DEICING & SNOW MELTING EQUIPMENT

[larryl]

tis the season,,i was just reading a forum about roof deicing equipment & "GFCI"
and thought i would bring it up, that we need to install
"GFEP"."GROUNG FAULT EQUIPMENT PROTECTION",,it's difrent than gfci.
check out 426.28,,the handbook explains it.

 

[jbwhite]

Re: DEICING & SNOW MELTING EQUIPMENT

So, What is a GFEP?

 

[iwire]

Re: DEICING & SNOW MELTING EQUIPMENT

It's a good point to bring up.

426.28 Equipment Protection.
Ground-fault protection of equipment shall be provided for fixed outdoor electric deicing and snow-melting equipment, except for equipment that employs mineral-insulated, metal-sheathed cable embedded in a noncombustible medium.

Using a standard GFCI on heat trace may well lead to problems.

Ground-Fault Circuit Interrupter. A device intended for the protection of personnel that functions to de-energize a circuit or portion thereof within an established period of time when a current to ground exceeds the values established for a Class A device.

Ground-Fault Protection of Equipment. A system intended to provide protection of equipment from damaging line-to-ground fault currents by operating to cause a disconnecting means to open all ungrounded conductors of the faulted circuit. This protection is provided at current levels less than those required to protect conductors from damage through the operation of a supply circuit overcurrent device.

 

[don_resqcapt19]

Re: DEICING & SNOW MELTING EQUIPMENT

For the GFEP used for heat trace the ground fault trip is about 30mA as opposed to the 4-6mA trip for GFCIs. The GFP breakers are harder to find and more expensive than GFCI breakers. If you are only installing a short length of heat trace the GFCI will work without tripping, on longer lengths the leakage current from the heat trace will exceed the trip point of the GFCI.
Don

 

[jbwhite]

Re: DEICING & SNOW MELTING EQUIPMENT

don, can you help me to understand this please.

are you saying that with heat trace all of the amps going out are not comming back. I am missing something. where are they going?

 

[jbwhite]

Re: DEICING & SNOW MELTING EQUIPMENT

May I add to my question. I have seen motor loads, old washers for example that would trip a gfci. I was under the assumption that when the motor started, for a split second the motor was drawing more amps on the hot than it was returning on the neutral due to some starting capacitor in the motor filling up. I now wonder if I am wrong.

Have you the time to try to clear me up on this?