The GFCI/RCD: A Simple but Life-Saving Protector
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- Опубліковано 16 сер 2018
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These devices are a common sight in homes and businesses around the US and around the world. But what are they for? Why do we need them? This video explores the life-saving potential of the GFCI (known alias: RCD) and explains how they work.
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I remember as I kid, I had these in my room, I clicked them all and thought I broke them. I basically had no power in my room for months because I was too scared to tell my dad.
I tripped the CFI in my bathroom once by running a wet/dry shaver under water while it was plugged in. I was just glad nobody told god 😳
@@thefaboo Really happy you didn't fry yourself, lol!
That’s honestly hilarious 😆
@@thefaboo fun fact unless you have better grond than the minus, you dont get hurt by dropping the toaster in the bathtub
@@rambo8863 thats false, I would know
0:34 "Will I ask a fourth question?"
The inserted dry humor is priceless.
@Husk You must be fun at parties
I think its fun
@Husk You are entitled to your opinion; however, I disagree with your opinion and find it quite funny. I don't know why exactly, maybe it's because it is akin to dad jokes (of which I find the majority hilarious for some damn reason, and I'm not a father). Or maybe it's because of it being dry humor like Tim-J.Swan said.
@Husk ad hominem, I see
@Husk I'm pretty sure I used the semi-colon correctly. I did not start the sentence with 'however' but I did use it in its correct usage. Example: The results remained consistent; however, the data were analyzed.
“They are a very effective safety net, but why risk falling in the first place” well said
It reminds me of a phrase I always say "if rolling a 1 will kill you, it doesn't matter how many sides they have, why roll the dice?"
Whenever I'm explaining safety things to coworkers there's some solutions that make things less dangerous, and other solutions that completely negate danger, and people like to just use the less dangerous one because it was quicker, and I'm trying to convince them to use the one with no danger
@@sewd1289 Except you're doing that constantly. sure, they're trillions of sides, but every step you take *could* be just wrong to cause you to fall and hit your head just wrong to kill you.
Any GFCI-protected electrical outlet in your home is a good test point for whatever older, perhaps vintage, electrical or electronic devices you might have decided to plug in after they sat around for years unused or that you had picked up at a flea market or whatever. Tube/valve type guitar amplifiers and hifi amplifiers are a particular case in point; these often have the audio ground and chassis coupled to one leg of the power cord *through a capacitor* , for the purpose of using the neutral wire as a pseudo "earth ground" to the chassis, in order to reduce audible hum and buzz. If the amplifier hummed, you would simply flip the non-polarized power plug around the other way and hopefully lessen the noise; or if the device already had a 3 wire grounded cord, there might be a switch on the back to select the ground polarity and you would set it to whichever position reduced the noise. The problem is, 60 or 70 years later those capacitors often leak voltage and so you might find some AC leakage current on the chassis of the amplifier, and also on the guitar strings and metal hardware of the guitar. However, plugging such a device with a leaky "death cap", as they are often referred to, into a GFCI outlet will immediately trip the built-in breaker and alert you of a dangerous situation.. As I have noted, vintage guitar amplifiers pose a special problem and should *always* be converted/ upgraded to a grounded 3 wire polarized cord and plug, with the death cap removed.
I married an electical engineer. Usually I would just smile and nod when she would wax poetic about eletrical stuff. However, because of this channel I have the ability to carry a conversation with her about her job now.
Must be sad that your wife has the valks
Green
This is very cute!
Jason
um. excuse me ?
"don't touch the electrical engineer while wet"
For real tho, that's cute
I love how he goes from technical terms to calling something a “doo dad”😹
Haha, he's very good at determining when it's okay to not be technical
Lovin' this dude's way of talking too haha
Doo dad is a super technical term. Right up there with Thingimajig/Thingimabob and Doohickey.
I dig this too. This channel is awesome
Hes gotta kinda dumb it down for us and it might be for comedic purposes
I have finally learned to watch your vids. When I saw the title, I thought "I know what GFCIs are," keep scrolling, then I thought "He spends 15 mins explaining, may be interesting." Everything you explain that I already know, I know much more clearly after I learn how much I didn't know. Thank you, sir!
I didn't learn more about humidifiers by watching his humidifier videos, except for the one about the personal air conditioner that is not an air conditioner. But I still feel it's educational, because it feels to me that Alec is incredibly good at communicating. This is something I've struggled with my whole life. I'm getting better, but I'm not to Alec's level. It's also fun to watch someone who is so clearly excited about topics as he is.
My colorblind brother spilled the beans about brown before Alec was born. I'm not sure how old he is exactly, but he looks like a teenager in his 2013 videos. My brother struggled and failed to make bright brown back in the 1980s. Brown is one of the colors my brother sees well enough (so long as he's not trying to distinguish it from green), but he got my opinion on it because I can see color, I just got my fashion sense from my colorblind brothers.
All of that said, I've watched a lot of his other videos as well, and, yeah, everything else, I went in thinking "I know this topic" and came away knowing more about it.
@@edgrimm5862 You should try making a tik tok or do a youtube for you!
Nailed it!
Me: At 3 a.m. about to sleep
UA-cam Algorithm: Hey, wanna watch someone talk about outlets!
Me: Sure!
Me at 6:30 trying to sleep
Huh, it's 2:50 a.m. for me right now. Close enough.
This guy could put a chihuahua full of caffeine to sleep.
Funny I saw this comment exactly at 3am
Inspired by this, I tested the socket in my bathroom. When I hit reset, my lights came back on for a moment, then turned back off. Guess my socket needs to be replaced, haha! Thanks for potentially saving my life I guess.
