Inspectors/Inspections.

[AdamS]

I am a Foreman for a solar shop in SoCal. We do resi installs and our jobs are somewhat "cookie cutter". My crew and I typically install 2-3 jobs a week. I'm competent with the NEC, I've been in the trade for 16 yrs 11 of them as a JW.

With that being said.... I'd like to know what obligations an Inspector has when he decides that he'd like me to fix or change something that I already know is code compliant. I come across respectfully when I challenge their "opinion", asking for a code reference. 9 times out of 10 they are unable to provide the reference and I'm given a correction notice with a vague description of what they'd like me to change without a reference given. I've been given responses like "Well, that's how we roll here" to the age old cop out "That's my interpretation". (90.4) Now I know not everything in the NEC is clear but if it is there is no deviating from it.

If I'm given a code reference (which usually takes a day or two and multiple phone calls to the Building Dept.) it's always an incorrect reference.

If I tried installing to every Inspectors opinion out here, I'd never ever pass an inspection. The NEC is supposed to be the standard but from what I've seen over the last 2 years is very "wild west" like and frustrating to say the least. A lot of Inspectors are receptive but most get defensive when their idea is challenged. Some have an enormous amount of pride to go along with the chip on their shoulder.

I have the NEC on hand as well as one of Mike Holts books with pictures (who can argue with a picture?) when I host inspections. I've had inspectors ask "who is this"? When I present the MH book. That's when I know I'm in real trouble.

 

[John120/240]

Your on the right track with inspectors, Be polite & Professional. Local amendments need to be in writing & legally adopted by your jurisdiction. This is the only way to deal with over zealous inspectors. Depending on the difficulty to remedy the perceived deficiency & cost, make a decision whether to take your case higher up the chain.

 

[ActionDave]

I agree with John120/240. Standing up to inspectors at the right time, in the right way, is not only helping yourself but every other electrician that has to be inspected.

 

[AdamS]

I have gained some ground with a few jurisdictions simply by introducing them to the sections of the code to prove my compliance and it's helped us pass more inspections. But there are still jurisdictions that we continue to have issues in. It really comes down to a lack of electrical knowledge on the individuals part. I think it has a lot to do with the fact that they're combination Inspectors (plumbing, mechanical, building and electrical) and usually electrical is their weak point. As an Inspector you'd think that this stuff would be second nature to them (code) and it isn't.

I have made corrections knowing that I didn't have to, just for the sake of getting the signature. I find it amazing that there are so many resources out there for all of us and they don't do their due diligence and educate themselves.

 

[mwm1752]

AdamS -- rest assured not all inspectors fall into your description. Code references should be available when your work is cited. I deal with all sorts and there are some when shown proper atricles will still not agree with interpretation. You see it can be no difference on the otherside of the fence when a tradesman has his mind set on how they interprete the code. Gennerally, a good conversation will usually bring understanding one way or the other. I have tradesmen all the time inferring inspectors from other juristiction have different rules or will say I've done it like this for 20 years, truth is IMHO code is minimum and changes every cycle. You've made several comments in your OP statement that can be misconscured as Bias. "I already know is code compliant" - "I challenge their "opinion"," - "it's always an incorrect reference" - "I'd never ever pass an inspection" - "When I present the MH book. That's when I know I'm in real trouble."
I am glad to here you are licensed as an electrician as PV installers gennerally do not have the same qualifications. Only dealing with art 690 is such a small section of the NEC. I personnally do not have problems with questions as I choose to use it as a learning experience for both parties. Even here with the knowledge & opinions given you will find very few subject where opinons on interpretations are completely unanimous. I would also agree the Mr. Holt's books are a great reference ut are not deemed as part of the NEC. Even the commentary in the NEC is just that "commentary". Being an inspector one must know the limits on what one can enforce & with which rule, as the "cause I say so doesn't fly in thei zone. Good luck & keep learning cause the first sign of BS is when someone tells me they know it all.

