Tap Oven Electricity for Outlet

Question

I just purchased a new house that has the oven in the island in the middle of the kitchen. Not the stove, just the oven. But there are no electrical outlets on the island. Can the oven electrical be tapped to supply power to an outlet or will I have to run a new electrical line to its own breaker?

Answer 1

Assuming we are talking about the US/Canada, I'll make some basic assumptions:

• Not the stove just the oven would almost always mean electric oven. That is because gas is great for a cooktop but not as useful for an oven. So typically a combination cooktop/oven will use gas but not when they are separate.
• Electric oven typically means 30A or 40A dedicated 240V circuit.

Assuming that is the case, you can't add receptacles to the circuit because:

• The receptacles need to be on a 15A or 20A circuit. A 30A or larger breaker is not allowed and is not safe. It turns out that in theory it is OK to tap up to 10' away using the usual 12 AWG wire to 20A receptacles. However...
• If the manufacturer's installation instructions require a dedicated circuit then technically code would require a dedicated circuit (because code says "do what the manufacturer says as long as it doesn't conflict with the code"). But practically speaking, you are likely OK except beware - if you try to use a 1500W small appliance at the same time as your oven is the high-energy-usage part of a cycle, you risk tripping a breaker.

The whole situation is a bit strange though, as kitchens are normally (for a while now) supposed to have receptacles near all countertops for small appliances. The island should be no exception. If this is a truly new house then you may have recourse with the builder to meet code requirements. But if it is just "new to you" then it is likely grandfathered in without the extra receptacles.

Three solutions:

• Simplest, usually: Run a new 12 AWG cable for receptacles connected to a 20A breaker.
• Much more expensive unless running a cable = "tear up concrete": Connect the existing incoming power to a small subpanel and connect the oven (with appropriate size breakers) and new receptacles (20A) to the subpanel. Whether this is technically/code-compliant possible will depend on a number of specific details.
• A hanging power pendant

Answer 2

The answer is yes. The tap rules do allow this and it is common in older homes to tap a duplex off the supply,

conduit from the tap to the outlet box is usually required and metal flex MC /AC is normally used.

The 10 foot tap rule has always been used on every example of this that I have seen. On both electric stove tops on top of the counter and single electric ovens below the counter.

Working in an area that for many years was almost exclusively electric this was quite common , maybe not as much today as “ranges” that have both oven and stove tops are no longer hard wired but I still see them.

The question since the 96 code change is the supply a 2 hot and ground or a 2 hot and neutral , it makes a difference, if 3 insulated conductors a grounding wire could be added and meet today’s code.

Answer 3

I really have to disagree for the following reason.

First the tap rule is found in Article 240 Which is for overcurrent protection. More specifically 240.21(B) "Feeder Conductors" (2) "Taps not over 25 ft long" which says you can only use the tap rule if it meets all 3 requirements. Part 2 of that requirement states:

The tap conductors terminate in a single circuit breaker or a single set of fuses that limit the load to the ampacity of the tap conductors. This device shall be permitted to supply number of additional overcurrent devices on its load side.

Article 100 "Definitions" - define a feeder as circuit conductors between a power source (line side) and an overcurrent device (load side). So to start, the tap rule can only be used as on a feeder 241.21(B).

What 240.21(B)(2)(2) is telling you is that, on the load side, you must have one breaker within 25' of the tap to protect your range and one breaker to protect your receptacle.

Your better off following the Article 210 "Branch circuits" and the short version is; You cannot run conductors any smaller than the rating of the overcurrent protection.