Tuesday, December 29, 2009

Wire Ampacity and Conduit Fill Calculation

Wire Ampacity and Conduit Fill Calculation

This week I want to take a minute to review our wire ampacity and conduit fill (wire fill) calculation.

There seems to be a lot of common confusion out there when it comes to wire fill. Annex "C" in the back of the 2208 NEC © is a good tool, but it can be very dangerous to use it without considering the impact of de-rating factors found in Chapter 3.

We normally use a 20 amp circuit breaker to protect #12 AWG cu wire. Annex C tables show that we can safely place a total of 16 of this size (Type THHN, THWN, or THWN-2) in a 3/4" EMT conduit. this is only for the protection of the wire from a physical stand point. Annex C is only concerned with the protection of the wire during installation. It does NOT take the ampacity of the wire into consideration!

When de-rating wire, we begin with table 310.16 (page 147, 2008 NEC ©) and de-rate for our ambient temperature AS WELL AS the number of current carrying conductors. The de-rating table T310.15(b)(2)(a) on page 145 shows us:

"Adjustment Factors for more than Three Current carrying conductors in a Raceway or Cable"

Number of C.C.C.

% of 310.16 Values

4-6 Conductors

80%

7-9 Conductors

70%

10-20 Conductors

50%

21-30 Conductors

45%

31-40 Conductors

40%

41+ Conductors

35%

You can quickly see that in our earlier example, if we put 16, #12 THHN conductors in that 3/4" conduit, we would have to drop the circuit breaker to a 15 ampere size! Now seriously, how many electricians in the field really do that? You understand now how dangerous the casual use of Annex "C" can be.

For all practical purposes, only 9 current carrying conductors could be placed in that conduit without having to drop the OCPD (circuit breaker) size: [T310.16 value for #12 THHW=25 Amps. 25 Amps X 70% (the de-rating for 7-9 conductors) would equal 17.5 Amps, and due to 240.3(B) we are allowed to round up to a 20A breaker.]

The grounded conductor (neutral) can also cause confusion sometimes. It counts as a "current carrying conductor" in some cases, but not in others. If it is shared between two different phases in a multi-wire circuit, it usually does not count as a current carrier , as it only carries the unbalanced load in the circuit. [For example, a "full boat with circuits #3, #5, #7 in a 30 panel, would not usually have their neutral counted.]

Where non-linear loads are supplied however the neutrals DO count. If you have electronic fluorescent ballasts or heavy computer loads (etc...) on a shared branch circuit neutral, it will have harmonic distortions that will disrupt the cancellation of loads between phases and can actually cause larger loads on a neutral that are found on any single ungrounded phase conductor in the circuit.

If the (neutral) grounded conductor is NOT shared between phases, i.e. a single 120V single phase branch circuit, such as a general purpose receptacle outlet circuit conductor, it counts as a current carrying conductor. In this installation it carries the full load on it back to the distribution point. Two other common issues with Annex C are considerations for different sized EGC/GEC conductors, and differences between Annex C values and manual fill calculations using Chapter 9, tables 4 and 5.

The value of Annex C is a "staff it full" value. Therefore you would have to keep in mind your additional ground wire, which is usually a smaller size than that of the phase conductors. The only way to use Annex C in this case is to always consider your EGC or GEC as a full size conductor count. A manual calculation is more accurate than Annex C and it has been this author's observation that Annex C values sometimes vary quite a bit from a manually calculated fill based on Chapter 9 tables.

All of that considered, going back to our 3/4" raceway, we could put 3 "full boats" in this raceway (3 neutrals not counted, 9 phase conductors, and 1 equipment ground) for a total of 13 conductors. This results in 3 less than our "fill amount" according to our Annex C tables. Thus, our advice is to always carefully consider your ampacity de-rating factors as required by 310.15.

(Author's Note: As evidenced by the above, an electrician would have to refer to several different tables in order to correctly and safely calculate the correct fill and ampacity values for watch and every pipe run. we are excited to provide and industry first for all our members. Electrician Testing has painstakingly prepared a custom table; available only through us, that considers ALL required factors. Everything is brought together in one quick and easy to follow chart. Contact us today to get yours, and look for our upcoming publication that will include this chart along with many, many more custom time saving tables!)

13 comments:

  1. How do we contact you to find this chart that contains allowable configurations of different current carrying conductor pipe fills?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hi Jeff, pardon my delayed response, I've had a lot of spam comments lately I didn't realize you had posted a question. You can e-mail me direct to mtolbert@electriciantesting.com I'd love to discuss this further.

    ReplyDelete
  3. How do I get a copy of the sweating chart. betancourt.brian@gmail.com

    ReplyDelete
  4. I.e. Oils like a copy of the derating chart if possible. BETANCOURT.brian@gmail.com

    ReplyDelete
  5. Regarding this part:
    [T310.16 value for #12 THHW=25 Amps. 25 Amps X 70% (the de-rating for 7-9 conductors) would equal 17.5 Amps, and due to 240.3(B) we are allowed to round up to a 20A breaker.]

    Arent standard THWN conductors rated for 90C, therefore we should derate from 30A?

    ReplyDelete
  6. I purchased a fixer upper home and discovered: -3/4 emt conduit filled with seventeen wires
    -fifteen #12 and two #10 (for water heater!)
    -twelve of them are current carrying
    -most of them are connected to 20A breakers
    -four circuits are sharing neutrals
    -the shared neutrals are on the same leg!

    Two bathrooms were sharing a single 14 gauge wire on a 15A breaker, with a 1300W heater in the bath fan, nice!

    I put each bathroom on their own 12 gauge run with 20A breaker, but now I need to sort out this 3/4 EMT mess. I want to avoid using shared neutrals and combine some of the circuits. Based on your article looks like I need to get it down to 9 CCCs in order for the 20A breakers to be legit? Most of these circuits are basement outlets and equipment and I want the outlets to be good for 20A. Thank you for the clarifying article.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Jess,

    You are correct. This is one of the parts to this article that need to be fixed!

    ReplyDelete
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  11. very informative article! thanks for sharing thhn building wire

    ReplyDelete

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