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When is a spark an arc? OR - When is an arc a spark?

Just watched some chap on the E5 youtube channel visiting Eaton in Austria. Eaton AFDDs have been something of a subject of ridicule in youtubeland, with various respected electrical content providers demonstrating through various real-world means that they don't function. So, off this chap goes to Eaton's HQ in Vienna where they provide him with a aluminium case full of test kit, complete with the Eaton logo and fitted out with various Eaton devices inside.

One of the devices is the Eaton AFFDD which has famously failed to operate on numerous youtube video presentations.

Of course, it trips when tested with their own test kit. After all, no point in trying to sell something which isn't really needed unless you can demonstrate that it actually works, so Eaton helpfully provides the 'right' arc signature so that the device can trip on command in front of all those cynical doubters.


Apparently, all those heath robinson youtubers have been getting it wrong because they have unhelpfully been simulating real world arcing events which these devices won't actually pick up. You see, according to the 'experts' you need an arc instead of a spark to trip the device! What the hell is the difference?


Oh how I laughed! Is this how far they'll go to flog you some old tat you don't really need?

Just how many different arcs and sparks are there out there? Has anyone told David Attenborough of all these new species to explore?


Feel free to jump in!
Parents
  • A few years ago I went to a house and installed a completely new cooker circuit because the people who lived there wanted an electric cooker instead of a gas cooker.


    So I installed the new circuit, then a couple of days later had the lady of the house on the phone ranting that I had messed up their consumer unit, because her husband was trying to use the cheap arcing sparking chop saw he had bought from a DIY store in the garage.


    I said it was absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with me or the work I had done, but I would call back around to have a look at it.


    The garage had a double socket outlet next to the consumer unit, the only sockets on the circuit, so I swapped the B16 MCB for a C20, problem sorted.


    There was still a problem from my point of view, the lady had absolutely no intention of paying me for resolving what she thought was a problem I had caused, when it was absolutely nothing to do with me. Materials and labour should have been around forty or fifty quid with the call out.


    So the idea of persuading customers to pay hundreds of pounds for a new consumer unit with devices designed to trip if there is an arc that my actually trip when they plug in cheap electrical appliances is not over appealing.


    Andy Betteridge
Reply
  • A few years ago I went to a house and installed a completely new cooker circuit because the people who lived there wanted an electric cooker instead of a gas cooker.


    So I installed the new circuit, then a couple of days later had the lady of the house on the phone ranting that I had messed up their consumer unit, because her husband was trying to use the cheap arcing sparking chop saw he had bought from a DIY store in the garage.


    I said it was absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with me or the work I had done, but I would call back around to have a look at it.


    The garage had a double socket outlet next to the consumer unit, the only sockets on the circuit, so I swapped the B16 MCB for a C20, problem sorted.


    There was still a problem from my point of view, the lady had absolutely no intention of paying me for resolving what she thought was a problem I had caused, when it was absolutely nothing to do with me. Materials and labour should have been around forty or fifty quid with the call out.


    So the idea of persuading customers to pay hundreds of pounds for a new consumer unit with devices designed to trip if there is an arc that my actually trip when they plug in cheap electrical appliances is not over appealing.


    Andy Betteridge
Children
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