You have to push it in until it clicks back to the "locked and loaded" position. That's deeper than the surface.
@@ZaHandle lmao but I am fast
@@itsjustthatsimple628 but i am faster
It's the "test" button that you're testing, not the "reset" button, lmfao
@@far2ez539 This was after testing it. Something had failed in the switch when I tested it, and any time I subsequently hit reset it would momentarily turn on then trip again. Ended up having to replace the plug which fixed the issue.
I just tested all of my GFI outlets, and to my shock one of them failed (that is, it fails to fail). I'm glad I watched.
To your "shock" LOL
The pun is strong in this one.
It was the easiest thing to do.
I haven't watch the whole vid yet, so this may be a redundant question, but how do you safely test a safety device?
@@nikkiofthevalley Your talking about the outlet itself right? Just press the "test" button that is directly on the outlet itself and if the green light goes out and comes back on after a reset then its good. If it gives you a red light then it is likely faulty.
Nice. For those who do not know, they make GFCI with Audible alarms, so if you have a fridge or something connected to one, it could save you a lot of money if it trips.
Technology Connections: "What i'm about to do is incredibly dangerous please don't do this"
Electroboom: "I might die and my body would be slowly cooking to perfection... I could post it to LiveLeak"
When he said that, I thought he was going to stick his thumb in a hot socket while he was standing in a full bathtub. I was so disappointed.
I see you a man of culture as well
it's LiveLeak
@@luigi6835 autocorrect
@@soaringvulture I like that whenever Alec says "this is incredibly dangerous, don't do this at home", what he shows is actually a safe way to do the thing. At least, so far, in all of his videos that I've seen. Disclaimer: I'm still catching up, so there could be a gem that I haven't seen. But so far, it's always been a safe investigation of something that is legitimately dangerous to investigate in a more direct manner than the route Alec takes.
You do a good job explaining stuff.
I mean... It's their job
I know lots of people who are terrible at their job
You do a great job too Camarara
Thank you
He does ok. Hea a great youtubee. But needs to explain slower amd better in my opinion or use examples
I appreciate the hell out of this channel. The intentionally cheesy 1980/90's public access theme, the desk-umentary feel, and your blazers. At first I thought this was all an elaborate joke, like Infinite Solutions. I was very wrong. Appreciate all the research, and the amount of effort you must put in to make engineers seem interesting.
Oh, and thanks for not having sponsors. In a world of non-stop advertising, I seriously appreciate your dedication to storytelling without a sales pitch.
You're also very funny.
Keep it up.
I mean, the only reason he's able to do this without sponsorships is because of Patreon, which is essentially just him being sponsored by his audience. It's not that different, fundamentally. I feel like demonizing taking sponsorships is counter-productive, especially considering that that's always been how educational content has been made. PBS is (or at least was) often supported by brands that then got a shout out between programs. Most other educational content in the past was supported by massive companies that could afford the cost. Not every creator feels comfortable taking money directly from their audience for what they do (which I don't really get, but it's their choice). There's nothing wrong with accepting sponsorships to support your private endeavor, especially if you only accept ones that you actually believe in.
He is a one of a kind charming and charismatic. Like many giants of american TV he is all his own.
In Dutch language we call it an aardlek schakelaar, which translates to: Earthleak switch. I think this covers it well! And indeed, in The Netherlands it is placed in the switch box to protect a part of the house, or in my case the whole house.
In Finland they are called vikavirtasuoja (fault current protector). IMO this is clear. Terms that refer to earth and ground confuse many as they think it is related to the ground wire.
In Czech it's called proudový chránič (current protector) which isn't very helpful
In Czech it's called proudový chránič (current protector) which isn't very helpful
“Will I ask a fourth question?” Had me laughing my butt off🤣 thank you for that!
When I was a kid, I thought that those plugs were waterproof and even shot it with a water pistol for fun... I'm lucky that nothing ever happened to me but please parents, if your child ask why there's buttons on that plug, give a better explanation than just "it protects from water" or something like that...
i once threw water on a gfci and it started arcing and went pop
Mister Brookes And one of the largest grounded exposed metal objects in a typical home is the actual kitchen sink! Standard example in EE class was always someone touching a faulty kitchen appliance and the kitchen sink at the same time.
lol
Okay, I'll show my kids this video then.
Science has changed the natural course of mankind. For example had science not created safety barriers to keep you around, you'd be gone and this boring tweet begging for thumbs ups would have never been around. It's sad.
In Germany we call them „Fehlerstromschutzschalter“ which literally translates to „False Currentflow Protection Switch“.
In Germany we still call them RCD or at least Fi
Different dialects?
That is the technical term, but casually they are just called "FI" for "F"ehler (=fault) and then the symbol for the current "I"
Why did it end up being one whole word lmao?
Ryszmarine That’s how german language works. We just add stuff together. For example a Lighter is a “Fire Thing”. Doesn’t matter how many words there are as long as it describes the functionality.
Yet again you've covered something cool we use in construction frequently. If you've ever watched someone drop a live powertool in to a flooded lift shaft without one like I have, you'll know why. Really cool you reinforced the fact that testing them really is testing them for real and that mechanical faults are just as good a reason to test as electrical!
In Germany, this safety measure is called "Fehlerschutzschalter" (fault protection switch) or "FI" in short and is required to be build into every flats or houses main power supply
Funny how many languages each seem to have a slightly different common term to describe these devices. Here in the Netherlands they are normally refered to as 'aardlekschakelaar' which literaly translates to 'earth leak switch'.
@@RC534 Yes this is funny ! In france it is call "interrupteur différentiel" or in short "différentiel" (differential switch) : because it check for a... difference in the current. Everyone named it differently !
