code question

Not in the National Electric Code. There may be something in the mechanical code.

thank you for the reply back! long story short I have to have an inspection done and I thought it was supposed to be hard wired but as you know it the other way around.

In our place, the previous owner did hard wire it. Trouble is that it was just put across the main feed for the air handler and the emergency heat. That's a 60 amp circuit! The wires serving the pump were like #14 or #16. Moreover, our air handler was 240 volts (no neutral) and the previous owner picked up "neutral" by using "ground."

If you have a separate CB that just handles the control transformer and the blower motor you can safely hard wire the condensation pump. But if you have a 240 volt blower motor, etc, just wire a plug to the pump and plug it into the "convenience" outlet that should be near the air handler.

Some condensation pumps have an extra set of contacts that open when the reservoir is about to overflow. You just wire these in series with the compressor control so that if your pump fails (or someone pulls the plug) you don't create a flood.

I completely understand your concerns. The "safe" way is for the pump to be on a 15 amp circuit but to have the "overflow" contacts turn off the compressor if the pump isn't functioning.

A typical heat pump "complex" is served by more than one breaker. If the control transformer is in the air handler then there is no way the compressor can operate unless the air handler is powered. Carrying this philosophy futher you wire the overflow switch in the pump so that the compressor will not continue to operate if the pump fails.

wire it how you like. hard or soft

I got a call back last night and was informed that the device being hardwired in *our township* is a code violation, so I'm ok.... for some reason I thought I'd heard it was the other way around