On Fri, 27 Jun 2008 19:01:16 +1000, Herodotus
wrote:

On Fri, 27 Jun 2008 01:53:57 GMT, Jere Lull wrote:

On 2008-06-26 08:11:48 -0400, Herodotus said:

I have been looking for a 30 AMP circuit breaker to add to my rebuild
of switch panel on Herodotus.

I had often wondered if two 15 AMP ones in parallel would work and be
equivalent to a single 30 AMP one but thought "No, thats dumb - too
simple a solution"

I wonder about the original premise, as I have a 50 amp breaker. It's
not in the panel, in fact it protects the panel, but they exist. As I
recall, it mounts through a 1/4 or 3/8" hole, a simple push-button.

The shop - Jaycar, a nation wide store in Australia similar to what
Radioshacks used to be like did not had the push buttom type you write
of in 50 AMPs but not in 30 in their rather extensive catalogue.

Peter


Peter,

I assume that you are looking for an "If all else fails this one
blows" sort of devise like the main entrance fuses on a house.

Try any commercial electric shop. You probably will have to be
satisfied with an "AC" breaker but, hopefully, you are not using it as
a switch. As a safety device it will work just fine. A friend of mine
did empirical tests on "AC" breakers using 12 VDC and the breakers
trip at the rated amperage. If you don't like that idea use a fuse -
the kind that have a copper tongue at each end. Drill a hole and bolt
them into the system.

I'm still in the yard. Top sides done and now trying to finish the
bottom in between rain squalls. The bottom is faired and mostly sanded
- hopefully we'll finish that today. then a seal coat, which we will
need good weather for and then a tie coat and the anti-fouling and
back in the water.

I've been doing an anti-rain dance on the fore deck every morning but
it isn't working very well - clear at 06:00 and by 09:00 black clouds
building up in the west.

Bruce-in-Bangkok
(correct Address is bpaige125atgmaildotcom)

On Sat, 28 Jun 2008 14:25:51 +0700, Bruce in Bangkok
wrote:

On Fri, 27 Jun 2008 19:01:16 +1000, Herodotus
wrote:

On Fri, 27 Jun 2008 01:53:57 GMT, Jere Lull wrote:

On 2008-06-26 08:11:48 -0400, Herodotus said:

I have been looking for a 30 AMP circuit breaker to add to my rebuild
of switch panel on Herodotus.

I had often wondered if two 15 AMP ones in parallel would work and be
equivalent to a single 30 AMP one but thought "No, thats dumb - too
simple a solution"

I wonder about the original premise, as I have a 50 amp breaker. It's
not in the panel, in fact it protects the panel, but they exist. As I
recall, it mounts through a 1/4 or 3/8" hole, a simple push-button.

The shop - Jaycar, a nation wide store in Australia similar to what
Radioshacks used to be like did not had the push buttom type you write
of in 50 AMPs but not in 30 in their rather extensive catalogue.

Peter


Peter,

I assume that you are looking for an "If all else fails this one
blows" sort of devise like the main entrance fuses on a house.

Try any commercial electric shop. You probably will have to be
satisfied with an "AC" breaker but, hopefully, you are not using it as
a switch. As a safety device it will work just fine. A friend of mine
did empirical tests on "AC" breakers using 12 VDC and the breakers
trip at the rated amperage. If you don't like that idea use a fuse -
the kind that have a copper tongue at each end. Drill a hole and bolt
them into the system.

I'm still in the yard. Top sides done and now trying to finish the
bottom in between rain squalls. The bottom is faired and mostly sanded
- hopefully we'll finish that today. then a seal coat, which we will
need good weather for and then a tie coat and the anti-fouling and
back in the water.

I've been doing an anti-rain dance on the fore deck every morning but
it isn't working very well - clear at 06:00 and by 09:00 black clouds
building up in the west.

Bruce-in-Bangkok
(correct Address is bpaige125atgmaildotcom)

Hi Bruce,
Thanks for this advice.

I am actually wanting to use them on my main switchboard as circuit
fuses. I meant to say in my posting that I can get 25 and 50 AMP
circuit breakers but no 30 AMP ones. After adding extra gear to the
boat in the many years after launching I have fuses in different
places as at the time it was easier to add an extra circuit off
another without doing the fiddly work of adding to the switchboard.

I shall have a look at those you wrote of.

Regarding your boat work, I shall pray for good weather for you at
next Friday prayers as, being a Moslem, I am closer to God than you
and it should thus be more effective than your pagan rain dance.
Perhaps you should do a Huckleberry Finn thing with a dead cat in a
stump full of water? It does get rid of warts and could also be
effective in stopping rain.

I may have some time when I go home from Sydney soon to shoot up your
way so that I can insult you in person and not from behind the
safeguard of the internet. I have been told that I may need to visit
Bangkok with some colleagues.