@@tom-sn4gd this is such an elegant name
@@tom-sn4gd actually similar to russian, it's called "differencial'nyj apparat" or "difapparat" for short here, literally means "differential machine"
@@RC534In Sweden we call them ground fault breakers
As a 25 year electrician, I have actually seen regular breakers NOT trip on a dead short. GFI can be a pain sometimes, but also save lives and property.
As a person who lives in America and has been overloading cheap extension cords my whole life. Most things dont use that much power. Basically the things that make things hot are all u have to worry about. The rest u can bunch up on a $5 extension cord and it wont even get warm.
At one point, we replaced an outlet, and to cut power to the one in question, we hit one of the GFCIs to cut the power. But when we reset it, we actually had to reset the breaker for that circuit to get the thing going again. Does anyone have an idea as to what might be the problem, if there is one?
Also, if the outlet with the GFCI we used were being protected by an AFCI, it would go off rather frequently, as I get an arc even from my computer charger. Probably should replace that outlet too
in australia we use this term to make it easier when training to be electricians; RCD's save people, Circuit Breakers save your house
in australia we use this term to make it easier when training to be electricians; RCD's save people, Circuit Breakers save your house
This channel is so rich in quality content. It’s all the electrical and technology questions that are hard to ask. It’s all the stuff you don’t even know you don’t even know
I'm an electrician (but definitely not an electrical engineer) and I never thought about the minutiae that goes into the GFI outlets so it was actually great to see.
I’m an electrician and I really appreciate this video. You explained how these worked very well.
In Germany (and in large parts of Europe) RCDs have been absolute standard for ALL sockets and lamps for very many years (and for the bathroom for many decades).
For this reason, they are almost always permanently installed in the fuse box or electrical distribution of the house. They normally cost about 40 bucks.
I know i am late, but this guy that makes these videos (and as good as they are) has such an elitist aura when it comes to electronics, he really dislikes it when Euros educate him on the superior network LOL
@@spicesmuggler2452 haha lol
Don't Americans often think they are the best or have the best (system)? 😅
@@003General No, that's just Europeans saying what Americans say, as Europeans are prone to do.
@@wta1518 ok
@@spicesmuggler2452 I think you’re taking him too seriously lol.
I live in South Africa, over here we call them an Earth leakage circuit breaker. I just thought that might intrest you🙂.
*earth leakage*
@@based980 ikr
Yup Most countries in Asia call it ELCB as well, Earth Leakage Circuit Breaker
Michael Imray bruh the electric is sent into the ground in case of leakages
Same in India.
I actually shocked myself with an electric outlet one time trying to plugin my computer in the dark. I was feeling for the outlet and accidentally got the plug half in, half out with my finger touching the metal. Fortunately, I was saved by a built-in safety measure: electricity going to the muscles of my arm caused them to seize and jerk my hand away from the outlet. It felt like something had vibrated the bones in that hand.
Good thing I wasn't in a bathtub at the time!
Why would you be plugging in a computer in the bathtub in the dark?
That happened to me aswell, got scared to death.
@@pluto8404 it was a hypothetical scenario. One could imagine trying to plug _something_ in while being unable to see the plug and being near water at the time.
@@pluto8404 Lmfao
Jesus, your plugs let you do that? There's all kinds of regulation about how much of the live pins has to be sheathed on plugs here to prevent exactly that kind of thing. o.o
I have an Electricians degree, but I love these videos because everyone can always use a refresher from time to time.
As a kid, a show like yours would be on my must watch list, every week. As an adult, there is no difference. Please keep making this amazing content and we love your work. Also, put speakers in more stuff.
I once played an electric guitar plugged into my amplifier while on a wet concrete walkway around a swimming pool. Need I go on? Ok, I will lol. My shoes got wet from walking around the pool. I touched my guitar's pickup and the metal part of my amp's handle at the same time. Even today, 40 years later, I can still feel the insanely horrible BUZZZZZ! through my whole body, and believe it or not, I could FEEL that the current was alternating really really fast (60 times a second, actually). It only takes one shock like that to make me pray to the god of electrons to never feel that again!
I can - almost - laugh about it now, but musicians and vocalists have been killed, some recently, by touching an ungrounded microphone.
I can relate to that. The best way to describe a shock on 120V AC is that you feel it vibrating. I took a shock on 1600V AC and that just plain hurt. My hand felt numb for a few hours afterwards (it only went from my middle finger to about my wrist)
Reminds me of when I was like 5 years old and wanted to test the new oven's lamp, I couldn't get enough extension chords to the outlet I could reach so I used a transformer mid way there. Step up 127v to 220v and that was my 1st electrical shock
Hi yes why on earth was mains voltage running through your guitar. This makes no sense to me as to how you would get a shock here. Handle on the amp shouldn't be connected to any sort of ground. Should be completely isolated. Your pickups should have less than a volt going through them at any time, they dont actually receive any voltage from the amp. No idea how you managed this.
@@ccleake1 You see, there's a lot of "should" and "shouldn't" happening here. In normal situations, yes. When shit goes bad, no so much.
The strings are grounded on a guitar, if this ground gets electrified with mains voltage at the amp, you get a mains shock on your fingers. You never know the absurdity of some electrical designs out there after all.
@@Kalvinjj I had a brand new gretsch that would shock the hell out of me from it's vibrato bar lol
Somebody once tipped off this is a kind of ripoff,
It should handle twenty amps great.
But the only thing preventin' a twenty-amp connection,
Is the shape of the holes on the faceplate.
Well my hand starts aching but it's stopped by this breaking,
If it weren't for this thing I might've hit the ground shaking!
