In article , RBM wrote:
What would you *think* the answer to this question would be? Why do you
think the manufacturers bother to put ratings and warnings on things?

My personal opinion is that it has more to do with liability than safety. In
the electrical and lighting industry the materials used over the last forty
or so years have improved greatly yet in the case of the lighting industry
the allowable wattage keeps decreasing. It's routine for a lighting fixture
to have a warning not to connect it to wiring rated at less than 90 degrees,
like your going to rewire eighty percent of the houses that want to install
fixtures in them. I don't think so. I'm sure a good portion of these ratings
is just to pass the liability on to you the installer or the consumer

In my experience, quality of electrical items has largely peaked out in
the 1980's and has gone a little downhill since then.

Meanwhile, it was common for many incandescent fixtures to specify
maximum of 60 watt bulbs as far back as around 1980, when I first noticed
this. This 60 watt limit may have been common even longer.

As for really high temperature rating requirements for supply wires -
this is new. I suspect this is mostly CYA from liability concerns,
although the increasing availability and affordability of non-contact
thermometers could be a reason.
If you add a fixture that requires higer temperature wire than your
building has, you only need high temperature wire from the next junction
box - and you can add a junction box a foot or two away.

If you have a fire starting at an electrical fixture being used other
than as directed, you may need a lawyer, even if the fire started from a
defect or a design flaw rather than the "misuse".

- Don Klipstein )