...There are issues with installation practices of wiring methods that these devices are bringing to the forefront... that is the poor wiring practices that some out there are performing and blaming on the AFCI tripping.
I wholeheartedly agree with this. I've done new residential with guys who would trip AFCI circuits at least 50% of the time because of their hack installation techniques: Grounds touching neutrals, paralleled neutrals, shorted neutrals.
All it did was emphasise the fact that this was the quality of their work on
every circuit but the AFCIs were merely sensitive enough to catch it.
That being said, I still don't think that arc-faults are the panacea that everyone makes them out to be. I've never had one trip on arc-detection, but seen many trip on ground-fault detection. Might as well throw in a bunch of tried-and-tested GFCIs and be done with it.
-John
