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  1. #1
    LUPE JIMENEZ's Avatar
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    Default Two breakers with same neutral

    Is it o.k. for two 15A breakers on separate buses to share one neutral wire?

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  2. #2
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    Default Re: Two breakers with same neutral

    Welcome, Lupe.

    It can be ok to share a neutral, yes.

    Have a look at this:

    Shared Neutral [Archive] - Mike Holt's Forum

    "There is no exception to the rule that every rule has an exception." -James Thurber, writer and cartoonist (1894-1961)
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    Default Re: Two breakers with same neutral

    Multi-wire-branch circuit.

    Both breakers should be turned off when working anywhere on the circuit. Wiring errors by DIYers and unqualified handy-types can lead to dangerous consequences.

    Very common in the windy city, land of EMT conduit and pulled conductors, NOT cable wiring methods.

    Contact a licensed, in the city of Chicago, ELECTRICIAN to do the work for you.

    Unqualified parties should NOT be poking around in the panel behind the dead-front cover.


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    Default Re: Two breakers with same neutral

    Quote Originally Posted by John Arnold View Post
    It can be ok to share a neutral, yes.
    Provided that the "hot" wires are correctly connected. I find miswired multi-wire circuits 2-3 times a month. They are constantly done wrong.

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    Default Re: Two breakers with same neutral

    FK, the NEC requires a common means of disconnect for any MWBC installed under the 08 edition. The conductors are also supposed to be grouped together, a wire tie would work.


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    Default Re: Two breakers with same neutral

    The wire tie is only to group the conductors, not to act as a handle tie.


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    Default Re: Two breakers with same neutral

    I suspect (I could be mistaken) that he is referring to the manufactured handle tie that looks like it is made from a bent wire. Not a piece of wire stuck on the breaker handles.

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  8. #8
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    Default Re: Two breakers with same neutral

    Quote Originally Posted by Gunnar Alquist View Post
    I suspect (I could be mistaken) that he is referring to the manufactured handle tie that looks like it is made from a bent wire. Not a piece of wire stuck on the breaker handles.

    No, your suspicions are incorrect. The wire tie(s) reference 2008 NEC was to conductors, not circuit breaker switch handles, i.e. "grouping" of the conductors of a MWBC.

    Jim Port is and was referring to the Code requirement regarding "grouping" indications of the conductors for a Multi-wire Branch Circuit, in the same cable sheath or conduit and where it/they enter and leave a box, cabinet, junction, pull-point, etc.

    I realize this may be a foreign concept to ya'll mostly "seeing" 15- or 12-3 NM cables w/ or w/o ground and unfamiliar with conduit; but conductors of more than one circuit's individual conductors can be pulled through a common wireway/conduit.

    The OP comes from Chicago - an area where NM is NOT permitted, where the use of metallic conduit or cable is required. Where pulling individual conductors via conduit IS the NORM, as is using that bonded EMT as circuit ECGs (a legal, legitimate wiring method for circuit equipment grounding conductors).

    It is the conductors J.P. is referring to "indicating" a "grouping" via the use of "wire tie(s)" within the panel cabinet or junction box, or other point of access.

    A "wire" (conductor) "tie" is not sufficient for interconnecting INDIVIDUAL circuit breakers or their switch handles on a MWBC.

    There are many more recently added changes in more recent additions of the unammended NEC regarding MWBCs, such as assuring continuous groundED conductor ("neutral") continuity, thus NOW requiring for example "pigtailing of the "neutral" conductor at devices such as receptacles, otherwise wired as "feed through", thus assuring connection is not broken for the MWBC when the "device" (in this case the receptacle yoke) is disconnected or removed from the "circuit". These code revisions are not retroactive or applicable to an installation pre-dating, or a jurisdiction which has not adopted either those sections, or editions of the NEC. However, I do not recall anything in the OP from the "new member" which asks about Code. Further, the post is constructed so poorly as to indicate a neutral wire between two breakers, not a shared neutral in the wiring of the circuit (conductors), there is also NO reference to single phase service - and poly-phase is also a "norm" in many areas/streets/neighborhoods where commercial/industrial and residential can share the same short block & multi-family buildings are often transformer supplied service.

    Finally, quoting 2008 NEC is inapplicable to the OP or his post. He neither asked about an inapplicable edition to his location, or inquired as to CODE. The Chity of Chicago does NOT use 2008 NEC (IIRC they're entrenched in an early-to-mid 90s edition references - in fact references contradict with different edition year references depending on the application- with local amendments and a host of specialized locally drafted code provisions). And like Steve Martin's title character in "The Jerk" announcing the arrival of the new Phone Book (Directory), The 2011 edition of the NEC is OUT, which of course would be "The Latest" edition of the NEC.

    P.S. for "fritzkelly" who was previously unfamiliar with the NEC, and required step-by-step instructions on how and where to view the 2002, 2005 and 2008 editions, or how to order them, and envoked numerous private messages to me early on as to how to acquire/access such information a few short years ago...and still can't get the "basics" under his "belt" on the most simplest of "issues" you really shouldn't be led down an erroneous path of misintrepretation G.

    Last edited by H.G. Watson, Sr.; 10-05-2010 at 07:44 AM.

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