>
>Do not think that you will protect other outlets by simply replacing one
>of the outlets. It is also not just a matter of placing the ground
>fault device at "the front of the line". The ground fault device will
>only protect other circuits if they are wired through the ground fault
>device properly. Read the instructions that come with the ground fault
>device.
>
>To protect entire circuits, ground fault breakers are also availiable.
>
>Installation is simple, if one can follow directions.
>
>Be safe.
>
>Jeff
I think that it implied that you should wire it properly, it would be rather absurd to imply otherwise. The GFI is not a fuse but measures the balance between the hot and common. If they are out of balance then the current is going to ground, which could mean YOU, and shuts down instantly, in nanoseconds I'm told. It has to be upstream due to the way it measures the balance on the two lines, it won't see any leakage before the device. My current darkroom is still under construction but my darkroom in Van Nuys was GFI'd off of the first box on the circuit and I can tell you that it that it was triggered by any other outlet on the chain. Likewise why would a breaker that was a GFI breaker work on any box the circuit. This is also the anathema of TV studios I mentioned. Once the circuit was on a GFI anything leaking on the circuit triggered the whole circuit bringing everything down. A real mess if you go off the air because of it. The problem here is that the equipment they use is "prof
essional" meaning that the internal grounding does not live up to the standards imposed on "consumer" gear, and thus a little leakage is not a problem as far as their design goes. But these GFI devices are sensitive to the slightest amount of ground leakage and shut down. The other problem is you could have 100 electronic devices on the line and not know which one is the culprit. Those of us who are old enough may remember the old serial circuit Christmas tree lights when one went out the whole string went down, and the only way to find the bad one was to keep changing bulbs until the string went on.
Dick
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