Outlet AMPs for Commercial

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BzyHvnFun

Member
Must commercial bldgs use ONLY 20 amp ac receptacles and not 15 amp? Is this a national code or varies city by city?

www.fastmac.com makes an ac outlet w/ 2 USB ports (U-Socket) - can it be used in commercial buildings?

Thank you
 
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hurk27

Senior Member
Location
Portage, Indiana NEC: 2008
raider1 said:
Welcome to the forum.:)

Is your product listed by a Nationally recognized testing laboratory such as UL?

Chris
Click to expand...

In looking at and reading over the web site and or the instructions, I see no reference to any NTRL listing, about the only thing it says is it complies with Canada's code or something.

It seems to be nothing more then a receptacle with a 5volt DC power supply built in the side of a receptacle.
 
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hurk27

Senior Member
Location
Portage, Indiana NEC: 2008
BzyHvnFun said:
Must commercial bldgs use ONLY 20 amp ac receptacles and not 15 amp? Is this a national code or varies city by city?

www.fastmac.com makes an ac outlet w/ 2 USB ports (U-Socket) - can it be used in commercial buildings?

Thank you
Click to expand...

As far as the NEC goes, it is not an NEC requirement, 15 amp receptacles are allowed in commercial, and even on 20 amp circuits where there is two or more outlets, (A duplex receptacle is two outlets)
Only local code adoption can change this, here in Indiana we have no such requirement or code change and its state wide.

But we do have requirements for NTRL listed devices, as do many states.
So thats where your going to run into problems.
 
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hurk27

Senior Member
Location
Portage, Indiana NEC: 2008
After going back and reading, is the conductors in USB cable rated to handle 2.4 amps? If I remember right those conductors are kind of small, I don't know for sure.

A fault on this cable can produce more current then the rated output?
 
raider1

raider1

Senior Member
Staff member
Location
Logan, Utah
hurk27 said:
In looking at and reading over the web site and or the instructions, I see no reference to any NTRL listing, about the only thing it says is it complies with Canada's code or something.

It seems to be nothing more then a receptacle with a 5volt DC power supply built in the side of a receptacle.
Click to expand...

I couldn't see anything on the website that indicated whether or not the product was listed either, that is why I ask.

Chris
 
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BzyHvnFun

Member
Outlet AMPs

Outlet AMPs

hurk27 said:
As far as the NEC goes, it is not an NEC requirement, 15 amp receptacles are allowed in commercial, and even on 20 amp circuits where there is two or more outlets, (A duplex receptacle is two outlets)
Only local code adoption can change this, here in Indiana we have no such requirement or code change and its state wide.

But we do have requirements for NTRL listed devices, as do many states.
So thats where your going to run into problems.
Click to expand...


Thank you very much for your answer! Now I just have to call each City to see what their codes are!
 
B

BzyHvnFun

Member
Outlet AMPs

Outlet AMPs

hurk27 said:
After going back and reading, is the conductors in USB cable rated to handle 2.4 amps? If I remember right those conductors are kind of small, I don't know for sure.

A fault on this cable can produce more current then the rated output?
Click to expand...

...

Each USB port has 2.4 amps. Enough to charge an iPad!
 
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hurk27

Senior Member
Location
Portage, Indiana NEC: 2008
BzyHvnFun said:
...

Each USB port has 2.4 amps. Enough to charge an iPad!
Click to expand...

So is there one power supply or one 5.8 amp power supply?

my response was not to as whether or not it could charge an I phone, it was to bring attention that the conductors in a USB cable could cause a fire if they are too small for this amount of current, I think I remember something about 28 AWG in them, the NEC says for a 27 AWG is .5 amps. Has this even been looked at? if products are supplied with these smaller cables then the only out is to supply with your outlet a heaver cable, if the power supply is a single one capable of 5.8 amps, you must find out what the available short current is that can be placed on these cables, and provide a short current protection device that would limit that available fault current to a safe level, if not your opening yourself up to a lawsuit if a fire was to occur.
I know of one heating repair guy who set a house on fire because he used Cat-5 for a thermostat run, and we think that 40va. is not allot of power but it still produces over 1.6 amps @ 24 volts, and Cat-5 can get very hot with that amount of current.

If you notice I'm not even questioning the 15 amp receptacle, as it is the low voltage side that many seem to not realize how fast you can get into trouble with because of the higher current with undersize wires.
 
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curt swartz

Electrical Contractor - San Jose, CA
Location
San Jose, CA
Occupation
Electrical Contractor
The maximum output for USB 2.0 is 500ma so I don't understand why these devices were designed with a 2.4 amp output.
 
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hurk27

Senior Member
Location
Portage, Indiana NEC: 2008
curt swartz said:
The maximum output for USB 2.0 is 500ma so I don't understand why these devices were designed with a 2.4 amp output.
Click to expand...

Yea I saw that, 3.0 goes to 900ma, and it does say it has 28AWG conductors so I did remember that part right, been a while since I dug into this, just don't know what conductor sizes are for 1x or 2x?
also I do see where they do have some devices that can draw as much as 1500ma, but their USB cords have 20AWG conductors, which doesn't matter since any USB cord can be plugged in, and if it shorts can be a problem unless I'm over thinking again?
 
Chamuit

Chamuit

Grumpy Old Man
Location
Texas
Occupation
Electrician
I've seen several power adapters that have one or more USB charging ports on them recently. Surely they are current limiting themselves.

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