Didn't make sense not to install one,
Not just to meet code, but for protection.
So that's what we do, it's smart you see,
No-one wants to play things that risky.
A shock does more than leave marks.
The last thing you see could be sparks!
Hey now, you should use these, they're called G-F-C-Is.
Hey now, they're important, don't get paralyzed.
Loose current isn't your friend,
You don't want to meet an untimely end.
This is beautiful
I hate you.
Bruh...
So I'm not the only one who caught the "Shape of an L" thing 😏
Oh man. I had to read this twice to realize it’s All Star
This is one of my favorite YT channels, if not my favorite. Super entertaining, super informative, and unique. It's amazing how oddly specific the topics you choose are, and yet how vital they are. Please don't stop!
Yet he still acts like a little baby when he gets educated yet loves to condescend.
I agree with you!
in the UK, the first time I saw these, they weren't aimed at household socket protection at all. They were basically marketed as inline plug devices for use with garden equipment (lawnmowers, strimmers, hedge trimmers, etc) as ways to protect you from shock if you accidentally cut the power cable. We didn't get them build into household sockets until much later.
In the UK and Europe, instead of having one outlet protected, theyre usually mounted in the breaker box and protect the whole house or a room
NO WAY! Wow. Just wow. I'm an electrician so I know my way around Dutch electrical wiring and know a bit about US-wiring and electrics, so I didn't thought I'd see something new in this video.But I NEVER knew there were RCD's built into wall-sockets. And just when I thought that was all, you started talking about appliances with RCD's mounted INSIDE the plug!
To talk about these devices: In the Netherlands we tend to call them 'Aardlekschakelaars', literally translated you end up with something like 'Earth-leakage switch'.Though it indicates it does 'something' with a leak somewhere, it's hard for many people to understand that the safety-ground wire (which we just call earth or PE in electricians-language) has nothing to do with the RCD itself: it only senses that there is current leaking somewhere, but as it's not returning to neutral, we assume it's leaking to earth.
And about the place where these devices sit: it's common in the Netherlands to have these in the service-cabinet (metercabinet as we like to call it).Indeed, it can be hard to find the cause of the leak, but that's also some common sense: just unplug everything on the same group (for as far as possible) and start replugging until the RCD trips and there's your fault. Garden-lighting is notorious though for moisture and causing random tripping of the RCD and because you have to open the switchboxes in the metercabinet, most people don't think about that possibility.
We got our metercabinet renewed last year. We got PKN6 RCD's from Eaton. Big downside from these is that they don't indicate the kind of fault, whereas the devices from ABB I use on a daily basis at work, the DS201 series, feature an extra indicator so you know the type of fault that occured.An overcurrent just trips the device, throws the lever down ánd moves a green 'signal' in a small window just above the lever.Resetting it makes the green signal turn red again.A ground fault however, does all of the above, but also shoots out a blue indicator in the middle of the handle, indicating the device has tripped because of a ground fault.
In Belgium, the usual name is 'Verliesstroomschakelaar' (literally translated: 'Current-loss switch).
Definitely been very happy with ABB products wherever I've used them, but being as Square D and Eaton seem to be preferred in Canada, ABB tends to be far more expensive here. For industrial products ABB prices are fairly on par depending on suppliers.
Nothing against you guys, but what is with your language, it just looks like you gave a kid a keyboard and they banged on random keys.
A good rule of thumb for figuring out which device set of the switch is to unplug the last thing you touched, re-enable the switch and try again.
Also in Flanders, the metercabinet is often called the "plombkas", literally the "kast" ('cabinet', the t isn't articulated nor spelled) where you put the "plombs" ('fuses', the b is also not articulated but appears in writing), which I presume comes from the French word for lead, i.e. what the old style fuses that melt were made of.
@@aphenioxPDWtechnology "Verliesstroom" would be "Forlorn Stream" using the English cognates. It sounds absolutely poetic, like someplace haunted.
As a Dutch person who doesn't know all that much about electricity, thank you for explaining how this relates to our situation.
Those are so my fidgety self has something to do while brushing my teeth
Hey and so you can actually test it often! Mission accomplished!
lol
You might be pleased to know that this video is now assigned watching for students in the Applied Electricity course at Lansing Community College. I was already a fan of yours so it was a pleasant surprise to see you in my school work!
Excellent presentation. I'm an electrician and I knew the gfci detected a current inbalance, but I didn't know how this was achieved. And I didn't know such a tiny current inbalance would trip it. I knew they were fast. But you quantified it for me.
Hahahahaha, the fact you threw in an "All Star" by Smash Mouth reference...and I caught it... Well done!! Can't wait for the next video!
Well, the amps start coming and they don’t stop coming
Hey now, you're an All Star....
I'm mad I missed it
Had to replay those frames a couple times before I understood what he was doing
I ran headfirst into the comments looking for this as soon as I saw that.
"Will i ask a fourth question"
At that point I had to stop the video to catch my breath
Sweet video!
You need to some cardio!
When I moved to USA this was the first thing it called my attention. And I was so frustrated everytime that I plugged the hair dryer and it was "not working" because the outlet was on test. But now that I understand what they are, I will never get annoyed about it. Thanks for such a good video!!!! 🙏🏼
"putting the protection at the outlet makes the device causing the problem rather obvious" not necessarily. I once had a house where half of the guest room was wired to the "load" terminals of the bathroom gcfi. Fixed it myself when I figured it out, but finding that was rather unexpected.
1:38 The musician in me heard a “wet power chord” and thought of a guitar power chord with wet distortion
Well which one should I pee on? That chord or that chord or in my chords? I'm sorry, it's 3:30 am 11 months later. This is an awesome and most important channel. This is why UA-cam was invented.
