terry talbot
Member
- Location
- houma, la
A100 amp breaker with two #6 wires in parallel feeding a heater from that breaker! ANY IDEA WHY ? Have never run across this before. Any thoughts?
Small parallel conductors
- Thread starter terry talbot
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jumper
Senior Member
- Location
- 3 Hr 2 Min from Winged Horses
- Location
- New Jersey
- Occupation
- Journeyman Electrician
Is this field wiring or factory wiring?
terry talbot
Member
- Location
- houma, la
Field wiring, besides not meeting the requirements for paralleling small conductors I don't think breakers are not normally listed for doubling lugging.
- Location
- Chapel Hill, NC
- Occupation
- Retired Electrical Contractor
Most aren't but one could use a splice and get away with that. But as stated above it is a violation anyway
petersonra
Senior Member
- Location
- Northern illinois
- Occupation
- engineer
are you sure they are actually in parallel?
take a look at 424.22 (B). a 100 amp Cb would not be allowed for space heaters unless there is some kind of protection downstream. Is this a space heater?
- Location
- Placerville, CA, USA
- Occupation
- Retired PV System Designer
If there were two resistance windings inside the heater, with separate terminals, and each wire went to a different winding, they would not be in parallel. But a resistive fault on one wire would overload that wire without necessarily tripping the shared breaker.
And, of course, one winding would not be properly protected against some types of fault by the large breaker whether the wires were in parallel or not.
As stated earlier, the heater may well calm for two supply circuits each protected at a lower current.
terry talbot
Member
- Location
- houma, la
mystery solved, the mechanical contractor instructed the electrician to run 2 # 6 conductors to serve the heater. instead of installing 2 60 amp breakers he chose to double lug them onto a 100 amp breaker. Thanks for the feedback.
Terry T
Terry T
ptonsparky
Tom
- Occupation
- EC - retired
You might check the rest of the work the "electrician" did. Then again, maybe you don't want to know.
terry talbot
Member
- Location
- houma, la
that is already the plan, thanks
jumper
Senior Member
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- 3 Hr 2 Min from Winged Horses
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