TRC
Member
- Location
- Atlanta, GA
I currently have a project located in the Bahamas and the governing electrical code is the Canadian Electrical Code 2006. With that said, I currently have a situation that has a light switch in the guest suite's bathroom (condo units) within reach of the bath tubs (within 1.5 meters of the bath tub).
CEC states (section 68-068) that the lighting circuit requires GFCI protection since the light switch is within 1.5 meters of the bath tub.
So the electrical contractor proceeded to install the GFCI breaker (Siemens QPF120) to meet the CEC code requirement. The lighting circuit that is being protected contains MR16 fixtures with electronic and magnetic integral transformers and compact fluorescent fixtures with electronic ballast only. No receptacles are on this particular circuit except for the lighting.
Nuisance trips started occurring on each of the guest suite's lighting circuit but we could not figure out why until we noticed that the electrical contractors two-radio (Motorola Radius CP200) was causing this GFCI breaker to trip as soon as the radio was keyed up to talk.
Now I know this sounds impossible or crazy but I did not believe myself until I went through the steps of testing the lighting circuit. I tested ground to hot (~119V), ground to neutral (~0.5V), evaluated the wiring for consistency and found nothing inaccurate or obviously wrong.
Can the integral transformers or ballast of the light fixtures be causing circuit to be imbalanced across the conductors just below the threshold of the GFCI breaker sensitivity (~5mA) and the motorola radio is causing enough interferrence to push the circuit to trip?
Any suggestions or ideas would be much appreciated.
CEC states (section 68-068) that the lighting circuit requires GFCI protection since the light switch is within 1.5 meters of the bath tub.
So the electrical contractor proceeded to install the GFCI breaker (Siemens QPF120) to meet the CEC code requirement. The lighting circuit that is being protected contains MR16 fixtures with electronic and magnetic integral transformers and compact fluorescent fixtures with electronic ballast only. No receptacles are on this particular circuit except for the lighting.
Nuisance trips started occurring on each of the guest suite's lighting circuit but we could not figure out why until we noticed that the electrical contractors two-radio (Motorola Radius CP200) was causing this GFCI breaker to trip as soon as the radio was keyed up to talk.
Now I know this sounds impossible or crazy but I did not believe myself until I went through the steps of testing the lighting circuit. I tested ground to hot (~119V), ground to neutral (~0.5V), evaluated the wiring for consistency and found nothing inaccurate or obviously wrong.
Can the integral transformers or ballast of the light fixtures be causing circuit to be imbalanced across the conductors just below the threshold of the GFCI breaker sensitivity (~5mA) and the motorola radio is causing enough interferrence to push the circuit to trip?
Any suggestions or ideas would be much appreciated.