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The Corrections

Dec. 16, 2015
Four electrical inspectors from across the country discuss the most common Code violations — and how to avoid them.  

For Scott Chisholm, Code enforcement often comes down to finding a balance between form and function. Chisholm has been an electrical inspector for the town of Needham, Mass., for nearly 10 years, and, in that time, he’s watched one single-family home after another get bulldozed and replaced with a gleaming McMansion. “This town has done about 100 teardowns a year since 1999 or 2000,” he says. “And almost all of them provide challenges between what I call the design team and the National Electrical Code.”

Something is missing on this kitchen island. Can you identify what it is? (ppa5/Thinkstock)

Among the violations he frequently sees, many concern Sec. 210.52 on Dwelling Unit Receptacle Outlets, particularly in kitchens. As 210.52(C)(2) stipulates, an island countertop space that’s at least 2 feet by 1 foot must have at least one receptacle to reduce the use of extension cords. But oftentimes, he’ll walk into a space and find those island outlets missing (Photo). “Usually these kitchens have very beautiful cabinetry, so no one wants to cut into or damage it,” he says. “The architect or interior decorator +isn’t thinking through the Code. They’re only thinking about what’s aesthetically pleasing.”

That’s also the case in the bathrooms and walk-in closets of these opulent homes with high-end finishes. Plans will call for chandeliers or pendant lights above the bathtub, a clear violation of Sec. 410.10(D): “No parts of cord-connected luminaires, chain-, cable-, or cord-suspended luminaires, lighting track, pendants, or ceiling-suspended fans should be located within a zone measured 3 feet horizontally and 8 feet vertically from the top of the bathtub rim or shower stall threshold.”

It’s a logical requirement. Who wants a corded light breaking loose and falling into the tub while it’s in use? But logic doesn’t always apply to design. “Maybe they have this Victorian motif throughout the house, so therefore they want to have these funky fixtures that match the rest of the house,” Chisholm says. “Well, they’re not going to be able to put them in that space.”

“Space” is the operative word when it comes to overhead services. More often than not, the houses Chisholm reviews have at least one side that’s dominated by windows. And strangely enough — whether it’s a matter of poor planning or lack of communication among the trades — that side also happens to be where electrical contractors are expected to bring power to the house. But in those cases, Sec. 230.9(A) of the NEC complicates things considerably: “Service conductors installed as open conductors or multiconductor cable without an overall outer jacket shall have a clearance of not less than 3 feet from windows that are designed to be opened ….” When that happens, the mistake can lead to higher costs for the customer because the electrical panel will most likely have to be relocated to another side of the house. “They ran all of their wires and home runs to one location, but now they’ll have to move it somewhere else,” Chisholm says. “So a service that could cost $3,000 is now going to run the customer $4,000.”

It should go without saying, but the key to avoiding most of these mistakes is communication. “Electrical work isn’t clearly understood by people who don’t work in the industry,” Chisholm points out. “The homeowner and design team — they look at a magazine and get ideas, but they have no idea what it takes to get that look. So it’s on the electrician to get in front of these issues early on in the process.”

Licensed to fail

Rick Hollander is an electrical specialist for the city of Tucson, Ariz., a job he’s held in one form or fashion since early 2000. He sits on the NEC’s Code Making Panel No. 18, and has served as an expert witness. Hollander points to one explanation for many of the violations he sees in his jurisdiction: “We’re a state that doesn’t have licensing,” he explains. “If licenses were required, training would be required, and more of these people would be educated in a lot of this stuff.”

What does he see? Overloaded boxes, raceways run across roofs that haven’t been derated for Arizona’s high heat, and a failure to follow local codes that may be amendments to the NEC. But one that stands out — particularly for its impact on the day-to-day use of a system — is the improper labeling of breakers in a panel. As Sec. 408.4 of the NEC points out, “Every circuit and circuit modification shall be legibly identified as to its clear, evident, and specific use.”

But too often, Hollander says, installing electricians will rely on abbreviations a homeowner may not be able to decipher. “Let’s say somebody has a problem in the middle of the day, and they send their daughter out to the electric panel,” he explains. “She’s trying to figure it out. She’s on the phone with Mom, who doesn’t understand either. And with all of these abbreviations and lack of labeling, she can’t turn off or turn back on a circuit because it’s a hazard.”

If he could offer one piece of advice to electricians — and he does, whenever he can — what would it be? “Education isn’t a bad thing. It’s an investment in your career and your future.”

Trouble in tech central

“How can electricians avoid these mistakes? The answer is going to be the same one every time: It’s just training and knowledge.”

That’s Rhonda Parkhurst’s recommendation. She’s been with the city of Palo Alto, Calif. — home to Silicon Valley and tech heavyweights like Google and Facebook — since 2004. After beginning as a combination building and electrical inspector, she went on to be an electrical specialist in 2006. She reviews work on “an array of scenarios,” from brand new commercial buildings to new single-family construction. “So we can be working with equipment that’s 50 or 60 years old or just recently put in,” says Parkhurst, who explains the violations and problems she encounters are just as varied.

