AFCI Everthing!

[kwired]

Your taking me all wrong on this.

The way I see it is once the wiring is terminated and the wiring is installed there's never really a need to disturb the connection or the device unless something goes wrong.
I dont see much vibration that would accidently make the neutral come in contact with the ground wire if the wires were seperated enough on installation.
so then it falls back to the wires not being seperated enough in the box to begin with.

Accidental ground to neutral contacts I can see,

For instance I troubleshot a tripping arc fault the other night becauise when the customer replaced the lamp in the vanity fixture the Neutral shell of the socket twiisted over and made
contact with the metal housing. (Cheap Fixture). I can see that, but it shouldnt happen very often in the house wiring just because the Neutral and Ground connections are on the same side.

Experienced guys like myself have learned to watch for these problems when installing a receptacle. The new guy that was just hired has not had to rework as many failed installations and will make those mistakes. Also the guy that has not had to deal with AFCI's before has one other potential device to catch mistakes he was overlooking before. True similar mistakes could be made on GFCI protected outlets, but there was probably less GFCI feed through protected receptacles than there is AFCI protected devices so there will be a higher risk of making a mistake. The GFCI may only feed an additional outlet or two in many cases, the AFCI is protecting the entire circuit (at least until these new wall box AFCI devices become more common in use).

 

[jap]

Experienced guys like myself have learned to watch for these problems when installing a receptacle. The new guy that was just hired has not had to rework as many failed installations and will make those mistakes. Also the guy that has not had to deal with AFCI's before has one other potential device to catch mistakes he was overlooking before. True similar mistakes could be made on GFCI protected outlets, but there was probably less GFCI feed through protected receptacles than there is AFCI protected devices so there will be a higher risk of making a mistake. The GFCI may only feed an additional outlet or two in many cases, the AFCI is protecting the entire circuit (at least until these new wall box AFCI devices become more common in use).

I'm sure your very experienced and everything you said is absolutely correct.

Which makes my original statement not so out of line.

I would suspect that more times than not, the fault is from an installation error, not accidental contact.

JAP>

 

[jap]

3 of the previous posts mentioned, "Helpers" "Newbies" and "The New Guy".

Which leads me to think its mostly installation errors.

 

[kwired]

3 of the previous posts mentioned, "Helpers" "Newbies" and "The New Guy".

Which leads me to think its mostly installation errors.

Well, just who do you think is installing the majority of the receptacles in the cases of larger crews, the newbies or the formen? Even in cases of crews of less than 6 people it is probably the newbie installing most of the receptacles, of course with the one man crew guess who does everything?

 

[jap]

I know, I run 6 myself.

I still think that if time was taken to show the new guys how important it is to keep seperation of all of the conductors in the box, especially Romex, there would be a lot less Arc FaultTroubleshooting due to direct Neutral to Ground contact which probably 9 times out of 10 is a result of the neutral and ground being seperated enough when they originally shoved
the device into the box.

JAP>

 

[jap]

I know, I run 6 myself.

I still think that if time was taken to show the new guys how important it is to keep seperation of all of the conductors in the box, especially Romex, there would be a lot less Arc FaultTroubleshooting due to direct Neutral to Ground contact which probably 9 times out of 10 is a result of the neutral and ground not being seperated enough when they originally shoved
the device into the box.

JAP>

Sorry, I meant to type "Not" seperated enough before the device was installed in the box.

 

[Tom Martin]

It is sad to hear a senior member say that they have replace afci breakers with non afci breakers just because of them tripping. Do we just ignore the code when it doesn't work for us? As far as the neutral touching the ground this should not happen whether it is on an afci or not.

 

[jap]

It is sad to hear a senior member say that they have replace afci breakers with non afci breakers just because of them tripping. Do we just ignore the code when it doesn't work for us? As far as the neutral touching the ground this should not happen whether it is on an afci or not.

In my case I should be a "Retired" member seeing as how many times I have to type something to try and get my points straightened out.

 

[GoldDigger]

... seeing as how many times I have to type something to try and get my points straightened out.

In some cases, I have found that curved points work better.

 

[jap]

That's a fact in most cases.

 

[kwired]

I know, I run 6 myself.

I still think that if time was taken to show the new guys how important it is to keep seperation of all of the conductors in the box, especially Romex, there would be a lot less Arc FaultTroubleshooting due to direct Neutral to Ground contact which probably 9 times out of 10 is a result of the neutral and ground being seperated enough when they originally shoved
the device into the box.

JAP>

People in general learn more when they make mistakes than to just teach them what is right and expect perfection afterward. If the guy that makes the mistake is not involved in finding and correcting the mistake he never learns though.

It is sad to hear a senior member say that they have replace afci breakers with non afci breakers just because of them tripping. Do we just ignore the code when it doesn't work for us? As far as the neutral touching the ground this should not happen whether it is on an afci or not.

It is still debatable whether or not AFCI's will do everything they are promised to do, but to just replace them with non AFCI at the first sign of problems is still ignorance to some degree.

 

[John120/240]

Set aside the neutral touching the ground for a minute. With arc fault isn't a big issue determining the arc signature ? Vacuum

cleaners are notorious for tripping arc fault breakers. It is up to breaker manufacturers to refine their products to tell the difference

between a dangerous arc and normally occurring events. Arc fault breakers were required by NEC before manufacturers were ready IMO.

 

[jap]

People in general learn more when they make mistakes than to just teach them what is right and expect perfection afterward. If the guy that makes the mistake is not involved in finding and correcting the mistake he never learns though.

