Shopsmith Forums

gutterman wrote:Wow, Ed!
I do knot know the electrical codes for the Nation or the state of Florida, but I have had experience for complying to the state of Washington's:
1) In Washington, even though the standard breaker has room for two wires, it is knot allowed to wire them that way.
2) In Washington, the spacing of receptacles in a bedroom (and the rest of the house too) requires that no point on a wall is more then 6' from a receptacle, so about every 12'.
3) In Washington, all bedrooms must be on Arc Fault Circuit Interuptor breakers. I have never seen a peanut/tandum/double/slim AFCI breaker.

Things must be really different in Florida!

Tim
I don't know the local Florida codes I haven't had to concern myself about them for nearly 5 years and I'm certain things have changed. You might be right about the spacing but I recall that you couldn't go cross walls so a 14 foot wall would require two plugs, I also think the plug must be within 4-6 feet of the corner so in fact a 14 foot wall would require 3. Again I'm trying to go from memory more from a site managers point of view and not an electrical contractor. Most builders simply used bigger panel boxes ran seperate home runs and the question never came up. However on "spec" homes cost were often held to a minimum and things were done more const conscious.

As for ARC fault breakers, at the time I was interested in this they weren't required at all any where in a house.(Editted to say I did a search and found you are right they are now required) Again I don't doubt they could be required now.
Again where you make the Y connection makes no electrical difference. The Breaker sees the same load, the panel sees the same load, the actual wire sees the same load.

Frankly I would rather have a solid mechanical connection (screw holding two wires) rather than 3 wires wire nuted together but again code dictates what must be done, and wire nuts have been proven trouble free for many years.

I once wired a garage using ground fault breakers, at the time they weren't in the code and to pass inspection I had to remove them replace them with regular breakers. I did this and after the inspection I reinstalled the ground faults. Today you can't have a non ground fault in a garage. Who knows what changes tomorrow will bring.

Best advice unless you are a certified electrician before you make any electrical changes check with someone that knows the current code or call your building department. Bottom line if your house burns down and it can be proven that the fire started because a non code electical situation your house insurance company may not have to pay.

I have a friend in this mess right now. Someone piled insulation on a non insulation contact recessed light and the house burned down. Since there was construction in progress in another part of the house the case has been one finger pointing after another. Right now it looks like the his home owner insurance will not pay.

Ed in Tampa wrote: . . .
I once wired a garage using ground fault breakers, at the time they weren't in the code and to pass inspection I had to remove them replace them with regular breakers. I did this and after the inspection I reinstalled the ground faults. Today you can't have a non ground fault in a garage. Who knows what changes tomorrow will bring.

. . .

Yep! Match the "CODE"! Even if what you do EXCEEDS the intent of the "CODE".

And we LET bureaucrats run the country!:eek:

JPG40504 wrote:Yep! Match the "CODE"! Even if what you do EXCEEDS the intent of the "CODE".

And we LET bureaucrats run the country!:eek:

When anyone makes a hard fast statement about what the code allows and/or prohibits, you must be aware that the code is modified regionally. It is modified for national/state/county applications.

It is also dependent on whether it is governing a new build, a remodel or an extensive repair.

About the only thing that I would say is absolute is that it most probably won't become more lax when modified.

I think this statement depends on how well you can communicate with the INSPECTOR. Yep! Match the "CODE"! Even if what you do EXCEEDS the intent of the "CODE"

Some years back the next county from me didn't even have an inspector. You wired the job and the power company did a walk through and if it suited them they hung the meter. A good friend of mine rewired an old house and put in a new service. He was quite careful and did a nice job but slipped up on one thing... He put the breaker box at the right height in the house but that made the meter too high on the outside. It was 6" too high. They refused to hook it up until it was the proper distance from the ground. He tore it all back out and installed it lower rewired it and had them come back. It passed of course but I didn't know about it until later. When he was telling me how much work it was he said he didn't have enough slack in a couple of runs up to the attic and had to replace those. I reminded him of just how much of a maverick I am and told him that he had a tall stone foundation on that side of the house and he was still landscaping the yard. I said "why didn't you just raise the ground about 8" or 10" along there?"
He just stood there with his jaw hanging down for a minute then started yelling at himself for not thinking about it. The sad part was that he had it in the back of his mind to fill that part of the yard some to improve drainage anyway.
All that the power company cared about was that their guys wouldn't have to climb on something to get to the meter. They wouldn't have cared whether he lowered the box or raised the ground.