I am sure they will get better. As I pointed out, the 2002 version only claimed to detect a parallel fault (basically a short) inside the wall
actually the white book stated
'carbon' and
'non-carbon' arcing(s) at the time Greg.
this was taken by many to mean parrallel and series mitigation, with much ado .....
but I suppose it isn't their money they are making people spend to beta test for CH and SqD.
well there's the rub. they go for about $38 ea. now, depending on brand / supplier.
that's over $1000 on most homes w/200A 40 cir panels
at that point, the consumer is making an investment that we, the contractor, are obligated to validate.
unfortunatly, they make only one propietory tester that i know of, don't have a lockout mechanism like gfi's, and state on the paperwork to disconnect when meggering
so the reality is, if you live where there's surges, spikes, your investment may stop
somewhat short of efficay, and mostly
look pretty.
as i've installed many version 1.0's that have ten years tenure at this point, there spectre of an arc related incident
isn't out of the realm of reality either
i often think (as contractors do)
who would be liable with a code compliant install , and afci's that
didn't do the job.
~S~