Good luck for the project.

cheers
Peter

On Sun, 29 Jun 2008 10:23:20 +1000, Herodotus
wrote:

On Sat, 28 Jun 2008 14:25:51 +0700, Bruce in Bangkok
wrote:

On Fri, 27 Jun 2008 19:01:16 +1000, Herodotus
wrote:

On Fri, 27 Jun 2008 01:53:57 GMT, Jere Lull wrote:

On 2008-06-26 08:11:48 -0400, Herodotus said:

I have been looking for a 30 AMP circuit breaker to add to my rebuild
of switch panel on Herodotus.

I had often wondered if two 15 AMP ones in parallel would work and be
equivalent to a single 30 AMP one but thought "No, thats dumb - too
simple a solution"

I wonder about the original premise, as I have a 50 amp breaker. It's
not in the panel, in fact it protects the panel, but they exist. As I
recall, it mounts through a 1/4 or 3/8" hole, a simple push-button.

The shop - Jaycar, a nation wide store in Australia similar to what
Radioshacks used to be like did not had the push buttom type you write
of in 50 AMPs but not in 30 in their rather extensive catalogue.

Peter


Peter,

I assume that you are looking for an "If all else fails this one
blows" sort of devise like the main entrance fuses on a house.

Try any commercial electric shop. You probably will have to be
satisfied with an "AC" breaker but, hopefully, you are not using it as
a switch. As a safety device it will work just fine. A friend of mine
did empirical tests on "AC" breakers using 12 VDC and the breakers
trip at the rated amperage. If you don't like that idea use a fuse -
the kind that have a copper tongue at each end. Drill a hole and bolt
them into the system.

I'm still in the yard. Top sides done and now trying to finish the
bottom in between rain squalls. The bottom is faired and mostly sanded
- hopefully we'll finish that today. then a seal coat, which we will
need good weather for and then a tie coat and the anti-fouling and
back in the water.

I've been doing an anti-rain dance on the fore deck every morning but
it isn't working very well - clear at 06:00 and by 09:00 black clouds
building up in the west.

Bruce-in-Bangkok
(correct Address is bpaige125atgmaildotcom)

Hi Bruce,
Thanks for this advice.

I am actually wanting to use them on my main switchboard as circuit
fuses. I meant to say in my posting that I can get 25 and 50 AMP
circuit breakers but no 30 AMP ones. After adding extra gear to the
boat in the many years after launching I have fuses in different
places as at the time it was easier to add an extra circuit off
another without doing the fiddly work of adding to the switchboard.

I shall have a look at those you wrote of.

Regarding your boat work, I shall pray for good weather for you at
next Friday prayers as, being a Moslem, I am closer to God than you
and it should thus be more effective than your pagan rain dance.
Perhaps you should do a Huckleberry Finn thing with a dead cat in a
stump full of water? It does get rid of warts and could also be
effective in stopping rain.

I may have some time when I go home from Sydney soon to shoot up your
way so that I can insult you in person and not from behind the
safeguard of the internet. I have been told that I may need to visit
Bangkok with some colleagues.

Good luck for the project.

cheers
Peter


My wife tells me that it is Karma. Must have forgot to buy her a new
washing machine or some other short coming and that is what is causing
the rain. She suggests an increase in her house keeping funds would
prove most successful in keeping the rains away.

If you do decide to travel to Bangkok e-mail me and we can set up a
meeting.


Bruce-in-Bangkok
(correct Address is bpaige125atgmaildotcom)

My wife tells me that it is Karma. Must have forgot to buy her a new
washing machine or some other short coming and that is what is causing
the rain. She suggests an increase in her house keeping funds would
prove most successful in keeping the rains away.

If you do decide to travel to Bangkok e-mail me and we can set up a
meeting.


Bruce-in-Bangkok
(correct Address is bpaige125atgmaildotcom)


I like your wife already - and I've never met her.

Wonderful woman. I love the direct, yet cultural approach.

Please pass on to her my respects.

cheers
Peter

Herodotus wrote in
:

However wait a while to see if Larry blows me out of the water and
proves me wrong.

Larry????

cheers
Peter



Paralleling them is fine AS LONG AS the wire they are protecting can
bear, safely, the whole amp load two breakers can produce. Most boat
wiring is way too light away from the starting circuits. Sure hope you
got big batteries!

I'm having great luck on DC circuits using automatic-resetting thermal
breakers GM puts in their crappy cars....or did until the plants
shutdown. They have high amp little plugin breakers you can buy at NAPA
and the sockets they plug into..

Of course, this won't do on most boats that don't have a DAMNED SWITCH
and wear out the breakers using them as switches....