As an electrical engineer and musician, if you only knew the dangers... Your electric guitar's safely grounded, you'd think. Untill your lips touch the phantom powered mic, burning and blistering your lips. Yup, that was a "safe" voltage and current, but boy does it hurt. How to prevent? Don't ground your amp. Also, imagine: outdoor gig, rainy, foggy or damp weather. Got a wall of marshall/vox/*insert favorite flavour*. How safe do you think it is? Well, of course it has a transformer, so high voltage is separated from line. But not the energy. And where does every ground fault go? You didn't ground your amp to not be shocked by the mic. So every fault goes through anything else grounded. Via your guitar strings, through you to the ground you are standing on. And this was just one example...
In Italy we call those devices (which are normally fitted inside the distribution panel) “salvavita”, literally lifesaver, and I always loved that name, because it speaks for itself and you don’t need to know what residual current or a ground fault is, you know it’s to save your life (also we have 230v which is much more dangerous)
Actually we call them 'interruttori differenziali' (differential switches). Salvavita is a BTicino trademark. But I agree that the name has been selected well.
Davide Bacchi technical term whatever, but everybody calls them that, the only problem is that most people tend to call also the MCBs, with only overcurrent protection “salvavita” which is wrong and might lead to confusion
Also, fun fact, they call them salvavita too in Malta
Voltage is not what kills you, it's the amps
@@tally1604 Can't have amps without voltage. For a given resistance (e.g. a human), current flow is dependent on voltage.
Very interesting. At my house, there are non-GFCI outlets and various light switches that are daisy-chained off each other into God only knows how many directions, including hot lines to one thing and the neutral to a different thing. At one time, the codes allowed for such things. No idea which plugs/switches are on the original leads and which ones are the daisy chained ones. Keeps things interesting! And about two-thirds of the house is on a single breaker (although, to be fair, we've made it this far!). Now, working with having an electrician try to make sense out of all of this without needing a home equity loan.
I have a lot of fish tanks, so my husband and I became intimately familiar with installing these things--because if I end up with 75 gallons pouring out onto my floor, I want to be able to run up and try to stop it, instead of worrying whether there's a wet cord or outlet somewhere that's out to get me. XD
Excellent video, and I’m glad you touched on the differences between this and a breaker - I made the mistaken assumption that they were the same kind of thing, except that the GFCIs might be faster in their response. I’m glad to learn the truth though.
I’ll also be sure to test these more regularly now that I’m more familiar with them. Good public service announcement!
That's something that confused me about this video, in Australia/Europe/elsewhere, the GFCI/RCDs are integrated with circuit breakers so they have additional protections. E.g. if there is a large amount of current being drawn when it trips, our breakers can handle that but I don't know how the American GFCI's are supposed to handle the flash over.
+Nick Stallman If I were to hazard a guess I would assume that the US outlets are designed under the assumption that they are protected by a 20A breaker and thus built with enough heat dissipation capacity to cope with the overcurrent for as long as it would take the breaker to respond. For the most part the breaker will be faster the higher the current so it's relatively consistent the amount of energy it would need to handle. I say relatively as of course extreme edge cases will destroy that such as suddenly being exposed to multiple megavolts such as in a lightning strike chances are that would indeed fry the GFCI and most of the electrical equipment attached to the circuit.
In the US any circuit that has a GFCI receptacle will ALSO be fed from a circuit breaker, either 15A or 20A and so the circuit will have short circuit and overload protection as well.
He didn't mention it, but there are GFI breakers in the US as well. These devices combine short circuit, overload and GFI protection in a single unit and protect entire circuits...identical to RCBOs in Europe. It's just less common to use GFI breakers rather than receptacles.
14:50 “shape of an L on her fore head” top left by his hand
an RCD/GFCI video is just about the last place where i would've expected an all star reference... fucks sake lol
GOLD! 😹
Well, the years stop comin' and they don't stop comin'
Hey now!!!
(You're an all-star)
WELL, THE YEARS START COMING AND THEY DONT STOP COMING
FED TO THE RULES AND I HIT THE GROUND RUNNING
DIDNT MAKE SENSE NOT TO LIVE FOR FUN
YOUR BRAIN GETS SMART BUT YOUR HEAD GETS DUMB
Excellent video. One thing I'll add (well...recommend)...particularly in Kitchens for the counter receptacles. Don't string them (don't use one and then wire additional receptacles, as they are designed). The 5mA current protection is total and if you are cooking some masterpiece that has the mixer, toaster, blender...and whatnot all going...these devices are often "reactive" loads that will have an influence on the current and timing that can cause a false-trip. Spend the extra money and let EACH receptacle be its own GFCI and you will never get false-trips again but be every bit as protected.
In the USA you can (and in some cases) do get breakers with GFCI (and pretty much all circuits are now AFCI...different subject). Depending on what is being protected and where your breaker panel is, it would be a big annoyance to have to trundle down in the the basement/garage or wherever your panel is just to reset the breaker for this sort of trip. This also comes back to the more stuff you have plugged into the circuit and the longer the cable run is, the greater the likelihood of a false trip becomes (that long wire run to the receptacles actually consumes some electricity to heat up the wire too and you don't want that counting against you on your 5mA.
Lastly, it was quite informative that internally the receptacle you showed has 20A contacts though a difference in the two models you didn't present is that a "TR" is going to also be Tamper Resistant (has the little doors to prevent kids from sticking things in). So you might get a price difference there though yes, 20A receptacles do tend to be notably pricier than their 15A counterparts.
