Ask What Up? What Up? Everybody? Welcome to another episode of Let's
Ask Paul, the podcast where you get to submit questions to me on the
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com and be more than happy to answer those questions for you during our Wednesday
night show. All Right, so this question was submitted to me, and
I thought it'd be a great question to focus on for this episode because there
is a lot of opinions rolling around about it and misconceptions about conductors and reidentifying
a conductor, and so this is a very specific question. I've looked it
over and the question is very much focused on they have some cable that has
a black red blue in it, and they want they're in a building and
this building hash and these are big branch circuits by the way, and they
have black red blues and they and they have another voltage system in the building.
Okay, they have another voltage system and they want to be able to
use that same cable with black red blue. But they want to phase it
out brown orange, yellow or whatever you know, other coloring they want to
use. They want to phase it out, but they want to use this
same cable. So there's many people that say that you can't do that.
So let's read us questions, says Dear Paul, Thanks advanced for your podcasts.
I listened to it every day on the job site. You have over
six hundred of them. I appreciate the effort that you put in to help
educate us electricians. My question revolves around the fact that we purchased quite a
large amount of a metal clad cable with black red blue inners. We now
have a project where we have two voltage classes that are on the project,
and our inspector is telling us that we can't use the black red blue for
the higher voltage classes, which we typically would mark brown orange yellow. Is
this in the code and why can't we use this same cable assembly as long
as we reidentified. Thanks in advance and again, love your podcast. Look
forward to listening to this episode. Okay, great question. I don't know
how you knew it would become an episode because I could have just responded back
in an email, which I actually have, but you it's a great topic,
so I wanted to make sure that I do a podcast on it.
So what your inspectors saying here is he's basically invoking the requirements and since you
said it was brand circuits, but again, there's a feeder rule for this
as well. It's two ten dot five C and it's the identification of the
ungrounded conductors. Now, in this scenario, what you've got is you have
a brand circuit that's applying of some circuits in a building in the premise wiring,
and there's more than one voltage class in this building. So the rules
calls for the identification of these ungrounded conductors. So it's not confusing, right,
We know that this black red blues for one voltage class for one specific
application, and then you have another one which could be brown, orange,
yellow, but it could be whatever colors you want generally speak, and we're
not talking about a delta high lag where it's got to be orange. If
color is a choice, then it would have to be orange if it's colors
used, because you could use tagging and other things that not have to be
orange. But that's not what we're talking about. We're just talking about the
selection of phase colors. And for those say, oh but it is very
GERMANE, well okay, well then you go you go read that rule and
you know when it's got to be orange, then you're happy. You know
when it's got to be orange. All right, We're not getting into that,
all right, So let me read what it says. So two ten
dot five identification of brand circuits. See, it says identification of ungrounded conductors.
And obviously we have two ten dot five A and B, which is
identification of the grounded conductor, which is going to send you to two hundred
dot six, and then equipment grounded conductor which is going to send you to
two fifty dot one nineteen. So those are covered. So they're really focused
on the ungrounded hot conductors. So here's what the code says. It says,
ungrounded conductors shall be identified in accordance with two ten five C one or
two as applicable. Okay, So C one says this brand circuit supplying from
supplied from more than one nominal voltage source. It says, where the premise
wiring system has brand circuits supplied from more than one nominal voltage system obviously in
the building, so you could have a one twenty two footy volte system in
there, and you could have a two seventy seven four eighty volt system in
there. Okay, you could have brand circuits in this building coming from two
separate sources. And again the code is going to have applications where it permits
you to have these different sources there, or could be a transformer that changes
these sources to different voltage classes within the building. The point being is you've
got two different voltage classes in here. Okay. It says each ungrounded conductor
of a brand circuit shall be identified by phase or line and by no voltage
system at all terminations connection splice points in accordance with two ten two ten dot
five C one A and C one B, which we're going to look at
here in a second. It says different systems within the same premise that have
the same nominal voltage should be permitted to use the same identification. And what
that means is if I have a one twenty two forty and a one twenty
two aweight in a building, whatever I use for the one twenty it can
be the same identification, whether it's the one twenty two forty or the one
twenty two O eight. That's what that means. Okay, you don't have
to come up with another color just because of the one twenty volte circuits.
If it's one twenty vold, it's one twenty volts, so it doesn't matter.
That's what that line says, and that was actually added last cycle.
Okay, all right, so when I'm looking at it, and i'm again,
folks, I'm in the twenty twenty three case. You're wondering, I'm
in the twenty twenty three edition. But it's the same thing. It really
much pretty much says the same thing in either one. All right, Now
there's an A and a B. Here's what A says means of identification.
