Are expensive earth leakage units better than cheaper units

**ians** · 02-Dec-20, 09:40 AM

Looking at the price of earth leakage units.

How do you justify a R2-3-4000 earth leakage unit compared to a R350?

Do they protect humans better than the R350 units?

I know RS components are expensive ...but WOW.

https://za.rs-online.com/web/c/fuses...reakers/rcbos/

**AndyD** · 06-Dec-20, 12:48 PM

Yeah, RS can be expensive. I use them quite a lot, they can often have items that are only in UK stock at my door faster than most local wholesalers can get something to me from JHB.

They tend to deal in high-end brands, they're fast to deliver to your door, their service and their after-sales service and their technical back-up is impeccable and their range is extrordinarily large but it comes at a cost. I doubt it would be financially viable to use them for domestic electrical components and bread and butter installation items that are readily available at local wholesalers.

**edit**
By the way, some of those more expensive RCBO units you linked to (like this one for example) offer full arc and overvoltage protection as well as residual current and overload current. You can usually see two test buttons on the front, one for AFDO and one for RCD. Arc protection is something you won't generally find in locally available units so it's not really fair to compare the prices in may cases.