This system saved my life when I was in Grade 1, thanks for explaining
In Europe, all safety devices are usually centralised, and it has been years since these elements were allowed to be placed outside the control panel.
Normally we call it a differential, and we have them calibrated to 30 mA.
(30 mA (for full circuit, not for one plug) and 230 AC volts, of course.)
As for the circuit-breakers, they are the same but in a panel, they also protect against overcurrent and short circuits.
I think it is 30 mA for bathrooms and 300mA for general circuits
15 mA or 30 mA. If you exceed 30 mA in losses you need to split the circuit. (In Spain and in houses, not industrial this is another thing).
More than 30 mA will kill you... this is the reason that forces you to split the circuits in 30 mA max possible losses. In any situation will stop you to death ;)
Maybe in Belgium is different don't know...
Same in Russia. All houses and apartments (except for old ones) must have differential breakers in main panel
like this imgur.com/a/22cEvV5
In Belgium it's 30mA for moist locations (like bathroom), 300mA for dry locations and if you go extremely wet (submerged) it should even be 10mA. In dry conditions you should be able to survive a very short jolt of 230V/300mA but under the right conditions even a 230V/30mA jolt can kill you
In Denmark 30mA RCDs are required on all circuits up to 20A (those above are used for distribution). It has been a requirement for new houses since 1975, and in 2008 it became a requirement for all installations. Even those that where legal when they where made. Non-private buildings are required to hire licensed electricians to test the RDCs every year, who uses equipment that measure that the RCD triggers fast enough.
1:35 also because plumbing is grounded so in addition to your wet hands having an easier connection to live, your body is more likely to have a decent path to ground
I love your content, it's so easy to digest and informative. At first I was like, "how can someone take 20 minutes explains why the high setting on fans are first" but after watching you videos, it makes so much more sense lol
You my friend are skilled in the art of explaining things in a very concise and easy to understand manner. I appreciate what you do. Keep doing it. Love being informed and educated. Knowledge is the enemy of ignorance.
You can buy GFCI circuit breakers in the United States, they just aren't as common. They are easily found at Home Depot or Lowes and they even make ones that have a dual function of AFCI and GFCI. AFCI is also available in GFCI style receptacles too with some also being dual function with GFCI. AFCI is now required on almost every circuit in the house (in states that have adopted the latest electrical code) including ones that have previously required or have not required GFCI protection. You should do a video about how AFCI is different from GFCI now.
Saw a video on youtube where a hams radio would trip his neighbors AFCI!
Yeah AFCI needs some work on defining what exactly is the trip threshold, right now there's too many harmless things that can trip them, "safer" or not.
It's not safer if it generates so many false positives that you can't tell if it was a real fault or just another nuisance trip event.
44R0Ndin. AFCI circuit breakeres have gotten better at detecting actual arcs instead of electronic noise. If you are having a problem with your electronics nuisance tripping your circuit breaker, it could be one from the early 2000's and would easilly be solved by replacing the arc fault breaker with a more modern one.
Lol used to have a paper shredder that would turn on if you keyed a walkie talkies next to it
They also make combo GFCI *and* AFCI circuit breakers now. Also, while GFCI receptacles often trip at 5mA, the circuit breakers won't trip until around 30mA.
In Italy are centralized and (fun fact) we call them salvavita which literally means "life saver".
Nicola Ramoso I only learnt that US homes don’t have it centralised when I first visit the US a few years ago. I was shocked (sorry). I always take it as granted, grow up in Hong Kong we have this as standard since the 80s. I also hate the US plug. The plug get loosen from socket easy, it expose metal with live current when not fully plugged in. In Hong Kong we had a mixed of US plug and European plug until it was all standardized to UK plug in the late 80s I think, man it is so much nicer!
@3:14 in Romania we call it differential safety/breaker, it's the kind that protects the entire house. But if you are smart/you have enough money, you will put a precise one per room.
I was amazed to find out, in another video of yours or electriboom, that american style GFCI is much more precise than our usual RCBO.
Thanks to videos like this and others on this channel, I've been getting much more interested in learning about electricity in America. I've been watching avidly for years and I'm now pursuing an electrician certification in my state.
I already know all of this(as a electricien). but I subbed because you deserve more views, you explain it very well.
greets from the netherlands!
I must say, your editing, concise & logical explanations and humour make for some of the best tech viewing on the 'net. Keep up the great work.
Excelsior!
If I was smarter I would have thought to say that first. Spot frikken on!
The past year I've been living in my own home and I find myself coming back to these videos often to understand what to change or do with my home
My other half doesn't quite share my love for educational content on this platform, but she sure liked your content. Both the personality, humor and presentation. I love this channel myself, just thought I'd share. Good work bud, as always!
"Will I ask a forth question?" , funniest thing heard on UA-cam today.
I just started watching your videos. Love your sense of humor and I feel like a genius after watching them. Grasping concepts like these is not easy for me but the way you break it down really helps keep it interesting and practical 👍
Just stumbled on this video. As usual, amazing (and hilarious) job explaining how GFCI/RCDs work! I had one of these at my last apartment (condo) and one day it tripped - for no apparent reason (the RCD was in the service panel). So I would reset it and anywhere from 15 seconds to 5 minutes later it would trip again! After looking around a bit, I found a leaky pipe was dripping water onto a power outlet under my kitchen sink! The RCD was a lifesaver!!
This video definitely gave me an appreciation for these little gadgets that I'd never had before. I never put it together that "test" meant you were actually testing the interrupter! I'm going to enjoy doing it now, knowing what's happening inside the device. Thanks! :)
My house, and many houses in Michigan since the 80s, have GFIs in the circuit panels centralized for all electrical outlets (indoors and outdoors outlets in my case). And indeed you do spend allot of time running back and forth to the panel for trouble shooting.
