I was doing a rough wall inspection today when the electrician approached me with a question. The job I am inspecting is planning to use those cheesy temporary light strings (the ones with SO cord and yellow lampholders with a plastic cage) for their permanent lighting!!! He says that the other stores of this type have used them and had no problem. I asked him to present me a cut-sheet on them so that I could look it over. I realize that cord cannot be used to replace a wiring method (which I think is the case). Any thoughts on this? Thanks in advance for your replies.
I have seen this type of lighting in Macaroni Grill restaurants. I came to the conclusion that they must have been low voltage lights due to the 2 wire system that I saw. Will they actually be 120 volt stringers??
Any of these sets I have worked with are labeled as "Temporary Light String".
I would think 110.3(B) would prevent the use of these for permanent lighting.
Bob, as always thanks for your reply. He stated that they are listed. My response was exactly what you said, a U.L. stamp doesn't mean you can do what ever you want with them! He claims they are some sort of special cord that is approved for this, that and the other. I am quite anxious to see what the cut-sheet says about them. I highly doubt I'll approve them.
Here is what the UL White Book has to say about Temp Light Strings.
TEMPORARY LIGHTING STRINGS
(XBRT)
This listing covers temporary lighting strings which are rated 20 amps,125 volts, intended for use indoors and outdoors to provide temporary illumination in accordance with Article 527 of the National Electrical Code.
Temporary lighting strings consist of a factory assembly of flexible cord, cable or insulated open conductors incorporating a series of Edison base lampholders provided with lamp guards. The flexible cord may be terminated at one end with an attachment plug, for connection to the source of
supply, and with a cord connector at the opposite end. If an attachment plug is not provided, the temporary lighting string is provided with instructions for proper connection to the source of supply.
I was just working with some of these and the UL tag that said TEMPORARY LIGHTING STRING was on the cable itself, make sure the contractor does not rip these off before you see them.
Good Luck, Bob
ask him/her for a letter from the manufacture stating that this is ok for this
type of installation making sure it is in english. GEO
I'd wait to see specs. I can certainly beleive that there might be a product like this for permanent installation.
I should get the spec's on it next week. I'll keep you guy's informed.
This kind of thread is one of the reasons I visit regularly. Ryan I look forward to see what you find.
Pierre
This poses an interesting question. I have visited a number of restarants that use there rustic light fixtures that looks like it consists of homemade materials. One in particular is an upside down metal pail with what looks like a wire guard from a HID fixture. The lamp socket is attached to a fabricated box afixed to the bottom of the pail and suspended from a down rod. I saw no listing labels. How can this be? Are there exceptions that can be argued with the AHJ when these restarants are built?
Blessings, Mark
It is not unusual for us to get jobs that require custom fixtures.
One that I can think of required wall sconces and pendent fixtures that where made of tea cups, in the style of Alice in Wonderland.
I do not know where the shop gets things like this made, but they are able to get custom listed fixtures.
One-off fixture labeling is somewhat like labeling available to electric-sign builders, and subject to periodic unannounced inspections and record keeping for assembled products.
Ryan, is the string going to be home-made or is it a factory-made string?
I've seen these strings as home-made kludges also.
The cheesiest one -- usually done by amusement parks, carnivals and restaurants (usually those places with out-door dining areas) and holiday lighting is the following:
You take two lengths of THHN, THWN or TFFN or whatever (dunno if stranded or solid) and place them parallel. I'm sure some people probably use zip cord because it's so much cheaper.
Then you get these "attach-on" (or signboard) lampholders that use insulation piercing contacts to punch through the inslation after you twist a locking mechanism on top. These are placed so the lampholder is across the two wires (like a ladder).
The entire string then gets spliced into the mains. Festoon lighting I believe it's called.
The NYC Transit Authority uses mostly home-made lighting strings that consist of heavy duty jacketed cable to which are spliced these pigtail lampholders (usually in pairs) and 5" lengths of cord with molded-on convenience receptacles -- picture the female end that's been chopped off an extension cord.
