counterfeit Square D breakers!!

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It's happening to all of the major manufacturers now. Some are just a bit more proactive because of having the advantage of foresight from observing what happened to Sq. D.

The Chinese knockoff issue extends well beyond circuit breakers as well. The tragedy with the CB issue is that they are primarily protective devices, so failure can mean death and destruction.

This is a good time to be very suspicious of any bargain that seems to be too good to be true.
 
From what I've read, real SqD's have the amperage molded into the handle and the fakes have it stamped on in white ink.

Is that accurate? The funny thing is that probably half of the QO's I've seen are of the latter type, and for many years.
 
LarryFine said:
From what I've read, real SqD's have the amperage molded into the handle and the fakes have it stamped on in white ink.

Is that accurate? The funny thing is that probably half of the QO's I've seen are of the latter type, and for many years.
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LarryFine said:
From what I've read, real SqD's have the amperage molded into the handle and the fakes have it stamped on in white ink.

Is that accurate? The funny thing is that probably half of the QO's I've seen are of the latter type, and for many years.
Click to expand...

Old SqDs are molded. I've seen bazillions of 'em.
 
(looks like the counterfeiters do a way better job engraving the ul stamp than the real manufacturer ?)
 
I drilled apart one of the counterfeits, and they're part-for-part identical inside. I'd rather think they came out of the same plant, just not "authorized".
 
I like the counterfeit breakers. I was thinking of placing an order and having them direct shipped from (China ?)
 
mdshunk said:
I drilled apart one of the counterfeits, and they're part-for-part identical inside. I'd rather think they came out of the same plant, just not "authorized".
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You cant tell much by "drilling one apart" and looking at it, what alloys were used? (Matters a lot, cheap metals can experience ductile failure after a few operations) How will the fake one hold up to mulitple operations?

How many of the fake ones were tested?(I know most people dont test thier breakers before they install them). Even if they look the same chances are there was no testing done for trip curve validation or AIC testing. At least the OEM's do batch testing, not great but better than no testing.
 
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