I have an ice cream freezer in one of our cafeteria's that is tripping the circuit about 2-3 times a day, I was wondering if anyone knows if the NEC address's this type of circumstance or of any other publication that might address this issue from either a safety or fire hazard standpoint as the customer is currently refusing to pay for the addition of an individual branch circuit.
Depends on the breaker type, the manufacture will have published duty ratings for each breaker. Typically MCCB's are only rated for 1-3 fault interuptions before it should be replaced. Because most dont have indicators as to what type of fault occured (LT, ST, INST) you need to assume it is not an overload and it is a fault condition.
Resetting a breaker without checking the circuit after a fault interuption is an OSHA violation.
1910.334 (b)(2) "Reclosing circuits after protective device operation." After a circuit is deenergized
by a circuit protective device, the circuit protective device, the circuit may not
be manually reenergized until it has been determined that the equipment and
circuit can be safely energized. The repetitive manual reclosing of circuit breakers
or reenergizing circuits through replaced fuses is prohibited.
Note: When it can be determined from the design of the circuit and the
overcurrent devices involved that the automatic operation of a device was
caused by an overload rather than a fault condition, no examination of the circuit
or connected equipment is needed before the circuit is reenergized.
