Generator Wiring

Yes, and if I catch my fingers in a mouse trap, I regret it; but I use mouse traps. How many things do you do daily that, if done carelessly, will be regretted? Yet you go on doing them, because they are inherently safe.

I didn't call that safe. It isn't; but that's not the point.

That is even more likely to happen with extension cords; or lamp cords for that matter. It is really a non-issue.

I never claimed otherwise; I simply said that your "The BIG risk (potential)" in your previous post was incorrect.

You imply that there is a safe/approved/proper way to use a suicide cord. There is not. It's very name - suicide cord - ought to give you a clue. There is nothing "inherently safe" about a suicide cord. It is care less to use a cord with male plugs on both ends. When you use a suicide cord, you start out by being careless, and the use of a suicide cord is inherently UNsafe.

The point is that it is inherently UNsafe.

No it is not a non-issue, nor are your examples pertinent. You stated:

The current does have a place to go in the wet ground scenario, and it does have a place to go (which you acknowledge) when you touch the hot and neutral simultaneously. Your statement was inaccurate, and the accuracy of what you say is an issue.

Regarding the lamp and extension cord examples: If a dangerous condition can happen three (or any number of) different ways, that doesn't make the first (or second or third) way any less undesirable.

You've missed it, again. That is NOT a quote of what I said. It is a quote of what John Gilmer said.

The proponents of incorrect installation and use of a generator use faulty statements of "fact", faulty logic, mis-quotes etc. in every discussion I have read of their ideas for connecting the thing "on the cheap". Statements similar to: "I would never forget to throw the main" "I would be very careful" "It is not particularly dangerous" "Other things are more unsafe" etc. are all bullshit, regardless of how sincerely they were made. Backfeeding is unsafe. Suicide cords are unsafe. There is a proper, recognized way to connect a generator to your house wiring. Use it. Doing otherwise is foolhardy, illegal and unsafe. It can, and has caused harm to homeowners and linemen. Suggesting or implying that the use of suicide cords is not so bad or not particularly dangerous or no worse than using a garbage disposal is both inaccurate and irresponsible.

I couldn't agree more with this. Sometimes people give the NFPA some 'grief' about how the NEC is often a 'tombstone' document. Some parts of it don't get changed until somebody dies in some sort of mishap. And *that* is exactly why the code is so specific about dual power sources like these. People *have* died. *Repeatedly*.

*NOBODY* intends to kill someone with their home-wiring. Everyone *promises* to not forget to throw the breakers in the right order. Yet people *have* died.

With an ungrounded generator and a suicide cord, *maybe* the 'hot' end would come in contact with a gas pipe, starting a new form of arc-gas welding. Or just some loose nails left on the basement floor. Go to pick up the cord and *FLASH*, we're talking some serious burns as the exposed prongs come in contact with some debris on the floor.

After doing it a couple times, someone gets complacent. Tries to avoid having to run up/down stairs quite so many times and turns on the 40A receptacles and plugs cord in. Then in dark garage, plugs *live* cord (power came back on unexpectedly) into a generator that isn't running. The resultant arc and flash leave them with severe burns and loss of vision in one eye.

The possibilities are endless, and *nobody* intended for it to happen.

Suicide cords and no mechanical interlocks means you are *ONE* misstep away from killing someone. Forget just *ONE* thing, and someone can die. I don't know about anyone else, but I don't trust anybodies memory *that* much, even my own.

daestrom

P.S. Yes, people nag me at work for being 'Mr. Safety', but nobody has died or seriously hurt yet on 'my watch' and I intend to keep it that way. My workers know my attitude and follow the rules.

P.S.S. Sadly, a lineman (not in my shop, but in my company) died recently from repair work related to Isabel. It was *not* a backfeed incident, but it could have been.

I assume by "installing fuses" you mean replacing fuses and then closing the disconnect blades. If you assumed that there should have been no voltage, then you clearly assumed incorrectly and should have tested or been advised of grounds if this was an issue. Apparently the switch was correctly designed since it withstood the imbalance current connected with the disconnect closure and there was no harm other than to your psychic. From your comment, the issue appears to be related to the crew that shorted the lines although I have no idea why anyone would short lines and not ground them? Do you work for a real utility?

Regards,

John Phillips