Newbee Question

I am working towards certification, and as part of one of the required essays looked at electrical inspections, specifically the AFCI testing article in the database. It states that when a circuit tests okay, the AFCI tester (indicator) will trip the breaker. I’m a little confused, because in one of Nick’s inspection videos he say he would never unplug or turn off computers, tvs etc. Isn’t tripping the breaker essentially the same as unplugging a device?

Thanks in advance for any help understanding this.

If the clients are home I inform them I’m going to trip the AFCI breakers and to shut down any computers.

There has been some debate about this. If the house is occupied at the time of inspection I don’t test them (AFCI). If the house is vacant then I do.

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Take into account what may be connected to that particular circuit and make a judgement call. Finding a faulty breaker is a good thing, but if something goes wrong is it worth frying a $2K desktop? Or killing power to a full freezer and not being able to reset?
There was a similar discussion not long ago about tripping GFCIs and not being able to reset them.

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Ditto that.
An occupied home has too many possible sensitive devices that could be affected. Shut down the power to an Oxygen Concentrator system by mistake and watch it NOT reset (if you even know about it). Whatcha gonna do when the tenant gets home and there’s no available Oxygen for their use??

(NO, has never happened to me.)!

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I test them all.

I send emails to all LAs before the inspection letting them know what I need access to such as the electric panel and attic access areas, and that I’ll be testing GFCI & AFCI devises as part of my inspection.

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^ What he said.

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