Odd swimming pool panel setup

[RBM]

I come across a number of pool wiring jobs, where the electricians cut as many corners as possible to keep costs down, and still remain legal. Unless I'm missing something, it seems that this may be legal.

The panel is an 8 circuit made for pool panel. It has a built in raintight outlet and two time clocks. This one has 2 double pole breakers for heater and pumps, 1 single pole breaker for under water lights, 1 single pole breaker for above ground landscape lights, and 2 single pole breakers for a small grill/ mini fridge setup. There are no GFCI breakers or devices in or at the panel. The panel is fed by a 50 amp GFCI breaker, which protects everything.

[hrhofmann]

Is this total thing a 120V circuit, all on one side of the line?

[SMS]

I wonder about these large GFI breakers and if they preclude using a GFI outlet. I would think that distributed GFI breakers/outlets would be a better idea from a practical standpoint.

[RBM]

Is this total thing a 120V circuit, all on one side of the line?

No, the feeder is 120 /240 four wire

[RBM]

My feelings as well. At the very least, this method is inconvenient in that anything that causes a ground fault takes out everything

[gfretwell]

It could certainly make an intermittent problem hard to find but it sounds legal to me. You just have to observe the rules connecting to it from the (pool) load side (insulated 12ga ground etc)

[Chip C]

Plus, the ground fault current limit on the "big" breaker is likely higher than it would be on a lower-ampacity gfci breaker, especially one for the convenience outlet alone. (This discussion comes up sometimes in the the U.K. d-i-y groups; apparently whole-house gfi's (they call 'em something else) are common and/or mandatory there.)

But it sure saves money; probably a couple hundred, based on prices here for dual-pole gfci's.

I'd make sure there was sufficient ambient lighting in the area on another circuit to make sure people could get out of the tub safely when that breaker trips.

Chip C Toronto

[bud--]

Any GFCI (US) should be 5mA ground fault trip (4-6mA). There are also breakers with ground fault protection for equipment that trip at 30mA - may be called GFIs.

The UK has RCDs - residual current detectors. In one thread I have read the protection for people was way over 5mA. In another thread I got the idea that RCD main breakers were used with supply schemes where there is no metal ground fault return path (ground wire in the service supply or N-G bond like in the US). If there is a 'large' (100ma???) current to earth, as from a ground fault, the RCD main opens. Otherwise there is not reliably enough fault current through the earth to trip a breaker.

Is a N-G bond required for all Canadian services?

[gfretwell]

That is not true of US GFCIs, they are required to trip between 4 and

6MA as part of the listing standard. A don't know a whole lot about the RCDs they use in UK but I assume they have a required range too..