Arc Flash FilesReview · nec-precheck
AI NEC Pre-Check
A structured pass over your drawings before the plan checker sees them.
Checks electrical drawings, one-lines, panel schedules, and install details against an owner-authored NEC article checklist, grounded in the code edition and amendments you upload.
What this product is for
Plan review comments are expensive in the one currency a project cannot buy back: schedule. A correction letter that arrives three weeks after submittal costs a redesign cycle, a resubmittal fee, and an inspector who now reads the rest of the set more carefully. This product is a structured pass over the same drawings before the plan checker sees them — one-lines, panel schedules, riser diagrams, and installation details — covering 49 checks across 32 topic areas, from working space and equipment marking to taps, ampacity, raceway fill, transformer and motor installation, grounding and bonding, and drawing-set integrity. It is a pre-check, not a plan review: it flags what a reviewer is likely to ask about, and it never determines that anything complies.
What the 49-point checklist covers
49 discrete checks across 32 areas. Applies to: Electrical drawings, one-line diagrams, panel schedules, riser diagrams, installation details.
- Working space and clearances
- Equipment marking
- Short-circuit and interrupting ratings
- Circuit identification
- Conductor protection
- Feeder taps
- Arc energy reduction
- Equipment location
- Grounding electrode system
- Equipment grounding conductors
- Separately derived systems
- Bonding
- Ampacity and adjustment
- Raceway fill
- Underground installation
- Physical protection
- Fire stopping
- Overcurrent protection
- Equipment arrangement
- Enclosures and environment
- Motor conductors
- Motor protection
- Motor disconnects
- Transformer protection
- Transformer installation
- Transformer disconnects
- System classification
- Coordination requirements
- Circuit separation
- Generator installation
- Utility interconnection
- Drawing set integrity
Grounded in the adopted code edition and amendments you upload. Every finding includes its source page and, where a code citation applies, the section it is based on — never from memory.
What this explicitly does not do
- Determining code compliance
- Substituting for AHJ plan review
- Arc flash incident energy evaluation (see af-study)
- Coordination study evaluation (see coordination)
These are structural limits on the product, not a description of effort. Absence of a finding is never evidence of compliance.
A finding in this product's format
Available fault current marking not shown at service equipment
The one-line identifies service equipment but the drawing set contains no field-applied marking for available fault current and the date of the calculation, and no note directing that it be applied. This is a routine plan-review comment and a routine inspection hold. Confirm whether the marking is shown on a detail sheet not included in this submission, and against the code edition your AHJ has adopted.
Illustrative and redacted. Not real customer data. See full sample reports →
Turnaround
- Automated release: Typically 1 business day, plus review time.
- Expert-reviewed: Typically 3 business days.
What you'll upload
- Drawings (PDF) (required)
Electrical drawings, one-lines, panel schedules, install details.
- Local code amendments (optional PDF) (optional)
Your AHJ's amendments only — not the full code edition. Without them, findings are checked against the general requirements of the edition you selected, and any check requiring code text you didn't provide will report as a general observation rather than guess a citation.
If this document needs more than a preliminary screening, the same firm offers a stamped engineering review by a licensed P.E.(opens in a new tab, external site) directly. That work is engaged separately from this Service — buying a review here does not create that engagement.
AI NEC Pre-Check — common questions
- Why should I upload my jurisdiction’s adopted code and amendments?
- Because it is the difference between a citation and an opinion. This is the only one of the six products whose code grounding comes from a document you supply. Upload the adopted edition or your AHJ’s amendments and findings cite the article and section from your document. Upload nothing and the review runs in degrade mode: findings are still produced, but as general engineering observations with no article number and confidence capped at medium. It will never cite a code section from memory.
- Is this a code compliance determination?
- No, explicitly not. Determining code compliance is reserved to the Authority Having Jurisdiction, and substituting for AHJ plan review is out of scope by design. This flags conditions worth a second look before you submit. Absence of a finding is not evidence of compliance.
- Which code edition does it check against?
- Whichever one you tell it at intake — NEC 2014 through 2026 — and, where you upload them, your local amendments. Adoption varies enormously by jurisdiction, which is exactly why the edition is a required intake field rather than an assumption.
- Who wrote the 49 checks?
- Jay R. Prigmore II, Ph.D., P.E. — a Ph.D. electrical power engineer holding twelve state professional engineering licenses and a founding member of the NFPA technical committee on electrical inspection practices. The checklist is original prose describing what to look for; it contains no reproduced NEC text and no numeric thresholds, because thresholds vary by adopted edition.
- Does it review arc flash or coordination?
- No — those are separate products, deliberately. Incident energy belongs to the AI Arc Flash Study Review and protective device settings belong to the Coordination & Selectivity Review. Buying one does not buy an opinion on the others.