ECN Forum Forums Code Related Discussion NEC & other Code issues Has the NEC lost focus?

We used to be able to run romex a bit closer to the edge of the studs, remember? Sort of parallel method. Then stackers got invented. Then the code got changed. I lost faith way back then. How about when smurf tube got invented. Seems like it got accepted pretty darn quick. Carlon must have hosted some really good parties.

Actually it didn't get in the code the first time that it was proposed...it had to wait to the next code cycle, and there was litagation that lasted for years and reached the Supreme Court. It seems that the steel conduit people paid for a number of their people to join the NFPA, go the May meeting where the code is voted on and vote that Article out of the code. One of the changes made after that was a 6 month delay between joining the NFPA and being able to vote at meetings.
Don

As far as I am concerned the stackers made wiring less safe here. The old standard was, if the wall wasn't thick enough to get 1.25" back (like 3/4" furring on a block wall) you used EMT sleeves. Now, with the stacker, I can just put that 1.25" to the side of the furring and be "hold your nose" legal. Of course that homeowner trying to "find the stud" with a nail has about as good a chance of hitting Romex as the furring.

Bubble covers are just a solution looking for a problem. They certainly do not keep the water out but they do provide excellent housing for paper wasps.

I actually like Smurf tube if you understand it's limitations. Carlon hypes it as the wiring method of the 21st century, good for everything, which it isn't but it is a good upgrade from Romex and it is great for low voltage.

A few represenatives from my company whent to Mike Holt's 2005 and 20008 code seminar.

He stated in 2008 all 15 circuits in a dwelling will be required to be ACFI protected. - ?Proposed?

This is what came from the comments phase (from the NEMA report)

(B) Dwelling Units. All 120-volt, single phase, 15- and 20-ampere branch circuits supplying outlets installed in dwelling unit family rooms, dining rooms, living rooms, parlors, libraries, dens, bedrooms, sun rooms, recreation rooms, closets, hallways, or similar rooms or areas shall be protected by a listed arc-fault circuit interrupter, combination type installed to provide protection of the branch circuit.
The vote on this comment was 7-3-1. IBEW, IAEI and IEC voted negative because they believe the expansion should have been to all circuits.

Remember when a neutral was a neutral?

To beat this dead horse one more time--it is not necessarily the frequency of the code updates that becomes so burdensome, but the sheer complexity of the code and the number of code changes which happen every three years.
Most electricians are not lawyers thank God, so trying to understand this very complicated document becomes almost impossible without many hours of study every year. So most of us I suspect learn to look up what we need to do a respectable and safe job.
Meanwhile, there are many in the business of teaching the code changes every three years. And where would NFPA be without all the income from the NEC and all the other literature they sell. Talk about built in motivation to do frequent and complicated code changes. For the same reason we will likely never see a flat federal income tax, because many people would have to close down either their tax prep or software businesses with the loss of many jobs. Turbo tax no longer works with Windows 98, so Microsoft even benefits from that. It just goes on and on like me. You can shoot me off of the pedestal any time you like!

As I have said before do engineering to do what you want. (I even am willing to allow licensed electrictians to do engineering.)

Despite claims that it is not the NEC is a design manual. For the most part a pretty poor one.

The US Military has issued a number of excellent design documents that augment the NEC for government facilities (but also largely apply to any commercial building) and are free on the internet. I keep a copy of a dozen different mil-handbooks on my desk right beside my NEC:
http://65.204.17.188//report/doc_ufc.html

Steve,
I never got a chance to thank you for those links...so, Thank You. They are interesting reading.

It seems some of the links on the page you linded to don't work. i.e. Arctic and Sub arctic design guide. Any clues on where to find those?

Thanks
Mike