Tom,

 

Good choice.  In my wee 320 I had 48 protected circuits, 18 by breakers and 20 by fuses.  However,; the first decision was what to put on the main bus and what to put on the essential bus (GPS, xpdr, com1, engine monitor on essential), then for each bus, what was to be assigned to a breaker or to a fuse. Important needed elements for navigation, fuel, ignition, gear, flaps, comm, etc. are on  breakers - more for intelligent load shedding if there is a problem. The rest of the minor stuff, like various light circuits, are individually fused whether on main or essential bus.

 

Like someone else mentioned, I never had a fuse blow - this is good.  Come to think, I never had a breaker pop either, but I have used them to remove things from the power grid when doing maintenance with the  power on.

 

I had x number of slots in each category and then decided how they would be divided up - a mental exercise when you get near the end.

 

Scott

 

As I reflected on this, thought it appropriate to further comment.  I WILL be using fuses AND breakers, but will be determining which is more appropriate (for my flight profile and expected conditions) at each required location.  Points made by Dennis and Jim taken as useful information towards that selection process.

 

Had hoped sharing the earlier story about the TKS had some value as well.

 

Now back to more productive stuff  LIKE BUILDING AN AIRPLANE.

 

Tom Sullivan

----- Original Message -----

From: Tom & Beth Sullivan

To: LML

Sent: Monday, April 29, 2013 8:53 AM

Subject: Re: Circuit Breakers vs. fuses

 

 Hey Tom,

Out of reach? Why would you have them out of reach?

 

 Not my idea, responding to the quote below.

 

"My fuse blocks are inaccessible in flight because if the fuse blows, there is most likely a problem that I'd rather troubleshoot on the ground and because no single fuse can take out enough stuff to be more than an inconvenience"

 

 

 

 Looking for and replacing a fuse during IMC flight, turbulence, icing and setting up for the approach is not my idea of a safe flight condition.  With the crap I fly in, that is a very real possibility.  Guess this is one of the benefits we get when we build, adding features that are relevant to our own flying conditions.  I just lost 25 lbs of pilot weight since Xmas, so I can sacrifice a pound or two for breakers.

 

Tom Sullivan