[RE-wrenches] How do we wrenches provide pertinent advice? (was120% rule applying to conductors)

William Miller william at millersolar.com
Sun Sep 30 13:15:21 PDT 2012


Friends:

It is my understanding that local AHJs can implement more stringent code 
requirements and can interpret ambiguous citations, but they can not waive 
specific code requirements without special permission. (NEC 90.4).  I don't 
know what is required to obtain "special permission," but I do doubt the 
wisdom of local official attempting to rewrite the NEC.

The original question was a request for help interpreting a code 
section.  While it is unfortunate that the NEC is not perfect, we are bound 
by it's provisions and need to understand the difference between analyzing 
the NEC and adhering to it.  I hope we have not further confused the 
questioner by side tracking to discussions of wishful thinking that we can 
convince a building official to ignore sections of the NEC that we disagree 
with.

There are forums to express opinions on the validity of code sections and 
to propose language, the Solar ABCs being one option 
(http://www.solarabcs.org/).

Respectfully,

William Miller

PS:  No one commented on the idea I presented of down-sizing the feeder 
breaker.  This idea requires analysis of the loads to prove viability, of 
course, but is likely much less expensive than pulling bigger wire.

wm



At 06:25 AM 9/29/2012, you wrote:
>Most of the inspectors I've dealt with are at least somewhat reasonable. A 
>few are fundamentalists for their own interpretations.  I'd at least show 
>the inspector the email with Bill Brook's statement and discuss the logic 
>of the situation.  It is obvious that the intent was to protect a wire 
>that was double fed and could overload. The AHJ has the responsibility for 
>interpretation of the code, so can allow what s/he sees fit.




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