Heat tape fed #12 protected by 30a breaker

[flatlander]

Hi I was at my friends place near Vail Colorado last week helping him with his new place. I noticed this cable in the roof gutters and downspouts called heat tape.
While in the panel I saw # 12 hooked to a 30 amp GFI breaker .
I have never seen stuff like that. Is it legitimate to have 12 on a 30 in this case?

 

[JFletcher]

Hi I was at my friends place near Vail Colorado last week helping him with his new place. I noticed this cable in the roof gutters and downspouts called heat tape.
While in the panel I saw # 12 hooked to a 30 amp GFI breaker .
I have never seen stuff like that. Is it legitimate to have 12 on a 30 in this case?

No, see 240.4. Doubt there is any change in the 11 or 14 NEC on that section

 

[user 100]

Hi I was at my friends place near Vail Colorado last week helping him with his new place. I noticed this cable in the roof gutters and downspouts called heat tape.
While in the panel I saw # 12 hooked to a 30 amp GFI breaker .
I have never seen stuff like that. Is it legitimate to have 12 on a 30 in this case?

Heat tape and other RHE's are covered in art 426, specifically in section III and also art 427.

 

[kwired]

Yes it is a code violation, but otherwise a fixed load doesn't get overloaded and you are still protected if there is short circuit/ground fault.
So even if I accepted the 30 amp breaker I would be more concerned about actual connected load, if there was too much load for a 20 amp breaker to hold then the conductor was too small to begin with.

 

[JFletcher]

Yes it is a code violation, but otherwise a fixed load doesn't get overloaded and you are still protected if there is short circuit/ground fault.
So even if I accepted the 30 amp breaker I would be more concerned about actual connected load, if there was too much load for a 20 amp breaker to hold then the conductor was too small to begin with.

Huh? If the 20A breaker trips, it's because the load is too great; the conductor size is irrelevant.

I have a pic of my deep fryer cord where mice chewed thru the insulation around the ungrounded conductor. Now, pair that bare wire with a bit of oil, and contact with the painted case of the metal fryer, and my fixed heating load could very well have drawn* more current than designed w/o tripping the OCPD.

Fixed w/electrical tape. The cords arent available separately for that model; no way I was buying a whole new fryer for a few gnaw marks that exposed a few strands of copper.

 

[kwired]

Huh? If the 20A breaker trips, it's because the load is too great; the conductor size is irrelevant.

I have a pic of my deep fryer cord where mice chewed thru the insulation around the ungrounded conductor. Now, pair that bare wire with a bit of oil, and contact with the painted case of the metal fryer, and my fixed heating load could very well have drawn* more current than designed w/o tripping the OCPD.

Fixed w/electrical tape. The cords arent available separately for that model; no way I was buying a whole new fryer for a few gnaw marks that exposed a few strands of copper.

At 120 volts, oil is an insulator. Any contaminants in the oil may be conductive.

With the OP there was also the added GFCI protection so minor ground faults are sensed and the device trips. What he had is code violation, but unless the connected load was more then a 12 AWG is supposed to handle - really isn't much of a safety issue.