Amount of Receptacles on one circuit

[charlie b]

Let the Code Committee come up with a number set in stone and be done with it.

Somewhere around a year from now, you will get your next chance to tell them that. The proposal stage for the 2011 NEC is over. So you could try to influence the 2014.

But I don't think the CMP would go for it. I hope they don't.

Keep in mind that there is a vast great difference between a discussion of what the code requires, and how to do a particular job. If you want to stay in business, you have to keep your customers happy. The NEC does not care if the customers are happy, so you have to care. If you do any insane things that the code does not forbid you to do, you will soon run out of customers.

 

[LarryFine]

I agree with the there's-no-legal-quantity-limit crowd, but I don't use the rules-of-thumb either, except for one: I design the receptacle circuits for the expected load, period.

In a large commercial space, for example, there might be a hallway-receptacle circuit that won't see anything except a vacuum or a floor buffer, and then, only one at a time.

Why couldn't there be 20 or 30 receptacles (if the space required it, of course) for the cleaning crew? For equipment or machinery, we'll never approach the rules-of-thumb.

As stated by others, the performance of the circuit will affect us before we approach such a limit. Two or three bedrooms will likely load a circuit even without lighting outlets.

On the other hand, if someone wanted 50 window-candle receptacles on one circuit, I'd accomodate them, as long as they don't have to do double duty as required receptacles.

 

[LarryFine]

To add, what if I wanted GP receptacles spaced every four feet around a room? That doesn't necessarily mean I'm going to use more power per room, or per square foot, or per receptacle, but if I did, I'd want a greater capacity anyway.