Garage Door Opener Breaker Size

1978 nec garage receptacles first required to be gfci protected.

Garage door opener breaker size. Find the right garage door opener. But there was an exception for receptacles that are not readily accessible which is defined as above 6 8 above floor such as a ceiling garage door. Gfci breakers will cut the power if they sense an overload short circuit but also line to ground fault. Without a bit more detail it s not possible to give an accurate answer.

And there is also a little twist in how it must be gfci protected. The outlets are being fed by surface mounted romex. The average garage door is around 8 x10 in size. If you have a 3 car garage with three openers you may want to consider a 20 amp circuit breaker.

Look for an opener that has the horsepower necessary for your garage door size based on size and weight. Average weight double doors and heavier single doors work well with 1 2 horsepower openers. These doors don t need too much power to open so you can buy a garage door opener that s around 1 3 horsepower as this will be more than enough to lift it. Wait do i need a dedicated circuit for a garage door opener.

Which opener is right for me. Here is a national electrical code nec timeline. It is now but was not previously required. A 1 3 horsepower opener can handle most doors 10 feet wide by 8 feet tall made of lightweight material such as uninsulated steel.

And the number of openers can cause this number to vary. We have garage door openers with features such as smartphone control ultra bright led lighting battery back up auto locking deadbolt belt drive chain drive and even wall mounted garage door openers. Gfci ground fault circuit interrupter protection. Since the receptacles are in a garage they ll have to be gfci protected.

As a general guideline you d use 12 awg copper conductors with a 20 ampere breaker and 14 awg copper conductors with a 15 ampere breaker. What kind of breaker should be attached to a garage door opener. This way we would need a circuit breaker with a size of at least 33 35 2 16 675 a which is why we would choose two 20 a circuit breakers. While it s best to check the manual for specifics generally a single garage door opener needs only 15 amps while up 2 or 3 will need 20 amps.

If you have a 1 car garage a 15 amp circuit is more than adequate. The issue is not that it is for a garage door opener but that the receptacle is on the garage ceiling.