Gradual bends in underground PVC

[Smart $]

Many plumbing elbows still have a radius to the bend, it just happens to be too short to be practical to use for pulling wire and cable through it - though I have seen it done many times:blink:

And there are even electrical fittings quite similar for classified locations. I don't believe a fitting is subject to the minimum bend radius.

 

[kwired]

And there are even electrical fittings quite similar for classified locations. I don't believe a fitting is subject to the minimum bend radius.

Yes I have used them. There are also some with even tighter radius that are not for classified locations. Some you can get at big box stores with a EMT fitting already attached to them - those have to be fun pulls sometimes. I will admit to using them for very short runs at times but have seen some on longer runs that make you wonder how they ever got the conductors into them without damaging the conducotrs.

 

[Strathead]

Well, it depends on who you ask because there is no definition for either.

Ask a plumber about anything that looks like a bent piece of pipe, and he'll likely say its a sweep.

To an electrician, however, and IMO, a short, factory-supplied piece of conduit with a standard radius bend is an elbow. Standard being anything close, but not smaller than the minimum permitted radius bend. A sweep meets the same criteria with the exception that the bend radius is substantially greater than the minimum.

A condulet, which an LB or LL or LR is, is not a part of this discussion IMO.

Wheatland, for example calls the large radius elbows. Cantex calls them special radius elbows. So while we use the term sweeps and it is generally understood as a bend radius larger than the standard one, I think the best advice is not to use or assume that the term elbow is only for standard radius.