 

[growler]

I've been given responses like "Well, that's how we roll here" to the age old cop out "That's my interpretation". (90.4) Now I know not everything in the NEC is clear but if it is there is no deviating from it.

I have the NEC on hand as well as one of Mike Holts books with pictures (who can argue with a picture?) when I host inspections. I've had inspectors ask "who is this"? When I present the MH book. That's when I know I'm in real trouble.

What type of things are the inspectors finding fault with (examples). Much of the code is cut and dried as far as what must be done and other parts are open to interpretation and the AHJ is given the option of that they will accept.

The Mike Holt books are still just opinions on the code and even if you use the NEC handbook with comments ( put out by the NFPA ) those comments are still just opinions.

Like it or not there is still quite a bit of authority given to the AHJ, not so much the inspector but to the government body that he represents. It's called the "Authority Having Jurisdiction" for a good reason.

Just reading the different opinions of people that come to this forum gives an idea of all the different opinions it's possible to have.

 

[roger]

I have the NEC on hand as well as one of Mike Holts books with pictures (who can argue with a picture?) when I host inspections. I've had inspectors ask "who is this"? When I present the MH book. That's when I know I'm in real trouble.

For the sake of conversation, I think Mike's commentary and pictures as well as the commentary and pictures in the NECH are correct however, they are not code, so yes, and inspector can certainly argue against them if he / she wants to.


Edit, I didn't see Growler's post before I posted

Roger

 

[growler]

Edit, I didn't see Growler's post before I posted

Roger

I didn't see that mwm1752 had posted the same thing before I posted either.

I'm kind of slow, it's not that I type slow but that I think slow and sometimes it's hard for me to figure what and how I want to say something.

 

[Fulthrotl]

If I tried installing to every Inspectors opinion out here, I'd never ever pass an inspection. The NEC is supposed to be the standard but from what I've seen over the last 2 years is very "wild west" like and frustrating to say the least. A lot of Inspectors are receptive but most get defensive when their idea is challenged. Some have an enormous amount of pride to go along with the chip on their shoulder.

this pretty much sums it up.

i've been a sparky in socal for 38 years.
it sounds like if you are doing 2-3 discrete jobs a week,
they aren't huge, and don't merit or have the time for
the best thing i've ever learned to do... the "courtesy" inspection.

if i've got a significant amount of work to do on a job, i call for
rough electrical before i do anything. when the inspector shows up,
i go over the prints and scope of work with him, to find out what
pet peeves he has. everyone has something, and i don't want to find
out what it is during final inspection.

everyone has something.

huntington beach has the neutral fault test,
and stainless steel ground rods.
costa mesa has the identified neutrals.
irvine has to have all the installer certifications done.
santa ana has to have a business license, even if all you did was
certify the lighting, and didn't install anything.

and sometimes, it's not the city, but a particular inspector in the city.

it's not limited to socal, either. everywhere i've worked is like that.

the reality as i've experienced it, is that if i don't get my job approved by
the guy who shows up, i don't get paid. if i can establish a collaborative
relationship with him, this stuff usually goes well. if that is not possible,
things can be difficult.

at the corner of beach and warner in huntington,
there is a 13 story built in 1984. the electrical inspector and the general
forman went round and round, about everything. we had the core of the
building, the parking structure, and the site lighting. the shop was a 125
man shop out of long beach, who'd been in business 40+ years. that shop
closed it's doors over that job, without ever getting a final electrical sign off.
the liquidated damages ate them alive.

i've heard electricians get into arguments with an electrical inspector over a
point of code. i've also seen people argue with or try to BS a police officer
who pulled them over. both situations seem to turn out similarly.

i've been accused of being anal, and "over the top" on some of my installations,
but there is a good reason for it. the cost of "over the top" is usually far less
than the cost of being a chew toy for the AHJ.

