# Siemens AFCI/GFCI Breaker Woes



## macmikeman (Jan 23, 2007)

We will be hearing more an more of this makarky for as long as they keep putting gfi protection into afci circuit breakers. Probably the afci portion of the damn breaker is causing enough ''dirty power'' to trick the gfi into thinking there is a fault to ground. It's all ass backwards from the NEC to insist afci's stay in the code when they consistently do not work as the hype claims they do. Get em out of the NEC. And remember- macmikeman is always right about things.


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## backstay (Feb 3, 2011)

sparky80 said:


> So........customer calls last week and says lighting circuit keeps tripping. I go over and find that the fixture seems to have had a short in it from the factory. Installed a pigtail as a temporary light and all fixed. Got a call today saying all the kitchen circuits are tripping. So I went over to confirm. Sure enough they are tripping microwave, toaster, mixer. I brought my 1 7/8" hammer drill in and only managed to trip one. I checked all the connections and am out of ideas. I have used Siemens for years with minimal problems. The fridge is on it's own circuit and dual function breaker and has never tripped. Any suggestions or help is appreciated. The customer wants "regular breakers". What to do?


So what do the lights on the breaker tell you is happening? I have never had a problem with Siemens breakers. I use their dual functin, ArcFault and even their double pole ArcFault for the rest of the house. I also pigtail my connections, I don't use the receptacles as a splice.


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## macmikeman (Jan 23, 2007)

backstay said:


> So what do the lights on the breaker tell you is happening? I have never had a problem with Siemens breakers. I use their dual functin, ArcFault and even their double pole ArcFault for the rest of the house. I also pigtail my connections, I don't use the receptacles as a splice.



If using the receptacles to carry the circuit is a problem for afci's , it's time to put on masks and go out and beat people up in the shopping malls.


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## backstay (Feb 3, 2011)

macmikeman said:


> If using the receptacles to carry the circuit is a problem for afci's , it's time to put on masks and go out and beat people up in the shopping malls.


I think they already are doing that. 

I was referring to loose connections.


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## sparky80 (Aug 1, 2016)

I have never had a problem like this. I do typically splice at the receptacle, more than two wires in the box gets jumpers. Thinking about using GFCI breakers.


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## backstay (Feb 3, 2011)

sparky80 said:


> I have never had a problem like this. I do typically splice at the receptacle, more than two wires in the box gets jumpers. Thinking about using GFCI breakers.


You need to check the neutral. And call the poco, they need to check their end as well.


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## sparky80 (Aug 1, 2016)

Check the neutral? I was wondering if there could be a bad connection at the pole. There is a heavy load from a compressor in the garage.


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## frenchelectrican (Mar 15, 2007)

sparky80 said:


> Check the neutral? I was wondering if there could be a bad connection at the pole. There is a heavy load from a compressor in the garage.


That is a good possiblty it have weak connection at the POCO termation so check it carefully.

A straight 240 volt compressor will not affect the lights too much but 120 volt compressor .,, oh yuh it will some degrees depending on distance and the connection is.


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## macmikeman (Jan 23, 2007)

I've already described in great detail about my experience with afci's tripping constantly and then when I shook the service drop at the point of attachment (which was loose due to some painters freed it from the insulator so they could paint and not put it back) which loosened up the poco crimps. This proves that they read upstream arc's . What we haven't seen much evidence yet is how good they are at downstream arcing faults, at least of the non gfi related type of faults......


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## brian john (Mar 11, 2007)

At the risk of sounding like a D**K

Have you tried megging the circuit?


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## frenchelectrican (Mar 15, 2007)

brian john said:


> At the risk of sounding like a D**K
> 
> Have you tried megging the circuit?


I would done that too if repalacing lumaires or breakers do not do anything good.


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## sparky80 (Aug 1, 2016)

I found the issue! At the suggestion of a former Siemens rep I purchased an AFCI tester. A 24 volt electronic driver for LED tape lighting was the culprit. I replaced it with a magnetic driver and tested thoroughly and the problems are gone. The only thing I thought was really strange was that the driver was on a lighting circuit and was effecting the small appliance branch circuits. Thanks for all the help.


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## telsa (May 22, 2015)

sparky80 said:


> I found the issue! At the suggestion of a former Siemens rep I purchased an AFCI tester. A 24 volt electronic driver for LED tape lighting was the culprit. I replaced it with a magnetic driver and tested thoroughly and the problems are gone. The only thing I thought was really strange was that the driver was on a lighting circuit and was effecting the small appliance branch circuits. Thanks for all the help.


The switching transients within the solid state driver are up in the mega-hertz range. They travel in all directions -- unless you've choked them off with a ferrite core low pass filter.

They are more than sufficient to trip AFCI logic, something that keeps coming up, over and over here at ET.

Over and over, electricians express total surprise about this phenomenon. 

1) They don't know that switching transients even exist in the first place.

2) They don't know that LED drivers -- engineered in Red China -- can be made more cheaply by omitting ferrite noise filters... so they are omitted.

3) They still trust the NEMA players WRT AFCIs.


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## readydave8 (Sep 20, 2009)

sparky80 said:


> I found the issue! At the suggestion of a former Siemens rep I purchased an AFCI tester. A 24 volt electronic driver for LED tape lighting was the culprit. I replaced it with a magnetic driver and tested thoroughly and the problems are gone. The only thing I thought was really strange was that the driver was on a lighting circuit and was effecting the small appliance branch circuits. Thanks for all the help.


How did AFCI tester help you find culprit driver on different circuit? If you can describe trouble-shooting process please.


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## 6 shooter (Feb 4, 2008)

sparky80 said:


> I found the issue! At the suggestion of a former Siemens rep I purchased an AFCI tester. A 24 volt electronic driver for LED tape lighting was the culprit. I replaced it with a magnetic driver and tested thoroughly and the problems are gone. The only thing I thought was really strange was that the driver was on a lighting circuit and was effecting the small appliance branch circuits. Thanks for all the help.


what is the AFCI tester you are using?


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## nrp3 (Jan 24, 2009)

Might be the one Siemens sells.


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## PlugsAndLights (Jan 19, 2016)

https://www.siemens.ca/web/portal/e...Arc Diagnostic Tool Data Sheet EM-LP-1540.pdf


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## lighterup (Jun 14, 2013)

I have found "low voltage" products are the problem in many
instances...if it's new construction , watch for other companies
to bring products on the home after you are done & gone.
Some of these products , in my experience that caused me more 
troubleshooting time than I can even remember, are...
...invisible dog fence equipment
...wireless routers that plug into receptacles at various points 
...as already noted , electronic driver
I have suspected POCO terminations and/or transformer at times
but they would never consider that themselves.
Other 120 volt products are ...most motor operated home products
treadmills...

I bought that Siemens arc fault tester too....

To answer Readydave8's question , the product has a device you 
connect to the home run at the panel.
It also has a remote device that you carry with you and gets its 
readings from the panel device via frequency.
I walk around with a 7 amp drill and go from outlet to outlet
(receptacles)and run the drill as I watch the readout on the
hand held. If you have a loose connection in a circuit , you'll
find it with this product , but as far as I'm concerned that's
about all you can use it for.

The best troubleshooting technique and least amount of your
time is to un plug all the s**t that the other trades sold the
HO ...I'll bet you dollars to donuts it's one of their products
causing all the fuss.


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## lighterup (Jun 14, 2013)

PlugsAndLights said:


> https://www.siemens.ca/web/portal/e...Arc Diagnostic Tool Data Sheet EM-LP-1540.pdf


Now you've been hangin out with CS again haven't you?:laughing:


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