EGC through EMT ?

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dielectricunion

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Bloomington IN
Eventually, I'm going to be rewiring my house. When I do, I'm planning to run all EMT, with the exception of maybe of few short whips of MC where needed.

Should I wire it with the conduit as EGC or run a separate green? In Chicago residential, it was very uncommon to see EGC run in the pipe. Now that I've been doing more commercial work in Indiana, I've become accustomed to EGC in the conduit.

Obviously, most of you will say "WTF, use romex idiot!" But I'm not, so should I add a green wire for good measure?
 
There are as many opinions on this topic as Ground Up vs Ground Down. Conduit as EGC = cost savings, VS Wire as EGC = feel good factor, What is your favorite auto, Ford, Chevrolet, Chrysler ???? It all comes down to personal Prefrence
 
dielectricunion said:
Eventually, I'm going to be rewiring my house. When I do, I'm planning to run all EMT, with the exception of maybe of few short whips of MC where needed.

Should I wire it with the conduit as EGC or run a separate green? In Chicago residential, it was very uncommon to see EGC run in the pipe. Now that I've been doing more commercial work in Indiana, I've become accustomed to EGC in the conduit.

Obviously, most of you will say "WTF, use romex idiot!" But I'm not, so should I add a green wire for good measure?
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Whatever one electricians opinion is worth: I have gotten away from most redundant equipment grounding such as bonding jumpers to devices (when not required) and wire EGC in EMT. I think its a waste of time resources and money. It is my understanding that most fault current flows through the raceway and not the wire EGC anyway. One common argument you will hear for the wire EGC is that a metallic raceway could have a loose joint, setscrew, etc, however I would argue that poor workmanship can cause any number of dangerous situations. One forgotten screw (MBJ) can make the entire breaker/fault clearing system not function.
 
I use EMT a fair amount even though MC is becoming more the norm. I don't pull a green unless I'm made to.

I have done one house in EMT and I did not pull a green. If I were to wire my own house in EMT I would not pull a green. Chicago may be crazy for requiring conduit in houses but at least they get it right by not being afraid to use it as an EGC.
 
That's kind of the way I've felt about it. I've seen lots of faults clear no problem through boxes and pipe.

I also love how much cleaner the panel and junctions are when you eliminate ground. Romex is so much worse for this reason... Everything loaded up with bare #12s. Even very clean, neat installs bug me when I'm looking at all that bare EGC
 
I am curious about this Chicago EMT code. I suppose if you wanted to use rigid you could, I have seen that in older homes around here. My question is could you use ENT? (of course now you need a ground) I did an addition up here for a customer who lives on the Virgin Islands. He insisted on ENT, says that is how they do the wiring down there. Is the reasoning to be able to add wires later or is there some other reason? Are the Chicago electricians like plumbers installing piping through joists or do they use some other type of construction? I can think of a lot of questions but it really must take quite a bit longer to do it that way. Job Security:D
 
My 1930 Chicago code book allows NM, but my 1954 doesnt. So the change happened way back then.

No one seems to know the real reason any more. Some suspect a fire caused by rats chewing into NM. Another theory is union pressure. Yet another is a building official had a relative in the steel industry.
 
GerryB said:
Are the Chicago electricians like plumbers installing piping through joists or do they use some other type of construction? I can think of a lot of questions but it really must take quite a bit longer to do it that way. Job Security:D
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I have heard (I hate it when a sentence starts with that...) that in Chicago electricians typically dont do the pipe work. There are crews that rough in the place with emt and then the electricians come in. Maybe there is a Chicago guy on here who can confirm or deny this.
 
I moved away from Chicago a bit over a year ago (spent 8 years there). I wasn't working as an electrician there but I worked on a lot of job sites and all Chicago electricians bend pipe, that I know of.

It may be different on huge new constructions, but your average in town contractors obviously bend and install on all their jobs.
 
electrofelon said:
I have heard (I hate it when a sentence starts with that...) that in Chicago electricians typically dont do the pipe work. There are crews that rough in the place with emt and then the electricians come in. Maybe there is a Chicago guy on here who can confirm or deny this.
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While, on large tract housing projects, there may be different crews that do the conduit, they are still all electricians.
 
dielectricunion said:
Eventually, I'm going to be rewiring my house. When I do, I'm planning to run all EMT, with the exception of maybe of few short whips of MC where needed.