"Will I ask a fourth question?" - laughed out loud at that. Good job throwing those subtleties into the content, Alec.
10:22 the subtle humor on this channel's videos never fail to give me a giggle
Interesting to note that ground fault switches are built into all circuit breakers here in Norway by law (on newer systems anyway). Not just in the bathroom either, but the whole house.
we have this in germany too
In Belgium we are (required) to have a big GFCI ("differential", translated from our flemish/kinda french word for it) for everything (300mA if I recall) and for humid rooms an additional more sensitive one (30mA). I had no idea they used in the USA them on idividual outlets, thanks for the video!
Also, great (still rather safe in my opinion due to the way it's configured) explanation setup!
Also great pro and con explanation for both setups, glad I watched the whole video!
Allowing large leakage currents is fine for protecting the equipment, but doesn't protect people from shock. If you have a heating element that suddenly finds a path to ground inside your electric kettle, it trips. But if a person grabs both the hot and neutral, they can get electrocuted because a RCD doesn't detect this as a fault. The GFCI design adds this protection and is called a RCBO in the UK.
That is likely because of TT earthing. I the US they use TN-C-S so on case if a fault hight current flows through the neutral and thr breaker trips. In TT the fault current is just a few amperes so one needs additional protection like a 100-300 mA RCD.
Great video. I'm ancient enough to remember when these came into widespread use (mid 70s) and I have always been impressed with the technology. Makes me shudder to think of all the outdoor holiday lights we plugged in in the rain and snow, without such protective devices.
In Italy we call them "salva vita" that means literally "life saver" :D
Awesome topic, brother! To be honest, I rolled my eyes at this upon reading the thumbnail because I’ve known for several years now that these continually monitor the amperage in/out looking for any potential difference and breaking continuity once a difference arises. (I’m a know-it-all as well....) I can honestly say that you taught me some shit today. I never knew exactly how the difference was monitored. I assumed it literally monitored both leads individually and compared them. It’s so much simpler than that! It’s actually genius in its simplicity! Thanks again, brother! ✊🏾
Edit: I might add that the only reason I’ve never taken one apart myself is the expense of them. I’m a pretty cheap guy...😂 I love tearing Shit apart to see what makes a thing “tick”, but it’s a battle between the compulsion to conduct exploratory surgery on a device, and the compulsion to not spend money unnecessarily...
These things are just centralized in European homes and active on all the wiring.
It makes them a bit more of a pain to reset if a fault occurs, but safer overall imo, because you don't have unprotected outlets, lamps or whatever else in your home. And since they do have to be checked on every so often to see if they still cut the power quickly enough, a single one in a centralized location is much easier to keep track of than potentially a dozen or so throughout the house, and cheaper to replace if it does fail.
Edit: I see now you brought this up in the video, and you bring up some valid points why having these things decentralized can be advantageous, the ideal solution would probably be somewhere in the middle, like having one for each room and etc., but all accessible from a central service panel.
Just my two cents on the matter.
Well done video! Explains what had been a mystery I experienced a while ago in the townhouse I'm renting. The regular outlet in my upstairs bathroom stopped working. I checked the breakers in the basement and found nothing wrong. I then went to use the outlet in the downstairs bathroom that had the test and reset buttons on it and found the reset button popped out. After resetting it, the upstairs outlet worked. Even though I thought both bathrooms were on separate circuits (the lights probably are), now I understand how the outlets are connected.
I was expecting by the power of purchasing two.
It is nice to get refresher courses with a little bit of extra knowledge that wasn't necessarily known. Great videos
Easily the most informative and simple explanation of a GFCI.
The bulb demonstration was amazing. And very safe! With that 'do not do this at home' warning, I thought you were going to jam a hot dog into the hot pin hole. LOL!
i didn't know i had one of these in my bathroom until seeing this video and checking
i've lived here for 17 years
Awesome! What an excellent breakdown of the gfci. Thank you for sharing your knowledge.
Why are these videos so satisfying to watch?
I am annoyed by the houses that have one of these for a whole group of outlets. When each outlet in a danger zone has its own GFCI, you can pretty much instantly find the cause
After just installing one of these, I decided I wanted a refresher on how it worked inside, so I looked up this video (which I watched ages ago). Thanks for making this. :)
And, I just watched again after sharing it with a friend who had one trip, but didn't know what they were. Thanks again, Alec! :)
+1 for sneaking in that Smashmouth reference. Lol
Yota_Ninja what's your UA-cam icon? It looks like an orthodox symbol.
No idea what that is lol. It's an Iron Cross with "YOTA" inside of it, I don't remember what font I used though.
Yota_Ninja it is spelled wrong :p
It spells ψοτα not γιωτα
;ρ
I am shocked to know these GFCI things do exist. Never saw these in Brazil, I've googled for it and i found this kind of outlet is only obligatory in construction sites.... and we do use electrical showers without it here *yikes.*
You can't use the showers you install with a GFCI. Those showers do on purpose what a GFCI is built to prevent (current to ground).
Yeah, when I saw on UA-cam those electrical showers you mention my brain nearly melted from the "nope" overload. But as far as GFCIs go, only newly wired homes have them here in Romania too, which means basically nobody ever saw one.
Check your electrical panel for a similar test button. The rest of the world puts them there, not in individual outlets. Mind you if you don't see a test button there either and you own your house then you might want to call an electrician.....
