Bypassed Ballasts retrofit

[brother]

Have any of you ever installed the new led lighting that bypass the ballasts in new fixtures? Basically these are retrofits of lighting that is supposed to reduce maintance costs because no ballasts are used in the old fluorescent fixtures. These new led tube lights are direct wire to the line power and no longer use ballasts.

Also the code question came up about the disconnect, isn't it still required even in these retrofits?

 

[Little Bill]

I've installed them. You said new fixtures, the fixtures come with a disconnect in them.

 

[kwired]

410.130(G)(1) which covers the disconnecting means starts off with "In indoor locations other than dwellings and associated accessory structures, fluorescent luminaires that utilize double-ended lamps and contain ballast(s)"

No ballast - this section doesn't apply, plus from my understanding some (maybe all) ballast bypass type replacement tubes are considered "single ended" meaning power is not applied to both ends but just to one end, which also eliminates application of this section.

 

[ramsy]

410.130(G)(1) which covers the disconnecting means ..just to one end, which also eliminates application of this section.

Would not rely on inspectors seeing it that way.

 

[kwired]

Would not rely on inspectors seeing it that way.

True, but there are a lot of things they can see any way they want, you need to educate them a little sometimes.

Now if what I said wasn't what NEC intended - then the CMP responsible for that section is who needs to do something about it, not random inspectors that read things the way they want to read them.