 

[AdamS]

AdamS -- rest assured not all inspectors fall into your description. Code references should be available when your work is cited. I deal with all sorts and there are some when shown proper atricles will still not agree with interpretation. You see it can be no difference on the otherside of the fence when a tradesman has his mind set on how they interprete the code. Gennerally, a good conversation will usually bring understanding one way or the other. I have tradesmen all the time inferring inspectors from other juristiction have different rules or will say I've done it like this for 20 years, truth is IMHO code is minimum and changes every cycle. You've made several comments in your OP statement that can be misconscured as Bias. "I already know is code compliant" - "I challenge their "opinion"," - "it's always an incorrect reference" - "I'd never ever pass an inspection" - "When I present the MH book. That's when I know I'm in real trouble."
I am glad to here you are licensed as an electrician as PV installers gennerally do not have the same qualifications. Only dealing with art 690 is such a small section of the NEC. I personnally do not have problems with questions as I choose to use it as a learning experience for both parties. Even here with the knowledge & opinions given you will find very few subject where opinons on interpretations are completely unanimous. I would also agree the Mr. Holt's books are a great reference ut are not deemed as part of the NEC. Even the commentary in the NEC is just that "commentary". Being an inspector one must know the limits on what one can enforce & with which rule, as the "cause I say so doesn't fly in thei zone. Good luck & keep learning cause the first sign of BS is when someone tells me they know it all.

Article 690 is indeed a small section of the code but at the same time it's very specific. We only install transformer less inverter/ungrounded systems.

Grounding seems to be the most widely misunderstood part of solar for inspectors. Here are a few specific things we'll get called on from time to time.... 1. Making us irreversibly splice our array egc in our roof top jbox. 2. Making us put solar labels on our conduit containing the inverter output circuit. 3. Making us irreversibly splice our egc/gec from the inverter to the existing gec in the main panel.

1. You don't ever have to irreversibly splice an egc 690.43 A. We use a split bolt for this. I've been given the reason as being that someone can go up on the roof and take a split bolt apart. Or some have tried quoting 690.47 D which isn't in the current code. Some will say that it's a GEC.

2. Only "photovoltaic source circuits" have to have a warning sticker on the conduit 690.31 E (3). I've been given the reason as " I like to see everything labeled" or it's the fire code. 605.11 of the CA fire code also only requires the DC circuits to be labeled.

3. 690.47 C gives us three options for terminating our egc/gec from our inverter to the main panel. We opt with #3. We go straight to the ground/neutral bus bar. Our bond bushings are installed on each end of our Emt accordingly.

 

[augie47]

I am a bit surprised you find that difficulty in So Cal as I thought PV would be prevalent enough that most questions had been ironed out. Locally I do very few PV inspections and it's often a learning experience for ME.
Even with a whole lot of study, seminars, etc I think a lot of us old time inspectors rely on years of field experience and there aren't that many with Solar experience.
I don't find the Article to be that "simple" and I'm afraid it will take a while for you to "teach the inspectors".... Your success will prove you have patience and finesse.

 

[JFletcher]

i've been accused of being anal, and "over the top" on some of my installations,
but there is a good reason for it. the cost of "over the top" is usually far less than the cost of being a chew toy for the AHJ.

QFT. I've found it easier (not necessarily "right") to pick your battles carefully with the inspectors. One job I was supposed to pull wire, another guy ran the conduit. There were numerous violations everywhere with the conduit, which the inspector called out, but he also dinged things that were not violations. I asked about them, non-confrontationally, and he paused for a moment, made a call to his office, and 30 seconds later tops was 'you're right, that's not a violation'. ofc we still failed the inspection, but only on legit issues.

Ive only ever been to one job where the inspector was figuratively pulling codes/rules out of his backside. Both us (LV/LE) and the EC on the job were very upset. I even had a picture from 3M showing my exact installation which exceeded codes - still no good. We spent 3 days reworking the 'violations' because fighting a ruling out of state on a commercial job would have cost us more time/money than fixing what he wanted. Up until that point I had done roughly 15 hotels, and the only thing ever mentioned during inspection was "you used too much fire caulk". Once.

