Hi: Do you electrical contractors in the USA ever use gasketed electrical boxes in house wiring. We have to use either them, or plastic vapour barriers around any boxes in outside walls and ceilings to ensure a continuous vapour barried in the house. If so, who makes the gasketed ones you use. Also, i was looking at some of the US Boxes, and could not see a ground bar in them. Do you have to tie your grounds to the box (Yes, Even the plastic ones here have a metal strip that we have to ground, and it goes to the screw hole where the device is mounted in. The reason i am asking is because these boxes (Single gang) cost about $3.25 each at our wholesalers, and i was wondering if i can find them any cheaper elsewhere.

There are plenumn boxes, wips, etc. at Garvin: http://www.electrical-supply.net/index.asp

I don't think that's what you want?

Tom

Yes, but it's achieved by simply connecting one of the grounding conductors to a screw in the back of the box.

The US solution: say hello to Mr. Wirenut.

I have used the Union Box line from Thomas and Betts.
Page 5 at: http://www.tnb.com/contractor/docs/union.pdf

Les- If we use an all plastic box for holding a device such as a switch or receptacle the box is not bonded. We must splice all the grounding conductors together and then pigtail for a termination on the device. Multi gang boxes require multiple pigtails or 1 long one that hits all the devices.
We don't use gasketed boxes much but I have seen them. We add a gasket between the trim plate and wall or ceiling, but they are so easy to remove and throw away afterward I consider them worse than useless.

Florida may be changing the plastic box situation. They have an emergency amendment to require bonding steel framing members and that will probably mean some type of bonding box. Of course metal will work but metal boxes are rare here. I guess contractors will have to decide what the best way is to accomplish this. I think a metal box here and there will do it (one per each isolated wall segment)

[This message has been edited by distributor x (edited 05-03-2006).]

Hi Distributor x...
You wrote: There are cheaper boxes coming into canada now from China, however there is a noticeable difference in quality when compared to Iberville or Temco
Hell, there is a huge difference in quality between Temco (Hubbell) and Iberville (Nu-tek) but you still sell them both?

Would i pocket the money or pass on savings to customers and erode the market???
Hello!!! Of Course i will try and save the customer money...you call it "erode the market" AND yes, i will also pocket the money as well! It's called Contracting.

Your Good Contractors tell you to raise your prices? I have spent a lot of hours at suppliers and NEVER heard anything like that, but i often hear contractors asking for better prices. Maybe your business would boom by raising them even higher? (Or are you trying to "Erode the market" by selling them so cheap to begin with?.

As for CSA or ULC, as soon as i find a Manufacturer that can make them cheaper, i will see if they have or will get CSA or any of the other 7 accepted approvals. If they already have "UL" approval, it is quite easy to have it tested for ULC.

distributor x I was wondering if you know what brand the cheaper import boxes are. I am asking this so I can avoid buying these things. #1 if they are plasticx I have a feeling that these would be a nightmare to use in winter temperatures.

"I have a feeling that these would be a nightmare to use in winter temperatures."

We just had a cold snap here, it got down to a whopping fridgid 45 F, (that's cold for here!) and had boxes blowing out the whole back. Really I can't imagine working anywhere colder....

So, an investigation into the recent death was conclusive? Is there a link to the findings?

Or is this a knee-jerk reaction...?

They are sure the steel framing was energized by a drywall screw strike and I hear this is the body they needed to require some kind of bonding in these steel studs.
They are using "EGC of circuit likely to energize" instead of 250.104(C) that refers to a 250.66 sized jumper.
That means a metal box or a plastic box with bonding strap will work.

[This message has been edited by gfretwell (edited 03-06-2006).]

So then, you're forced to have house panel loads bonded to the studs when they pass through a unit? How is this accomplished?

Not trying to be difficult, just curious how this is being executed.

Since most of these walls connect together in a matrix, you could accomplish effective bonding with a couple steel boxes. The only thing you really have to watch is small isolated sections of wall but 210.52 will usually require a receptacle in each of these small wall segments anyway.
In commercial, where metal enclosed wiring methods are SOP bonding steel framing has not really been an issue. It really came up in residential with all plastic plumbing and electric.
The exposure is in metal medicine cabinets and non-electrical enclosures that are screwed to the steel studs.

well lets get back on topic
I once wired a whole house w/ boxes that had a flange around the edge w/ a foam gasket attached to it. and they attached the vapor barrier to that gasket. the homeowner also put in a special fan to reclaim the air in the house[can't remember the right term]
that was 10 years ago went back last year the house was full of mold they were arlington boxes

The "fan" is a heat recovery ventlator. It basically circulates the air inside to out, transferring heat from the outgoing air to the incoming air (and supposedly the other way in the other season), since the house is near perfectly sealed, and natural "leakage" does not exist.

I heard of gasketed boxes being used with foil backed drywall.