeding another box with 2 conductors hooked to the same phase. Running two conductors of the same phase to a switch box might not be a violation... but it
is a waste of materials.
I think running 2 conductors of 12/3 to a box in parallel might be a violation.... however Charlie correctly pointed out that one conductor fed the switch and the other fed the receptacles, so they were not in parallel. That's what he described that Charlie said was unconventional.
That's what makes it unconventional: two conductors of 12/3
to a switch box.
12/3 FROM a switch to switched receptacles is not unconventional at all. Where would be the question in that? I read this thread because it talked about theory ... I think I see what's going on now