alt.energy.homepower

Neon John wrote:
>
>
> The way it works is this. There is a second toroidal inductor around the hot and
> neutral lines. It is driven by the 60 hz signal and is the primary of a transformer.
> The neutral is the one turn secondary. Ignore the hot lead for this discussion.
>
> The neutral and ground are bonded together at the breaker. If they get connected
> together aft of the GFI then a complete circuit is formed, neutral->ground->breaker
> ground->breaker neutral->neutral. Current flows in this loop, induced by the second
> toroid. The main sensing toroid detects this as imbalance current and trips the GFI.
>
> It's hard to imagine any credible (not fictitious products of some safety nazi's
> imagination) scenario where connecting the neutral and ground together causes any
> hazard. I'm not sure what they were thinking (scratch that, they weren't thinking)
> when they came up with this "feature".

That's truly friggin' bizarre. If I were to install one of these
breakers into say my shop sub panel, isn't it going to bond my isolated
ground and neutral busses that are required in a sub panel? Can't see
how it wouldn't be a problem if it is actually bonding ground and
neutral at the breaker. Unless the breaker has terminals for the neutral
and ground of the branch circuit, but only connects to the neutral in
the panel, but then it doesn't have the proper ground. Sounds like a
total mess.