JoeStillman
Senior Member
- Location
- West Chester, PA
A Client built an apartment building with pre-fabricated modules. Entire apartments roll up on a truck and get stacked up to make a building.
In each unit there is an air conditioner fed via a light-duty non-fused disconnect switch - the kind where you pull on a plastic handle with two pieces of copper attached. The copper is held by jaws attached to cable lugs. You can flip it over and plug it back in in the "Off" position. Disconnects have been applied within their ratings. There have been 4 failures of these disconnects. The owner found out when the tenants reported "no heat". The plastic plugs are melting.
As a temporary measure, they've bypassed the disconnects within the box. I told them it was ok to do that because it's all within sight of the panel. But I want to advise them on how to stop this from happening. There are dozens more of these in three buildings. Here's a picture of a failed switch...
Two of the other failed switches were left in place because they couldn't be pulled out. I have become distrustful of these switches. Is this evidence of loose cable lugs, improperly inserted disconnects or loose jaws? Anybody see this before?
In each unit there is an air conditioner fed via a light-duty non-fused disconnect switch - the kind where you pull on a plastic handle with two pieces of copper attached. The copper is held by jaws attached to cable lugs. You can flip it over and plug it back in in the "Off" position. Disconnects have been applied within their ratings. There have been 4 failures of these disconnects. The owner found out when the tenants reported "no heat". The plastic plugs are melting.
As a temporary measure, they've bypassed the disconnects within the box. I told them it was ok to do that because it's all within sight of the panel. But I want to advise them on how to stop this from happening. There are dozens more of these in three buildings. Here's a picture of a failed switch...
Two of the other failed switches were left in place because they couldn't be pulled out. I have become distrustful of these switches. Is this evidence of loose cable lugs, improperly inserted disconnects or loose jaws? Anybody see this before?