The splices are covered with lots and lots of electrician's tape.
Plastic yellow cages are then attached to the rubber lampholders (these things frequently pop off anyway or get stolen).
In recent years, I've noticed there's a move in some places to use these pre-fab strings.
The Transit Authority also uses some of them.
You can tell because the lampholders are molded on to the service cable -- they also come with plastic bulb cages.
[This message has been edited by SvenNYC (edited 08-26-2003).]
Sven: I have not seen them yet, but from what I understand they will be a listed product. I spoke with the electrician today and he says he is still working on finding one I will accept. He says he has seen cut-sheets on several they have proposed but knew that I would turn them down.
I was in a Italian food place yesterday that uses festoon type lighting (2 parallel conductors and clamp-on sockets). These were clearly low voltage because I could see a step down transformer near the end of each string. I was able to get to a place where I could read one of the bulbs. 12V. from the R V supplier.
SvenNYC said:
You take two lengths of THHN, THWN or TFFN or whatever (dunno if stranded or solid) and place them parallel. I'm sure some people probably use zip cord because it's so much cheaper.
Joe Tedesco later told me via e-mail that you're suppsoed to use STRANDED, not solid, when making a festoon lighting string using insulation-piercing lampholders.
I made the decision today to not allow them. The electrician couldn't give me a listing, so I looked the manufacturer up on the web. Their page page pops up and advertises "temporary lighting".
I discussed this at our IAEI board meeting today, and the consesus was to not allow them.
Thanks for the update Ryan, how did the EC take the news?
Bob
The EC took the news fine, but the owner didn't
I've been playing phone tag with the owner yesterday and today so we'll see what happens.
Ryan:
You may want to suggest Article 411 for the LV type of lighting now popular around the country. I have seen it installed in some fine restaurant's and lounge areas.
Of course now this has me wondering if what the owner will do after all is inspected and passed -- he goes over to a couple of his stockboys and says "go hang this up!"
I know of at least one manufacturer who makes a listed lamp string. This is listed under decorative luminare and is limited to 25W per foot, is custom made to your specs and has moulded on lampholders. It is rated up to 16A per string at up to 250VAC. I don't remember the manufacturer offhand, but I did see this type at Macaroni Grill last night. It is an all black lampholder with a 2 wire heavy duty 12AWG zipcord with no cage on the individual lamps. I'll try to find this string again.
I wired up a forge once, who's owner, among other items, made lamps.
he asked about 'listing', so i forwarded info on OSHA's 17 accepted labs
it was, to my knowledge on the sidelines, simply a matter of skipping along through them until one lab passed his work
said lamps now have a sticker, are mettalic, and would probably be viewed as a potential hazard (no 90 deg warning is visible either btw)
the sticker, naturally, absolves anyone from liability.
Fixtures, imo, are a great example of the growing chasm bettween Liability and Safety ...
Check out Tokistar Exhibitor series...
http://www.tokistar.com/ They make an indoor / outdoor stringlight that is ETL listed. It is a 12/24v string and they make a mounting base for messenger cables.
I thought this thread was dead, but the other day I made an interesting discovery.
I finaled this building about six weeks ago, and they did not install the lights. It was made perfectly clear to the owner that I could not permit their installaion. They stated that they understood and would not install them. Everything was fine.
The other day I went there do a business license inspection, and guess what? About 1,000 feet of this temporary lighting junk was installed. The owner installed it, and in a very non-compliant manner, I might add. I told him he is to have a licensed electrician remove it, and to be expecting a visit from the state department of professional licensing. He will be getting cited and fined for doing electrical work without a permit.
Go get em Ryan.
Don't take any grief.
I imagine you will check up on this again.
Bob
AAARGH...CHOMP...RIP...CHOMP...REND...RUFF...AARGH...TEAR...
(Sounds like somebody's gonna need a new seat in their pants!)
Go gettum, boy!
Interesting. If someone plugs a fixture into a receptacle is he "doing electrical work"?