The little breakers are really tiny and mounting them is really
easy....and cheap. I'm using them as branch circuit protectors on the
very heavily wired primary electronics bus, which uses a continuous-duty
12V contactor with lighted switch as a master disconnect to shut down
the whole electronics suite in all compartments from right by the hatch
with a bright red light (night vision cabin lighting) so my captain
doesn't go off and leave the whole boat running for weeks.

I put the branch breakers, which don't require a manual reset but reset
themselves in about 10 minutes in the heat, where the branch circuit
comes off the bus, whereever that may be (helm, nav, cockpit, etc.)

For 30A, I'd want to use #8 for short runs and #6 for long runs, up to
the bow for instance. As the sooper-dooper marine wire is just plastic
covered wire, I use the heavy speaker wire Radio Shack carries. When
the main warehouse store closed here, I bought it all, a lifetime
supply, for about 10c/ft...(c; My shed is full of it on big spools...a
lifetime supply.

Boeland wrote in news:4863ba21$0$17938$5fc30a8
@news.tiscali.it:

Paul wrote:
My only question would be. Will the current divide evenly between the
two paths? If there is corrosion on one path that would "force" all
the current to the other.
You are correct, corrosion on the contacts of one of the fuses will
upset the balance. The current will be evenly divided only if the
resistance (contacts, fuses, wires) in each leg is absolutely equal.
This is unlikely to be the case and a slight difference in resistance
will exist but won't be of much consequence. Even two identical fuses
will have a slight difference.
So just make sure that both current paths have good contacts and wires.
Boeland


If one of the breakers has corrosion or weakens its trip point, he'll soon
get fed up with the nuisance trips on one of the breakers and replace
it...Not really a problem.

Not sure about Fuses, but do know that one can purchase higher amp
marine DC breakers that are actually more then one CB in parallel.

http://bluesea.com/category/3/10/pro...ne/overview/22

Note the handles are all tied together. Closer inspection can see a
buss bar on the back that connects all the breakers together.

-al-

On Wed, 02 Jul 2008 05:26:29 +0000, Larry wrote:

Herodotus wrote in
:

However wait a while to see if Larry blows me out of the water and
proves me wrong.

Larry????

cheers
Peter



Paralleling them is fine AS LONG AS the wire they are protecting can
bear, safely, the whole amp load two breakers can produce. Most boat
wiring is way too light away from the starting circuits. Sure hope you
got big batteries!

I'm having great luck on DC circuits using automatic-resetting thermal
breakers GM puts in their crappy cars....or did until the plants
shutdown. They have high amp little plugin breakers you can buy at NAPA
and the sockets they plug into..

Of course, this won't do on most boats that don't have a DAMNED SWITCH
and wear out the breakers using them as switches....

The little breakers are really tiny and mounting them is really
easy....and cheap. I'm using them as branch circuit protectors on the
very heavily wired primary electronics bus, which uses a continuous-duty
12V contactor with lighted switch as a master disconnect to shut down
the whole electronics suite in all compartments from right by the hatch
with a bright red light (night vision cabin lighting) so my captain
doesn't go off and leave the whole boat running for weeks.

I put the branch breakers, which don't require a manual reset but reset
themselves in about 10 minutes in the heat, where the branch circuit
comes off the bus, whereever that may be (helm, nav, cockpit, etc.)

For 30A, I'd want to use #8 for short runs and #6 for long runs, up to
the bow for instance. As the sooper-dooper marine wire is just plastic
covered wire, I use the heavy speaker wire Radio Shack carries. When
the main warehouse store closed here, I bought it all, a lifetime
supply, for about 10c/ft...(c; My shed is full of it on big spools...a
lifetime supply.

Thanks Larry,

As always, good practical advice

cheers
Peter

Herodotus wrote in
news
Thanks Larry,

As always, good practical advice

cheers
Peter



Just make sure those guys in the Topsiders on the dock don't find out you
bought boat parts in an auto parts store. They get kinda ugly!

On Wed, 02 Jul 2008 22:40:08 +0000, Larry wrote:

Herodotus wrote in
news
Thanks Larry,

As always, good practical advice

cheers
Peter



Just make sure those guys in the Topsiders on the dock don't find out you
bought boat parts in an auto parts store. They get kinda ugly!

There are no NAPA stores here in Sydney. I think we still own our auto
stores. Globalisation hasn't yet reached them However there are two
NAPA stores in Curacao. I bought some fan belts, oil and a few things
from. They seem to know their stuff as well. I check the circuit
breakers when I return their in a couple of months IF the dreaded
airport security people don't arrest or shoot me. Funny thing is that
the last couple of times I transitted through the USA, I was not
stopped and my bag searched and my clothes swabbed for explosives like
the previous 3 or 4 times. Maybe they have a computer system that is
intelligent.

cheers