It is still debatable whether or not AFCI's will do everything they are promised to do, but to just replace them with non AFCI at the first sign of problems is still ignorance to some degree.

Who ever said the guy that makes the mistake is not envolved in finding and correcting it? We make it a point to get them envolved so we all can learn from it, it just doesnt pay very
well .
As far as troubleshooting Nuisance tripping due to Neutral to Ground connections that accidentally happen, at least for us, it's usually a result of a fixture or device that's causing the
issue, not because the Neutral and Ground werent seperated enough when they were pushed into the box and eventually got together.

 

[jap]

Set aside the neutral touching the ground for a minute. With arc fault isn't a big issue determining the arc signature ? Vacuum

cleaners are notorious for tripping arc fault breakers. It is up to breaker manufacturers to refine their products to tell the difference

between a dangerous arc and normally occurring events. Arc fault breakers were required by NEC before manufacturers were ready IMO.

It seems most are still improving on thier designs.

There was an Arc Fault Breaker demonstration put on the other day with a couple of different Vacuums, where some brands of Arc Faults tripped and others didnt.
But I feel for GTX's situation where it seems even though you may have checked everything it still neusance trips.

 

[cowboyjwc]

Were about 70% of them defective or did you find out you actually had faults in your wiring and it was simply detecting them in most cases? There have been improvements to the GFCI's that help prevent some undesired tripping, but the basic principle of operation has not really changed any.

It was usually the receptacle. It was after we got power that you would find that it wasn't that they were tripping, it's that they didn't work at all, even with the reset button in. But that's not to say we didn't have issues. The first ones had pig tails out of them and they sometimes wouldn't fit in the box and you for sure couldn't put one in a tiger grip (cut in) box. Then they came out with the screws on the side, but you had to wrap the wires and that would cause the screw to stick out and make the receptacle even wider.

But like I said, most just plain old didn't work and we hated them, but now every electrician in the world uses them as an up sale, if they can. One day we'll hear all of the same complainers saying "what? Your receptacles aren't tamper resistant and AFCI protected?"

 

[A/A Fuel GTX]

It is still debatable whether or not AFCI's will do everything they are promised to do, but to just replace them with non AFCI at the first sign of problems is still ignorance to some degree.

A ground wire touching a neutral or an aggressive staple will trip an AFCI instantly. I have no problem with that. My beef is the RANDOM trips that are very time consuming to try and pinpoint. I highly doubt replacing an arc fault breaker with a conventional breaker will burn the house down if random tripping is the problem. How many call backs are you willing to make to a customers house as a result of this technology that was rammed down our throats without due diligence? And BTW, i resent the ignorance comment.

 

[A/A Fuel GTX]

It is sad to hear a senior member say that they have replace afci breakers with non afci breakers just because of them tripping. Do we just ignore the code when it doesn't work for us? As far as the neutral touching the ground this should not happen whether it is on an afci or not.

It's my own house Pal........I didn't say I did it at customers houses.

 

[kwired]

Arc fault breakers were required by NEC before manufacturers were ready IMO.

And guess who lobbied hard to get them into the code before they were ready for the market:roll: They even put a effective date in the code because they knew they would not be ready yet at press time. It was nothing more than business decision and a lot of R&D money would have to wait three more years before it starts seeing return on investment if it were to wait for next code cycle.

A ground wire touching a neutral or an aggressive staple will trip an AFCI instantly. I have no problem with that. My beef is the RANDOM trips that are very time consuming to try and pinpoint. I highly doubt replacing an arc fault breaker with a conventional breaker will burn the house down if random tripping is the problem. How many call backs are you willing to make to a customers house as a result of this technology that was rammed down our throats without due diligence? And BTW, i resent the ignorance comment.

Surprisingly I have not had any callbacks for nuisance AFCI tripping. I have not installed a lot of them up to this point, as I have been doing more non dwelling work in general, but have installed a few the past few years. Does this mean maybe my installation practices are better and I am not creating conditions that will trip them than some people that have callbacks, or have I just been lucky? I don't play the lottery so I really have no measurement for lucky.

As far as the ignorance comment - I didn't even know who was being mentioned when I replied and was just replying in general that I think it is ignorant to replace with non like component when something gives you problems without trying to find known causes for trouble first. I agree AFCI's may still have unresolved issues, but I still do see this approach from some people in other areas, like replace a GFCI with a standard breaker or receptacle, or if a 20 amp breaker trips frequently just put a 30 amp in its place. Those solutions are treating symptoms and not finding a cause to deal with.

 

[infinity]

Lets not forget all that requires AFCI is 15 and 20 amp 125 volt circuits supplying outlets in specific rooms, at least right now. A switch is not an outlet - at least right now, that has been debated some also with the requirement to have the grounded conductor at switches in many locations.

You missed part of my post which said a lighted switch. My proposal was regarding a lighted switch that controlled something outside of the required scope of AFCI protection. The CMP choose to make the new requirement for devices.

 

[kwired]

You missed part of my post which said a lighted switch. My proposal was regarding a lighted switch that controlled something outside of the required scope of AFCI protection. The CMP choose to make the new requirement for devices.

Didn't miss it, but maybe missed what you intended to say. I was focused more on the switched load being outside the area requiring AFCI. I do see the fact that since they are now requiring grounded conductor at switch locations to help facilitate occupancy sensors and other automatic controls, that the switch possibly is more than just a switch and possibly is an "outlet" for a controlling device. Such device not only passes on a load like a switch but also does consume some energy itself though minimal, as part of it's normal functioning.