ECN Forum Forums Code Related Discussion NEC & other Code issues AFCIs?

See this thread for more comments.....

http://forums.mikeholt.com/showthread.php?t=83968

I just installed five GE AFCI on my 1966 house with success. I also installed GFCI on every branch except the fridge, so that 90% of the house is covered by both.

The back room that was once a garage had faulty wiring with splices everywhere. The GFCI did not work on that and I had to run new wire from the panel to the new receptacles, because there wasn't enough wire to change the receptacles.

So far I have used a 15 miter saw, 15 amp air compressor and 13 amp shop vac on the new AFCI, GFCI breakers, receptacles.

I like the concept. I was able to identify and troubleshoot the problem areas, with out having to rewire the entire house right now.

I don't understand how the bedrooms are more important than the kitchen and living room that gets warn out from use? Perhaps some people in old houses are using space heaters, so they are forcing this on new construction? My 40 year old bedroom electricity is fine, while the living room and kitchen were warn out from use.

(please don't chop up my post to take issue with one aspect)

I had my first nuissance trip of an AFCI this week. 100W bulb blew on a garage door opener, FLASH, click, room goes black. Panel was right beside the light switch, so diagnosis was easy. Aren't they supposed to only blow if it's something like a 60A arcing fault?

Anyhow, I got this house in just before the code change- the bedroom lights share the circuit, three AFCIs total in the house. And one was defective out of the box. Really gives me a nice warm/fuzzy on the technology, ya know?

John, it's not so much to protect people in bedrooms using space heaters. It's to protect people using extension cords that frequently get covered under clothing items or pinched under furniture legs. That won't really matter when the new code changes take effect, since nearly every residential circuit will require AFCI protection.

Not to mention, new houses will eventually become old.

Ed,

That is fine, but the currently available AFCI does not provide protection from those types of problems. The "combination" type that is required starting 1/1/08 is said to provide that type of protection.

When Harvey Johnson from C/H was selling me on this AFCI deal he was working on in the early 90s, the scenario they were using for the fault this catches was a lamp cord, behind the bed, buried in dust bunnies gets crushed when they move the bed. It arcs and starts a fire in the fuzz before it trips a breaker. That made sense to me. The 1999 proposal for AFCIs on bedroom receptacles made sense. It got silly when they finally adopted it in 2002 and it picked up the ceiling light and smoke detector.
Everything after that borders on insanity, particularly since the device old Harv described in 1994 still doesn't seem to exist. The goal was always parallel and series arcs. The parallel arc was easy, he was working on the series arc then. They still seem to be having problems with a series arc being detected without nuisance tripping.

Greg, you've hit on my cause for reservations ... unkempt promises, and the feeling that you've had a 'bait and switch' pulled on you.

Bedrooms-but-not-rest-of-house make sense if you look at this as a life-justified cost as oposed to economics. The original code in 2002 required AFCI in bedrooms, because the risk to life is a LOT higher if a fire starts in a room where someone is sleeping.

If a homeowner drives a nail through a wire in the wall, or if the insulation is torn by a staple during insulation, it may not immediately short, but may short sometime down the road. The risk of this is exceedingly small, and the cost is high- it's not cost justified- it's cheaper to replace the houses that burn down than to install all these AFCIs.

Who can put a price on a life, though? If this technology prevents 1 fatal fire over the next 50 years, does that justify the millions of dollars spend and numerous nuisance trips of AFCIs? The 2002 code was restricted, and still didn't eliminate the risk as it only applied to outlets, and not all the other cables passing through the walls, or cables on the stairs or other exit routes, etc.

I doubt AFCI will save the # of lives GFCI does, but it will undoubtedly save some.

Steve,
While a lot of deaths occured in the bedroom, many of these were from fires that had a point of origin outside of the bedroom.

As near as I can tell, the text in 210.12(B] does not require 120V kitchen, bathroom, garage and unfinished basement circuits to have AFCI protection.
Anyone know if this is correct?
Why is it these locations were not specifically mentioned in this article.