Being failed for compliant+ work is seriously aggravating. and tho I've personally never faced it, if the inspector is being very thorough, like pulling a tape measure to see if your bored holes are 1 1/4" from the stud face, and they arent, just nail plate them and move on. No need to get huffy or argue there. Nail plates are cheap and take 3 seconds to put on. I nail plated everything on commercial anyway.

 

[J.P.]

I had to pull the meter, unhook my feeds into my main service disconnect and put a bonding bushing on PVC once. It took me about an hour. The city inspector was very happy once the bonding bushing was installed. Wrong, but happy.

Now he considers our whole company to be great to work with and doesn't do more than glance around on inspections.

Hour well spent.

 

[jaylectricity]

I rarely have problems with inspectors even when I realize I've overlooked something.

When you ask for a code reference, make sure you say it's because you want to read the code and become compliant in a way that pleases everybody. You, the inspector, and the customer. Just doing it the inspector's way may not make your customer happy, but maybe you can find a way to make it compliant that the customer will accept. It's a way of not telling the inspector he is wrong or that you don't want to do it his way.

 

[Fulthrotl]

Article 690 is indeed a small section of the code but at the same time it's very specific. We only install transformer less inverter/ungrounded systems.

Grounding seems to be the most widely misunderstood part of solar for inspectors. Here are a few specific things we'll get called on from time to time.... 1. Making us irreversibly splice our array egc in our roof top jbox. 2. Making us put solar labels on our conduit containing the inverter output circuit. 3. Making us irreversibly splice our egc/gec from the inverter to the existing gec in the main panel.

1. You don't ever have to irreversibly splice an egc 690.43 A. We use a split bolt for this. I've been given the reason as being that someone can go up on the roof and take a split bolt apart. Or some have tried quoting 690.47 D which isn't in the current code. Some will say that it's a GEC.

2. Only "photovoltaic source circuits" have to have a warning sticker on the conduit 690.31 E (3). I've been given the reason as " I like to see everything labeled" or it's the fire code. 605.11 of the CA fire code also only requires the DC circuits to be labeled.

3. 690.47 C gives us three options for terminating our egc/gec from our inverter to the main panel. We opt with #3. We go straight to the ground/neutral bus bar. Our bond bushings are installed on each end of our Emt accordingly.

i'm sorry, i missed that this was concerning solar installs exclusively in your original post.

so, the top three items, two are grounding, and one is labels.
if i was hitting these over and over, what i'd do is stick $200 on each job,
buy a burndy hypress on ebay for $800 used, get the correct dies for the
two or three things you'll need to crimp, and just switch to hypress.
then get a pack of the appropriate stickers, and apply liberally.

after two weeks at three jobs a week, the tool and crimps are paid for,
and everyone is happy going forward. and you make an extra $600 a week
after the stuff is paid for.

 

[kenman215]

i'm sorry, i missed that this was concerning solar installs exclusively in your original post.

so, the top three items, two are grounding, and one is labels.
if i was hitting these over and over, what i'd do is stick $200 on each job,
buy a burndy hypress on ebay for $800 used, get the correct dies for the
two or three things you'll need to crimp, and just switch to hypress.
then get a pack of the appropriate stickers, and apply liberally.

after two weeks at three jobs a week, the tool and crimps are paid for,
and everyone is happy going forward. and you make an extra $600 a week
after the stuff is paid for.

To reinforce what you've said, it's been my experience that most inspectors, electrical or building have their hot button issues. Sometimes it may even seem like they're overlooking flagrant violations on their quest to focus on the one or two things they really care about. Example: building inspector recently was willing to pass mechanical closets with two inches of clearance in front of the furnace access doors, but made the plumbers fire caulk behind their escution plates for sink supplies on non-demising walls.. Best thing is to find out what they really care about and make sure it's done. If they flag something on one of my jobs, I typically invite them back the next day or get their email address to send them pics of the completed work the same day.