In Australia only new properties or rented properties have them. Or old properties that have had major electrical work done, by law any major works will include installation of an RCD
@@AttilaAsztalos We had them in Oman since the late 90's afaik
That's funny, here in France, we call them « differential circuit breakers » (disjoncteur différentiel). That actually really helped me to understand how they work.
i love that you awnsered our burning question number 3 so damn quickly!
thank you!!! :)
I like your channel. I learn something every time I watch.
13:51 'a shock in their bedroom' -> "steve, how could you!"
Excellent description, and background for how you do things in the US (for those of us not in the US). I don't think we have RCDs built in to the outlets in Australia, but I have a device I bought for ~AU$30 that plugs into the regular outlet, then you plug your appliance into that.
You always do an excellent job explaining these technologies.
In my country they are in the general box at the beginning of the house circuit and cut all power, and they are call Differential Switches. BTW Very interesting video!
in the UK there used to be a thing called an earth leakage operated circuit breaker, which shut off power to the entire house when it tripped, but it had a major flaw (before the RCD took its place, and some installations in the UK have one RCD for the whole house, although that is no longer allowed in the regulations here, as newer installations are required to be either Dual RCD or have RCBOs, or a combination of RCDs and RCBOs)
14:49 no one has mentioned that fact that he says "shape" and in the top left says "of an "L" on her forehead"
It was only the 20th time I watched this video that I noticed it! 😂
😂😂😂😂😂😂
did I mention you're one of the best things that ever happenned to youtube? thank you so much!
Am doing University mechanical engineering industrial training, and I can say that this video officially helped me learn stuff I need to know before I was taught.
Before I could move into this old house, the ordinances required the seller, among many other "violations" written up by the city inspector, to install GFCI's in several locations, and be inspected (again) by the city inspector. I test the GFCI's periodically. One day I, having lived there over ten years, I tested the one in the main bathroom, but for the first time leaving the radio still plugged in, which is a bit awkward, but I didn't want to miss a chunk of my program. And I didn't. The radio was still playing after the GFCI tripped. For over ten years I would have been electrocuted if whatever the GFCI was supposed to be protecting me from had occurred. Not really surprisingly, it turned out that the wires to the "line" were reversed with the wires to the "load," and the GFCI worked right when rewired. Somebody guessed wrong. Aren't electricians and inspectors supposed to know these things?
Of course I seldom take the radio right into the bathtub water with me, so no harm done really.
Well my guess would be that either the seller did it themselves or had a buddy with a screw driver do it, instead of a trained electrician
14:50 I feel proud for paying attention (look in the corner)
Ok
It's a very odd little message. Shouldn't it say "T" instead of "L"? I'm assuming it refers to the extra part on the outlet holes.
It's 5 am and I have no clue what I'm watching, but it's very entertaining
This gentleman provides excellent information and a side order of humor.
Copious thanks! Most of my adult life I've seen these outlets. I viewed them with a full glaze over my eyes as I had zero concept of what they were about.
After this brief tutorial it's a whole new world of viewing the outlets in my house.
I just love this, it's very interresting and in my experience, finding out what device tripped your circuit isn't that hard, because in most cases it directly happens when you plug it in, but I can see the benefit on having this on every outlet. But isn't it weird that it doesn't protect for short circuits? You could see that as the job of the circuit braker, but it just seems handy. Mainly, because my dad just snips live wires, because he couldn't be bother to walk to our service panel. (PS. I'm from the EU so I don't exactly understand the US version of the system)
Most of the time, you're right, it's pretty easy. But it isn't always. If it happens when you turn on the device instead, that's just as easy.
But some stuff works on a timer. If it's something you've plugged into a timer switch, then you should be able to easily identify it when you test the timer when you first set it up. Everybody tests these things when they set them up, right? (Oops. I didn't at least once.)
Other situations can be more complex. When you have complicated electrical connections, such as a computer and peripherals that are wired to it, the fault could only occur when a specific thing is attempted. For example, a periodic check of the printer's ink supply could cause a momentary residual current to flow through the cable to the printer and out the wrong neutral power socket. If you keep your printer off most of the time, stuff only fails on rare intervals. If the periodic check happens every half hour, and most of the time you need to print something the printer's only on for less than 5 minutes, you may not even associate it with the fact the printer was on for a while.
There are other complex situations, I just gave the computer example because I work with them a lot so I'm familiar with it.
The most baffling RCCI problem I ever diagnosed was shortly after I got married. We moved into an apartment whose RCCI outlets had colored reset and test buttons as shown in the video. For the first few months, at seemingly random intervals, the RCCI outlets would trip. I was never around when it happened, and there wasn't anything plugged into them. Finally, my ex asked me if I knew how long it took the circuit breaker in the bathroom to reset. She'd been trying to test them for months, but they always took long enough to reset she gave up waiting. (To be clear, we didn't get divorced over that. We didn't even argue over it. Also, we're still friends. I'm sure I'd have encountered more baffling RCCI problems if I were an electrician, but I'm just a computer programmer.)
As an electrician I’m happy you explained this I have to put this in because of the nec and sometimes I see people have installed there own receptacles right next to sinks
I was building some grow lights recently, and I was concerned about potential shorts and the risk of fires and electrocution. I grounded the whole system and plugged it into a GFCI plug. As soon as I plugged it in, the GFCI tripped. Looking closely, I found a single stray strand of copper wire where it wasn't supposed to be and it created a short. I was glad for the GFCI because I could have easily gotten a shock or some other harm. It's videos like this that had me install a dual GFCI/AFCI on that circuit.
I had a weird situation in an older house where I was replacing ungrounded outlets with grounded ones. I shut off only the breaker for the outlet I was changing, and got zapped on one outlet, because each half was on a different breaker. After that, I tested both halves for power before removing an outlet.