Should I wire it with the conduit as EGC or run a separate green? In Chicago residential, it was very uncommon to see EGC run in the pipe. Now that I've been doing more commercial work in Indiana, I've become accustomed to EGC in the conduit.

Obviously, most of you will say "WTF, use romex idiot!" But I'm not, so should I add a green wire for good measure?
Click to expand...
Use whatever you want. If you want you can run stainless or brass RMC and pull oxygen free conductors in them as well. Might not want to conceal much of that though - just so you can show it off:happyyes:

Run a single branch circuit to every outlet as well if you want.
 
GerryB said:
I am curious about this Chicago EMT code. I suppose if you wanted to use rigid you could, I have seen that in older homes around here. My question is could you use ENT? (of course now you need a ground) I did an addition up here for a customer who lives on the Virgin Islands. He insisted on ENT, says that is how they do the wiring down there. Is the reasoning to be able to add wires later or is there some other reason? Are the Chicago electricians like plumbers installing piping through joists or do they use some other type of construction? I can think of a lot of questions but it really must take quite a bit longer to do it that way. Job Security:D
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Chicago electrical contractor here. Only time I use ENT would be "smurf-tube" for low volt wiring for wall mount tv's. Otherwise for new construction or any open walls it is EMT all day long everyday and everywhere (I guess like a plumber running his pipework). Funny story......I moved to Minneapolis 20 years ago for a few years, got a job right away and showed up to the first job with all my pipe benders. I was asked what the hell are those for, get the romex. I asked what the hell is romex LOL.
 
electrofelon said:
I have heard (I hate it when a sentence starts with that...) that in Chicago electricians typically dont do the pipe work. There are crews that rough in the place with emt and then the electricians come in. Maybe there is a Chicago guy on here who can confirm or deny this.
Click to expand...

Chicago electricians run pipe all day long. Some residential contractors may hire apprentices or helpers that will only drill holes and run EMT. They will be very good at that but that is all they will know, and would have no clue how to do other things like service calls, working with old wiring, motors, etc. But I never seen or heard of a company that would go into a jobsite and only run pipe for the electrical contractor, i think that would be a nightmare as when you are running pipe, you know in the back of your mind that you will be pulling the wire after drywall is installed.
 
The small amount of work I did in Chicago in resi with EMT, I was pulling THHN solid.

At my current job doing electrical in IN, we always pull stranded (residential is mostly NM cables)

Ignorant question, but, is this a commercial VS residential thing or just a preferential choice?
 
mrtom said:
...i think that would be a nightmare as when you are running pipe, you know in the back of your mind that you will be pulling the wire after drywall is installed.
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Even if you ran the pipe that you are pulling, it is much faster to pull the wire before the drywall goes on. When I did apartments or commercial work, I always pulled all of the wire before they drywalled. Also made up the splices tucked the wired before the mud rings went on.
 
dielectricunion said:
Ignorant question, but, is this a commercial VS residential thing or just a preferential choice?
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The latter. I work for a very small shop. There is one other electrician, the motor guy, and the boss. I use stranded as much as possible, workmate uses solid as much a possible, motor guy has no interest in the debate, and boss mostly cares about how much work is getting done.

Extrapolate that out to the whole country and I bet the ratio holds.
 
don_resqcapt19 said:
Even if you ran the pipe that you are pulling, it is much faster to pull the wire before the drywall goes on.
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When we run pipe we also install the conductors during the 'roughing in', as soon as possible. Our goal is to leave absolutely as little as possible to do during trim out.
 
mrtom said:
Chicago electrical contractor here. Only time I use ENT would be "smurf-tube" for low volt wiring for wall mount tv's. Otherwise for new construction or any open walls it is EMT all day long everyday and everywhere (I guess like a plumber running his pipework). Funny story......I moved to Minneapolis 20 years ago for a few years, got a job right away and showed up to the first job with all my pipe benders. I was asked what the hell are those for, get the romex. I asked what the hell is romex LOL.
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:lol:That is a funny story. So to answer the OP's original question did you pull ground wires for residential?
 
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