 

[AdamS]

i'm sorry, i missed that this was concerning solar installs exclusively in your original post.

so, the top three items, two are grounding, and one is labels.
if i was hitting these over and over, what i'd do is stick $200 on each job,
buy a burndy hypress on ebay for $800 used, get the correct dies for the
two or three things you'll need to crimp, and just switch to hypress.
then get a pack of the appropriate stickers, and apply liberally.

after two weeks at three jobs a week, the tool and crimps are paid for,
and everyone is happy going forward. and you make an extra $600 a week
after the stuff is paid for.

Doing resi solar work for this contractor has put me in a one on one with the Inspectors. Where before on large commercial or industrial jobs I wasn't in charge and didn't deal with inspections. So hosting my own inspections is newer to me.

Thanks for all the feed back. The consensus seems to be to find a happy medium which is something that I had started implementing. The variety of opinions amongst inspectors of the different jurisdictions here can still be challenging but over the last 2 years doing this I'm starting to get to know each of them and understand what I'll have to do to make them happy. I have a notepad that lists all the cities and their expectations.

 

[jaggedben]

@AdamS

I think part of the problem you are having is that the code for solar has been changing every cycle. In California we are on the equivalent of the 2011 NEC. The 2008 NEC required a grounding electrode for solar arrays, which is where your #1 and #3 issues could require irreversible splices, depending on interpretation and where the electrode is. That requirement was removed from the 2011 NEC, but it came back in the 2014 NEC (and will probably, hopefully be gone again in the 2017 NEC). Be prepared for a whole new round of confusion at the beginning of 2017. The point is that it didn't come from nowhere, and now you have to educate inspectors that the code has changed. I've found that awareness and enforcement of these things varies by region, as does the need to re-educate inspectors.

As for the stickers, I have met so few people, inspectors and electricians alike, who actually understand how inverters shut down when the grid reference goes away. It's a huge pain in multiple ways but your situation is not unique.

Ultimately it costs a lot less to send the guy doing the inspection with a pouch of stickers, a bag of crimps, and a crimper, than to roll someone out there for repeated fixes and inspections. As others have said, be polite and try to win what you can. Ultimately you have to do what they say (unless you have the time and money to sue, which I'm sure you and your customers don't).

I also recommend putting notes in your plansets explaining your interpretations of code. For example, mark the EGC from the clearly array as such, not merely 'ground', etc. etc. Have a notes page which explains these things. That way you can show the inspector that the plan checker approved your planset that way, which usually is a help.

 

[meternerd]

Really not much to add, but as a POCO guy, I have a few comments. First....nobody knows everything, but there are lots of folks who think they do. Smaller towns such as ours have, as was mentioned above, inspectors that cover a multitude of areas...building, electrical, plumbing, etc. They do their best, but most realize they still can learn something. I take inspectors to the job and show them where they "missed" it on service requirements...not only Code, but POCO as well. They seem to appreciate it, coming from us, but from contractors, maybe not so much. But, in my biased opinion, ultimately, you may win the argument, but you'll be on their "S&^T" list if you argue too much. Stroking their ego by doing what is asked may be a better way to go. Lose the battle, but win the war. I had good relationships with most electricians, but with some, I knew an argument was inevitable. Real world..... As far as solar, you should talk to a few installers who have had Rhonda from Palo Alto do inspections...now that would be painful, but she DOES know it all! Teaches classes to the EUSERC utilities.

 

[Fulthrotl]

I have a notepad that lists all the cities and their expectations.

bullseye! you got it.

my experience was it was easier to make a cheat sheet
and write it down, than to have it carved on my chest.

as bumpy as it looks, of late i've been seeing how it's done in some of the
bay area cities. smile and nod, there is a level of inspection neither you
nor i have every had to walk thru.

rejoice.