The first category, she’ll admit, isn’t black and white. “There are some areas in the Code that are gray,” Parkhurst says. “If you’re not taking classes, or you don’t have people you can ask, parts of it can be confusing.”

In particular, in existing electrical systems, she’ll find new subpanels from one manufacturer installed close to a main service from another. In most cases, they won’t be series rated, which isn’t a Code requirement but is mandated by manufacturers. “Let’s say we have 65kA available at the main service, and the subpanel is 200 feet away,” she says. “We probably have 10kA that’s 200 feet away. So the 10,000A-rated breakers in the new subpanel are fine. But if they don’t have that distance — and they don’t have that drop — that new subpanel they just installed has to have a main breaker rated at the available fault current.”

Even though you won’t find rules specific to that situation in the NEC, it’s still something that will get your installation rejected. In other words, some mistakes aren’t attributable to laziness. Others, though, are — like putting breakers from one manufacturer in a subpanel from another. “If you look on the inside of the cover, it’ll tell you, ‘Here are the suitable branch circuit breakers that you can put in this panel,’” says Parkhurst, who compares this situation to trying to repair a Ford with Chevy parts. “It may fit, and it may work for a while, but it’s not something you want to do.”

Like Scott Chisholm of Needham, Mass., she finds that receptacles and where they’re located always seem to be an issue. But ironically — and maybe even a little humorously — it’s not always the installing electrician’s fault. Although Sec. 210.52(A)(2) stipulates that any 2-foot unbroken space along the floor by doorways must have a receptacle, she’ll walk into new residential construction and find 2- or 3-foot spaces between an entry door and a closet door lacking one. But once she’s done a little more investigating, she’ll find that the box was there — it’s just been covered up by drywall. “I’d say that’s the case 50% of the time.”

That’s only a few of the problems she finds, of course, but she’s also quick to point out that inspectors shoulder some of the blame. Because while she tries to be thorough in her inspections, not everyone in her position is — and that can lead to mixed messaging. That doesn’t mean she’s willing to let her fellow inspectors slide. “We’re very fortunate that every Code cycle the NFPA puts on training for all of the jurisdictions to go over the Code changes.” And, she adds, it’s free.

A never-ending cycle

Donny Cook started as an electrical inspector in Shelby County, Ala., in 1988 — which also happened to be the year Shelby County started doing building inspections. He’s writing many of the same corrections today as the chief inspector that he wrote nearly three decades ago. “The owner of a company has been doing this for 30 years, and he knows his stuff — partly from corrections that we wrote him a long time ago,” he says with a good-natured laugh. “But now he doesn’t have time to stop and teach the new guys.”

What makes the consistency of those violations interesting, though, is often the simplest things. “I do programs for the International Association of Electrical Inspectors and National Fire Protection Association, and all of the training focuses on the new and complicated stuff,” he says. “The Code gurus don’t want to focus on the basics because it’s not as exciting to them anymore.”

And when he says basic, he means it — for example, how to read equipment nameplates and consequently what size wires and breakers to use. “You think, ‘How complicated can that be?’” Cook says. “But I went through the IBEW apprenticeship program and was a contractor for 15 years before becoming an inspector, and I still run up on nameplates that I really have to think about.”

It’s not always a matter of knowing how to read nameplates, however. Sometimes installers just won’t read them. And it’s not necessarily because they don’t want to. Consider the situation when an engineer’s plans call for a particular brand of rooftop HVAC unit but a winning bid specifies a different one. A new manufacturer can result in a new wire size, but if the installer isn’t paying attention, he or she may miss the change. “Installers have a tendency to do their work based on the plans, not necessarily the equipment that’s actually selected,” Cook says. “Nobody’s trying to get away with anything. It’s just an issue of coordination.”

As it happens, many of the violations he encounters involve a failure to read the fine print. Following the manufacturer’s installation instructions is required by Sec. 110.3(B) of the NEC, and yet Cook says you’d be surprised how often installers throw them out and wing it. “A good example is low-voltage lighting in kitchens,” he says.

Small luminaires for under-cabinet applications — “hockey pucks,” as Cook calls them — require specific wire types and sizes, based on the number of lights used and the power supply. “But you’ll end up with what looks like extension cord-type wiring,” he says. “A lot of guys look at it and say, ‘Well, it’s low-voltage.’ But if you put enough hockey pucks on there, the power on the circuit can be pretty significant, and you can end up with a fire hazard.”

Unfortunately, the problem seems to be a cycle that contractors in his jurisdiction can’t seem to break out of: Experienced electricians end up working on complex jobs, leaving the newbies to easier work. But no one has taken the time to train them on the basics — like definitions in Art. 100. By the time they’ve been hit with enough corrections to get straightened out, they’re moving on to bigger, more involved work. And a new generation of journeymen is there to take their place, making the same mistakes all over again. “It’s unfortunate. We write these corrections over and over, day after day,” Cook says. “That said, it does make for good job security for inspectors.”

He’s joking, of course. There’ll always be a need for inspectors, but with more training and a little more attention to the details, maybe they won’t have to fail quite as many inspections.    

Halverson is a contributing writer based in Seattle. He can be reached at [email protected].

About the Author

Matthew Halverson

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