AFCI Fuse - is so annoying - Page 2

>From the consumer products safety commission:

> My house which is 1.5 years old has been having problem with the Siemens
> AFCI Fuse. According to the builder, this fuse is installed on 2nd floor
> for bedrooms for some reasons. The AFCI part of the fuse always get tripped
> after power interruption by local hydro company. I had to manually went to
> basement to reset it.
> This AFCI is so stupid and annoying. It has been raining these days these
> days and it almost got tripped once a week! Never had any problem usually in
> sunny days because there is no power interruption.
> 1. Is it possible to replace it with the regular Fuse? I am really sick of
> this. Will that violate the electrical code??
> 2. This is so annoying that I even tried to unplug computers, light fixture
> but didn't help, still got same problem. Any other suggestions?
> 3. Should get another AFCI Fuse? maybe the one I have is defected??
>
> Help....

>arcing (short to ground)
>sorry, that's not what AFCI is for; that's just the first thing that
>came to mind when I though ARC. My bad!
>Short-to-ground is protected by a regular breaker. You'll get nice fat
>spark if you do this, but you don't need AFCI to detect it.
>AFCI tries to detect all the other types of arc that don't trip an
>overcurrent breaker.
>They accomplishing this by watching the waveform and figuring out what
>a bad arc looks like.
>They actually have an algorithm (computer program) to detect this.
>Again, from the consumer products safety commission:
>http://www.cpsc.gov/volstd/afci/AFCIFireTechnology.pdf
>Again, sorry for the sloppy (wrong) definition of arc earlier!

> My house (which is just about 1 year old; moved in August 2004) had
> AFCIs.
>
> Tons of nuisance trips, especially when powering off an inductive load
> (ceiling fan). Code requires them for all the bedrooms.
>
> I talked to the Siemens rep at a trade show (I do industrial electrical
> controls). He hemmed & hawed & suggested I take it back for a new one.
>
> I talked to some electricians (house wiring folks; not plant (factory)
> electricians), and the general consensus is that they're worthless due
> to nuisance trips.
>
> They've been required in receptacles since Jan1, 2002. They're
> required in bedrooms only, and they're intended to protect against
> fires started by arcing (short to ground).
>
> Some background on why and when these are required:
>>From the consumer products safety commission:
> http://www.cpsc.gov/LIBRARY/FOIA/FOIA03/os/ecafci.pdf
>
> And, from underwriters laboratories:
> http://www.ul.com/regulators/ode/0504.pdf
>
> I suggest you look into the risks and make an informed decision for
> yourself.
>
> Personally, I believe that in my house, my decision supersedes code
> requirements. It's my house, dammit. I reviewed the risks, and
> evaluated the nuisance costs to my wife and myself, and then removed
> them and installed regular breakers.
>>My house which is 1.5 years old has been having problem with the Siemens
>>AFCI Fuse. According to the builder, this fuse is installed on 2nd floor
>>for bedrooms for some reasons. The AFCI part of the fuse always get tripped
>>after power interruption by local hydro company. I had to manually went to
>>basement to reset it.
>>This AFCI is so stupid and annoying. It has been raining these days these
>>days and it almost got tripped once a week! Never had any problem usually in
>>sunny days because there is no power interruption.
>>1. Is it possible to replace it with the regular Fuse? I am really sick of
>>this. Will that violate the electrical code??
>>2. This is so annoying that I even tried to unplug computers, light fixture
>>but didn't help, still got same problem. Any other suggestions?
>>3. Should get another AFCI Fuse? maybe the one I have is defected??
>>Help....