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Posted By: Admin Landlord Installed Baseboard Heater - 04/10/09 03:14 AM
Quote
One of the Code Enforcement officers took this picture in an apartment. The landlord had installed the electric heat.

Alan Nadon


[Linked Image from electrical-photos.com]
Posted By: Trumpy Re: Landlord Installed Baseboard Heater - 04/10/09 04:23 AM
Umm, no, just no. frown

That heater should have been installed to one side of the recept for a start.
I really "like" the idea of that cord running over the top of the heater, where, umm, all the HEAT comes out.

Electric work is so simple isn't it?

Is it a requirement in the US to use high-temperature flexible cord into a heating appliance?

Don't think that Romex is going to fly somehow.
Posted By: EV607797 Re: Landlord Installed Baseboard Heater - 04/10/09 04:36 PM
No, Mike. High temp flexible cord would not be required in this instance. This installation is just wrong, period.
Posted By: noderaser Re: Landlord Installed Baseboard Heater - 04/11/09 06:57 AM
Romex is fine, but it generally has to be in the wall...
Posted By: renosteinke Re: Landlord Installed Baseboard Heater - 04/11/09 06:08 PM
This instal brings up an issue that I often have with lighting installs: how do YOU do it?

I often see a tail of wire just poking through a hole, into the back of the appliance.

While I like the idea of a box in the wall, there are the challenges of placing that box exactly where it needs to meet the appliance, as well as attaching the appliance to the box.

Otherwise ... as for this particular picture ...
I have such a heater, that came factory equipped with a cord and plug. Certainly preferable to having the cable work its' way through a hole next to the box!

Our code - as ridiculously specific as it can sometimes be - relies upon the clearance requirements that are part of the product listing to ban receptacles over such units. I've posted pictures here of installations where there were receptacles in the block walls about a foot above the heaters - while not a good situation, one would have a hard time documenting a violation.

This is certainly an interesting oversight; the code seems to assume that no one would be so silly as to place a receptacle above a heater at all, and allows for receptacles to be built into the heaters themselves.

Relevant code sections are 210.52 and 424.
Posted By: Bigplanz Re: Landlord Installed Baseboard Heater - 04/12/09 02:47 AM
I suppose this would apply insofar as the lovely wire coming straight out of the wall into the heater arrangement.

424.10 Special Permission. Fixed electric space-heating
equipment and systems installed by methods other than
covered by this article shall be permitted only by special
permission.

No specific prohibition for having an outlet directly over a space heater, I suppose, except for the common sense "What on Earth are you thinking?" prohibition.
Posted By: Jim M Re: Landlord Installed Baseboard Heater - 04/14/09 07:39 PM
I can't find it right now but there used to be a prohibition about receptacles over electric baseboard heaters. Really don't think it would have been deleted.
Posted By: Bigplanz Re: Landlord Installed Baseboard Heater - 04/14/09 10:59 PM
210.52 had this entry in the online 'draft' of the NEC 2008:

"Permanently installed electric baseboard heaters equipped with factory-installed receptacle outlets or outlets provided as a separate assembly by the manufacturer shall be permitted as the required outlet or outlets for the wall space utilized by such permanently installed heaters. Such receptacle outlets shall not be connected to the heater circuits.
FPN: Listed baseboard heaters include instructions that may not permit their installation below receptacle outlets."

I am not sure what 'FPN' means, but I assume it is a footnote of some kind.
Posted By: Jim M Re: Landlord Installed Baseboard Heater - 04/15/09 12:43 AM
FPN = fine print note.
Posted By: Bigplanz Re: Landlord Installed Baseboard Heater - 04/15/09 01:38 AM
Originally Posted by Jim M
FPN = fine print note.


Ah! Thanks.
Posted By: mikesh Re: Landlord Installed Baseboard Heater - 04/17/09 07:00 PM
If the owner provides mechanical protection for the romex it Could pass inspection. But it is a bad location for the heater and a bad way to wire the heater. A little more drilling and fishing and the feed could have been installed inside the wall and poked out behind the heater Connection box. That also would provide the mechanical protection necessary for the cable.
Code is a minimum standard I hope we all exceed.
Posted By: crselectric Re: Landlord Installed Baseboard Heater - 04/18/09 06:49 AM
what about white socks before labor day? seems that if they could get romex in the box side why couldn't they get it behind the unit and enter the ko in the back, maybe it was a masonry wall.
Posted By: crselectric Re: Landlord Installed Baseboard Heater - 04/18/09 06:52 AM
sorry didnt see previous post, chris
Posted By: Texas_Ranger Re: Landlord Installed Baseboard Heater - 04/19/09 08:24 PM
The landlord isn't by any chance first generation immigrant from Europe?
'Cuz in pretty much any European country I know this would fly after adding a few staples for proper support of the NM cable.
Posted By: mxslick Re: Landlord Installed Baseboard Heater - 04/21/09 10:22 PM
I'm willing to bet that the heater is fed from the same circuit serving the receptacle, and that is poorly pigtailed onto the existing wiring. smile
Posted By: nrp3 Re: Landlord Installed Baseboard Heater - 05/02/09 05:08 PM
Not sure whether this was discussed previously, but I have a customer (property management company) that has apartments built in the late 70's. They have probably have a hundred or so units with electric baseboard heat with outlets above the heater. Must have been ok then, but what about replacement heaters? I change half a dozen or so a year. Should I start getting the inserts for the receptacles?
Posted By: Bigplanz Re: Landlord Installed Baseboard Heater - 05/03/09 06:34 AM
Originally Posted by nrp3
Should I start getting the inserts for the receptacles?


Why not just take the receptacles out entirely, wirenut together the hots, neutrals and grounds and then put a blank faceplate on it?
Posted By: nrp3 Re: Landlord Installed Baseboard Heater - 05/03/09 01:52 PM
The problem is in how much work it is,ie, where the outlet is in relation to where I can install the receptacle in the baseboard. If it is close to one of the locations, then the fishing is easy, otherwise we are into drywall surgery. I'd cover up the plug once a new one was in the baseboard. I suppose I could just take it out, but then lose one of an already too few plugs.
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