I recently installed 54 custom fixtures constructed by a local metal fabricator. He has a license to certify fixture as meeting UL requirements. I thought they would fail inspection but the AHJ didn't even look at them to see if they had a UL sticker.
UL does not license anyone to make listed products. He may have a contact from UL that will inspect and then list the product he makes, but UL would not permit him to list his own fixtures.
Pierre
Pierre I do not know the specifics but we have custom fixtures made and the shop that makes them UL lists them.
Bjarney from above
One-off fixture labeling is somewhat like labeling available to electric-sign builders, and subject to periodic unannounced inspections and record keeping for assembled products.
Maybe Bjarney can elborate on this.
I'm not certain that luminaires are required to be listed.
If they are listed, then 110.3(B) applies, of course.
iwire — The intent of such a program is to be in lieu of a UL inspector examining and labeling each individual product that leaves the factory. UL Standard 1950 or 1958 would likely apply.
[This message has been edited by Bjarney (edited 01-12-2004).]
The saga continues...
I met today with state department of professional licensing and the owner, on site. The owner has recieved a class "A" misdemeanor and $1,000 fine. Jail time will be dependant upon how quickly the issue gets resolved.
EDIT: I took some pictures of the installation, but since they are pictures of energized lights they didn't turn out very well. I will try to touch them up and post them, if I can get any good ones.
[This message has been edited by Ryan_J (edited 01-15-2004).]
Well guys...this is the best I could do as far as editing goes. This picture does no justice to the installation though. This is just a small section of the store, they actually had about 1,000 feet of this stuff strung out.
Bill: If you want to try editing the pic, be my guest, I couldn't get it much better than this.
Oh that is just beautiful, how much do they charge to eat at a construction site?
That looks like where I have "brown bagged" it many times, I did not know it was chic.
Do they have somebody cutting metal studs with a chop saw to complete the ambiance?
Ryan take out the temps, do they have lighting?
What lights where in place when you did the electrical final?
How are these tied in?
Bob: The lights that were in at the final were just the lamps that are displayed. They have about 75% of the exterior wall that is glass, and they have provided emergancy lighting. With that in mind, I had to pass it.
How were they tied in? I'm glad you asked. I'll post a picture of that tonight. Basically, they were tied into a four square box via romex connector and no strain relief!
This is the way they were connected, Bob:
This was the only one that was in an area that I could get a picture. Many of them had extension rings, missing covers or much more strain on the cord. Also, there weren't very many connection...makes me wonder about how many Watts are on the circuit (continuos load) and also about voltage drop.
Ryan: i been wondering why the owner dont want to spend $$ for using the HID's or HO's strip lumaires ??? i work in my area and all the open celeing that are plan to be "warehouse" style must have hid or flurosecent lumiares allready mounted instead of those whippy [BEEP] tempory lumaires [ i deleted one word you can add this if you want to ] therefore how much more the owner getting a idea to get around the inspection that is a bunch of bull... the owner will dealt with not only the electral inspectors as other inspectors as well as needed ..
merci, marc
What if he used plugs and recepticles on those
lights? Instead of hard wiring it? Would that make it more acceptable or is it still bad as it would be obviously not easily taken away?
Hi, Ryan!
Yes it's terrible, and I'm with you all the way.
My ? is:
If they were to leave these in place for 89 days, then unplug them, rehang them,
and plug them back in in 15 minutes, what would you think?
[This message has been edited by electure (edited 01-18-2004).]
Ryan:
I have one of the MG chain rest. in my area. I'll have to stop in & see what they have for lighting......
It's been around for a while, I'll see if I can get any info.
People around here think that a $250-$500 fine is steep....go get'm.
John
Is that a Romex clamp holding the cord?
Temporary lighting requires a permit, every time it is installed. I don't think Ryan will issue a temporary lighting permit for this place!
I have numerous customers who have moved into private residences here with only pigtails for lighting...
one actually hung xmas lights around his indoor pool , and his kids hang thier towels off of it...
as we have NO occupancy permits here (save for some isolated pockets via municipality), i can only advise against this practice...
~S~