In today's video I Want to talk about one of the biggest problems I see in the HVAC industry I See this rule broken all the time and I think there's a lot of confusion around this rule that I'm going to talk about in this video. What I'm hoping to do is to eliminate a lot of confusion and what's really good is you as a homeowner can know if there's a problem here immediately. What I'm talking about is most HVAC systems on the outdoor unit the indoor units sometimes but the outdoor unit. It's going to have what's called a Max fuse amps size or a max circuit breaker size.

There's different verbes depending on what brand it is. It might literally say circuit breaker size or MFA might be the acronym it uses but essentially it's telling you what size breaker or what's the largest breaker that can be installed with this unit. And part of the confusion here is a couple things. The first thing is electricians will sometimes go by by the wire size.

They'll say well, the unit has this size wiring in there and I don't want to get into all the ends and outs of why that's incorrect You as the homeowner, you as an electrician an HVAC Pro whoever you are that is deciding whether or not this breaker is sized properly need to go by that label Period. There's no gray area on that. and I've actually had conversations with actual electricians on why that is why they think it's one way versus another. They'll also say to me if it says 35 amps they'll say well, I can go up to 40 then just different things like that.

There's no gray area here that these units. If they say it needs to be a Max fuse size or a Max breaker size, it needs to be that size or smaller. That's the maximum that you can put on that system. Now you can go smaller technically by code, but I probably wouldn't recommend it in most cases.

If the unit says that it is a Max size, say 35 amps and your electrician says you can't have 35 by code I can go up to 40 and you know you can't have 35, they don't make it or they don't sell it I Say this lightly, but I would maybe get a second opinion if not find another electrician that is an old school way of thinking and that used to be true and certain situations when it came to the National Electric Code you could go up in size and certain situation. but today when that unit says that it's got a Max fuse amps, then that's the size it needs to be Now I will say me as a professional I Don't usually argue with the electrician on that if he says that to me, I'll usually just let the homeowner know that. Hey, that's a concern, but it's ultimately up to the homeowner and/ or electrician what they do in that situation. But I Don't argue with them when it comes to Virginia There are certain things that I can and cannot do under my license and running line voltage electric to my unit is not one of them and so that brings me to my last bit of all of this and that is I Also, don't determine what size wire that wire needs to be if electrician thinks it should be one size versus another.

I Don't usually argue with them on that unless I think there's a huge safety problem, but there are things that they need to take into account that I don't as the heating and air pro installing that Appliance I don't have to worry about the wire size and things like that as much as they do. They got to take into account distance from the panel and other reasons why they may drate that wire and go up in size. In fact, I've even asked some electricians to go up in size. It's okay to go up in size on the wiring, it's just not okay to go up in size on the breaker.

One example of that might be I have had many splits installed and it'll say that the breaker size needs to be a double pole 15 amp breaker and I'll still ask that electrician if he doesn't mind going ahead and running 12 gauge wire for a lot of reasons, one of those being you just never know the future If someone were to come behind us and install a larger unit or a unit that calls for a larger breaker size and they just don't take into account the size of the wire that's there. To me, that's just small things, that's a little bit of a pet peeve. But the ultimate thing is if you see this video and if you get anything out of it is you as the homeowner number one, this is a big deal. It's a huge deal.

You should go right now and go look. I Wouldn't go to sleep tonight if you catch this video. Wouldn't go to sleep tonight without laying eyes on that label on the outdoor unit and then laying eyes on that breaker size because I See this rule broken all the time and it's not okay. Guys will sometimes install much larger Breakers and it's not okay and I've heard this argued I've heard guys argue over well, if it's this temperature or if it's this wire or all these different scenarios why it is or is not okay.

The bottom line is you are at risk for a possible fire if you are not doing things properly if you're not having things installed properly and so this is not only a major one, but it is a easy one for you to check as the homeowner in that just looking on that label finding out what the MFA Max Fuse amps Max Fuse Max Breaker size Whatever verbage they use there, it may say minimum. It may say minimum. circuit amps or something like that. it.

that doesn't matter as much in this scenario, but you need to know what that Max is and that's the largest that your breaker can be and you'll be able to check that yourself. So thanks for watching. If you like this video I Think you'll like this one even more. It's where I share three secrets that most heating and air technicians don't want you to know.

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