It says the means of identification shall be permitted to be by separate color coding,
marking tape, tagging, or other approved means. Okay, so let
me start out with this. If you have an MC cable that has black,
red, blue, but you need to reidentify it for a color scheme
that references another nominal vaultage system, then you can do that with marking tape.
You could do that with tagging or other approved means, maybe heat shrink
if that's what the hj's okay with. Maybe you don't want to use the
color coding of the insulation. But at terminals, remember you're supposed to do
this, where at terminations, connections and splice points, you're going to reidentify
it with marking tape with the new color identification that you choose for that voltage
class at that location. So if that means that I have a red conductor
and I'm wrapping it with brown tape at the termination, then so be it.
Now the key is I have to go to B, which is posting
of identification meanings. So if I'm going to take a conductor that is red
and I'm going to put brown tape around at the termination, then I need
to make sure that my method of identifying this is available, okay, And
so let me read you what it says about posting of identification means. And
remember this is kind of no different than striping. If I have a certain
color with a certain color stripe on it, then you identify it accordingly.
This is no different if a red conductor with brown tape, Okay, however
you identify it to make it very clear. Then you want to make sure
that you convey that to people. So here's what it says for B of
this rule. It says posting of identification means. It says the method you
used, the method you used for conductors originating within each brand circuit panelboard or
similar brand circuit distribution equipment. Shall be documented in a manner that is readily
available or shall be permanently posted at each brand circuit panelboard or similar brand circuit
distribution equipment. The labels shall be of sufficient durability to withstand the environmental environment
involved, and shall not be handwritten. So you're you're gonna type out this,
you're a phonomic label or whatever you're going to do in order to make
sure that you have this identification, okay, And the point of that is
that whatever you choose to do, whatever you choose to reidentify, wrap and
tape that whoever's there can read it. It's not handwritten. It's very clear
what you're trying to do. So there's nothing in the code that says that
I can't take a cable with black, red, blue and use it by
reidentifying it, by taping it another color and making sure that it's very distinctly
marked at these locations. The difference between the two systems, so what are
the color schemes being used for the one voltage class and then what's the color
schemes and very distinctive identification of the other voltage class that will be in the
same building. That are brand circuits now this also applies to feeders as well.
Okay, same scenario. So I think it's very clear to me anyway
that it's telling me that I can do it by color coding, marking,
tape, tags, or other approved means. And just because my color has
an installation. Remember years ago all we had was black and we had to
phase these things out. Well, now just because the installation is colored,
that makes it more convenient to leave. If that's what you want to select
your purchase and get your color coordinated ahead of time, that's great. But
there's nothing in here that says that I cannot take a red and put blue
tape on it, or a blue and put red tape on it, or
a black and put orange tape on it. There's nothing that says that I
can't do that within the allowance of two ten five C one right. So
again that's kind of hopefully that answers the questions. So again, if you
have an inspector who has a problem with this, you know, again,
if it's in a race way, you're not going to see it anyway.
The portion that comes out now, this only requires that you identify it at
the termination, right, and at any connection point or any splice point that
you maintain it. If you do it at the panel, you want to
make sure you maintain it through the system, so no matter where they open
it up, they're very clear what's going on. Right. But if you
do that, absolutely nothing says that you can't do that. Now, that
doesn't mean everybody go out and just buy one standard black red blue and use
that for both one twenty two forty or one twenty two eight and then use
it again into seventy seven for eighty although you can. Most people are going
to buy color. That's the whole purpose of buying. If if you're not
going to do that, then you might as well just buy black conductors.
Okay, So that's the reason why people. But in case somebody happen to
run into a situation where they're like, crap, I'm in a bind and
all I have is black red blue in the SMC cable or for example,
can I reidentify those conductors with phase tape and the marking tape? And the
answer is absolutely yes. Two ten dot five C one says it. Now,
whether somebody says, well that's confusing because I see the insulation color and
I see the tape. Well, that's because the National Electric Code is not
for the untrained person. If you're a trained person, then you know what
two ten five C says, and you're looking at that termination, and you're
looking for the color that's being used at that termination and how it corresponds with
the required posting of the markings, right, and then it should be fairly
obvious to you as a trained professional. Okay, we don't want everyday Joe
just doing this. These are trained professionals and the code is written in a
certain way. So again that's the importance of learning the code, because if
you don't know the code, then yeah, I can see where you get
confused. Right. Anyway, that's my take on it. I hope you
got something out of that and we're able to help you out just a little
bit. If you have any questions, feel free. I'm more than happy
to give my opinion. Just go to Paul Abernathy dot com, submit your
question and I will answer it. Hopefully it'll be answered in the live shows
starting June twenty eighth, but it also could be on upcoming podcast. Till
next time, Stay safe, God bless, Ask open