Last Leg,
AFAIK, there is no difference- they're just not quite as beefy. Series-rated breakers cannot open under full fall current, but can withstand it without exploding, provided an upstream (series) breaker opens in time. Thus, you only really need 1 full-fault current rated breaker in the panel, and the rest can just be series rated. The disadvantage is that you lose coordication; if you have a fault on any branch circuit, the main will open and you lose the whole panel. The advantage is that these breakers are often cheaper than full current-rated breakers.
As the series rating is dependant entirely on the properties of the full-rated breaker, you can't necessarily mix-and-match breakers.
I'd be interested in seeing a white paper, too, actually.
Last edited by SteveFehr; 10/15/07 12:19 PM.
