With a name like this I wonder if you're pulling my leg.
Color coding -- ungrounded conductors
- Thread starter ike5547
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With a name like this I wonder if you're pulling my leg.
Yep and yep.
Yeah. I've seen this a lot in SF where I worked about 20 years. Installed in black pipe.
JFletcher
Senior Member
- Location
- Williamsburg, VA
Yes, I was joking around and being sarcastic with my post. Four pairs of cable all colored the same would be an absolute nightmare to terminate properly, a nightmare that could be drummed up in the combined minds of the Marquis De Sade and Denis Leary.
Back when I was doing low voltage wiring for hotels, I might run through eight different sets of color for the jackets... Blue for phone, white for internet, orange for point-of-sale, green for wireless access points, red for critical lines like the elevator cab telephone and the fire alarm control panel and used yellow for security cameras. Black was reserved for future circuits.
it did not cost us any extra money to use multiple colors. we did have a partial box of the red Cat5e on we were done, we simply took it to the next job and used it there
- Location
- Illinois
- Occupation
- retired electrician
I get paid by the hour, I love jobs like that
I get paid by the hour, I love jobs like that
Great! If you're not being hounded by your other customers to leave that interminable all black conductors job. I see a lot of people here agreeing with me (inadvertently) that some sort of identification is preferable, Whether it be number tags or by other means.
- Occupation
- Licensed Electrician
The only identification that matters is the one that you do, on site, verified by you, not relying on any preconceived notions about the color of the insulation.
That's great. I wouldn't hire you to engineer or draw plans on any of my jobs though. All black conductors for the sake of demonstrating one's electrical skills can be dangerous too.
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JFletcher
Senior Member
- Location
- Williamsburg, VA
All black wire is awesome... If you are building a bomb that you did not want diffused.
I understand what he is saying about making assumptions based on insulation color, assuming a green wire is not energized could have painful or fatal results... Ironically enough from people that would just wire things up any old way, and not know (or care) anything about basic color coding.
Maybe because I started in telecom is why I do not have an aversion to colors... 25 pair color code really could not be done any other way, save for toning out each wire. I'm sure this could have been done, and I'm sure that if it were done that way your phone bill would have been about $600 a month versus $10 in the 70s..
I understand what he's saying too. It's eminently reasonable. It just isn't a reasonable argument against color coding or wire identification by an installer.
I never imagined I would be arguing this on this forum.
JFletcher
Senior Member
- Location
- Williamsburg, VA
Back on topic, where did the black / red / blue for 208 volts, and brown / orange / yellow for 480 volts originate? Seems awfully standard to me for something that is not in the NEC.
Thanks kwired, now why mark the white hot feeding a switch in a loop, we know when we see it it's the hot! One of my pet peeves.
Color code works right up to changing rotation then, an other thread.
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I completely agree with this.
Keep your nasty sticky black tape off of my conductors.
JAP>
kwired
Electron manager
- Location
- NE Nebraska
- Occupation
- EC
I don't like that rule either. Mark it if you want to - is ungrounded anyway. Most qualified people know it is ungrounded whether marked or not. DIY guys may or may not have a clue, marked or not, the rule is stupid. Same for when a white conductor lands on a breaker. Unless it is somewhat rare situation of being a grounded phase conductor - white conductor landed on a breaker is going to be ungrounded whether marked or not - that is just common sense.
Same goes with those that have a problem with all the same color wire for the ungrounded conductors.
I'm not talking about cables. Individual conductors that are pulled in pipe.
Most jobs that I've been around are actually more professional and make perfect sense when plants use color codes such as all black for 480 and all red for 120.
It prompts the installer to put a wire numbers or labels on his conductors and makes for a very clean installation and easy to trouble shoot.
And, instead of having multiple rolls of Black, Red, Blue, Brown, Orange,Yellow, Purple, Pink, ETC.... which is an added expense when trying to maintain color codes in a wire pull, pulling from just a couple of colors such as Black or Red is always more economical.
JAP>
Which is still all the procedures you would have to do regardless of the color of the wire.
JAP>
- Location
- Bremerton, Washington
- Occupation
- Master Electrician
Exactly, the NEC had a color code requirement and it was removed in the mid 70s, electricians would see a black wire and assume it was 120V.
Until the 2005 NEC green could be used as an ungrounded conductor
- Location
- Bremerton, Washington
- Occupation
- Master Electrician
If you make a code proposal for a color code standard, the CMP will say "we want you to test the voltage and not assume its what the colors seems to indicate"
You can have a plant color code standard, but on a Friday, to get the job done, someone can use the wrong color wire...
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