Using THHN No. 14 on 20 Amp lighting circuit

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lce

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Is it acceptable to tap from a 20 Amp, THHN No. 12, lighting circuit, a 2 wire THHN No. 14 branch for the switches when the light load for that switch will only be from 60 Watts up to 300 Watts maximum? I allways use No. 12 on the entire circuit but it seems to me that the fixed lighting load on every switch will never be very high.
 
Thank you. I've checked the NEC many times looking for an article or exception that allowed this but hadn't found it.

I have a similar question: Is it ok to tap from the dryer circuit (30 Amp CB, 240 V, 3 wires, THHN No. 8, with a 120 V, 2 wire THHN No. 8 branch for the washer? I would have to connect the No. 8 wire to the 15 Amp Duplex receptacle.
 
Ice-man, you're scaring us. These are questions an experienced electrician wouldn't ask.

No, because you can't supply a 15a or 20a receptacle from a circuit of greater than 20 amps.
 
Sorry for the questions with rather obvious answers. I know an electrical contractor that was going to tap the washer from the dryer circuit and just wanted to confirm it was against code.
 
iwire said:
Larry lets go easy here, there are electricians that have never had to deal with duplex receptacles.
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I grok. It's just that my DIY spider-sense alarm went off.

lce said:
Sorry for the questions with rather obvious answers. I know an electrical contractor that was going to tap the washer from the dryer circuit and just wanted to confirm it was against code.
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Well, okay this time. :)

I imagine that you could set a small panel and branch out separate circuits for each appliance, as long as there are separate ground and neutral conductors in what would become a feeder.
 
lce said:
Sorry for the questions with rather obvious answers. I know an electrical contractor that was going to tap the washer from the dryer circuit and just wanted to confirm it was against code.
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You say your an electrical contractor, might we ask what state and city ? I too smell a diy.
 
Jim W in Tampa said:
I too smell a diy.
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I smell something, too

fish-odor-kills.gif
 
Last week i ripped out a set-up just like this .....a dryer outlet ran with 14-3 and spliced to feed the washer recptacle !!

I have finally hit a bottom in my field .
 
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lce said:
Is it acceptable to tap from a 20 Amp, THHN No. 12, lighting circuit, a 2 wire THHN No. 14 branch for the switches when the light load for that switch will only be from 60 Watts up to 300 Watts maximum? I allways use No. 12 on the entire circuit but it seems to me that the fixed lighting load on every switch will never be very high.
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See you changed your op but answer is still no.
 
LarryFine said:
I imagine that you could set a small panel and branch out separate circuits for each appliance, as long as there are separate ground and neutral conductors in what would become a feeder.
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Your post brought back memories of the time period that I was doing houses for a builder in a high end golf development. . The houses were always sprawling and he always planned out and had his excavator dig the service trenches where he wanted them which was always on the opposite end of the house from the kitchen. . I reacted by putting in a subpanel on the opposite side of the basement from the main panel. . After a few houses I stopped checking to see if I needed one and just put them in every house automatically.

With todays wire prices, if I was still a contractor, I imagine I would be doing the main and sub on opposite ends of the basement on almost every single house. . And I would be using aluminum for the feeder.

David
 
David, that's exactly what I did on a 7800+ sq.ft. house last year. Two 200a disco's back-to-back from the 320a meter, SER to the two 200a ML panels, and SER from those to two 100a sub-panels at the far end of the house.

These subs supply the bathrooms, bedrooms, sewage-ejection/grinder pump, bedroom HVAC, etc. We have two of each panel because we split the house loads between generator-backed and non-generator-backed feeds.
 
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