quote:

Originally posted by trapper189:
Electrician said main breaker was bad, of course electrician doesn’t have one on the truck. Electrician said due to the panel’s age (20 years old), they recommend replacing the whole panel. My dad called four electricians and this was the one that could get out there today, the rest couldn’t get to him until Thursday.

I don’t know about replacing the whole panel. Sounds like BS to me. I had the 30 year old panel replaced in my house because it was made by Federal Pacific Electric, the original breakers were junk, and replacement breakers were $50 and up.

Thanks for the help and advice. SIGforum FTW!

HARD PASS. 20 years is NOT that old.

quote:

Originally posted by trapper189:
Electrician said main breaker was bad, of course electrician doesn’t have one on the truck. Electrician said due to the panel’s age (20 years old), they recommend replacing the whole panel.

That sounds like bullshit to me.

WE have a supplier here that specializes in old obsolete stuff . There's probably one in your area . I can give you their contact info if you want it . Maybe they could ship you one if they have it . Just an option .

Nobody asked me, but I'd pull the bad main breaker, inspect (and tighten as necessary) all the branch breaker wires - so long as the main is out and you can do them safely, do it - and replace the main breaker. An hour including the coke-n-smoke break. Have the electrician do it if you don't feel comfortable yourself.

A strong magnet to hold the panel front screws is recommended, to save you having to move the largest object in the room - cause under that object is where those little jerks are heading if you drop them.

Square D panel still has another 40 years left in it unless it's been exposed to moisture. If they give you any trouble sourcing a replacement main I should be able to get it, still friends with manager of SqD dealer. You shouldn't have to go secondary or new/old stock, but if you do you can get whatever you need.

I am curious about the addition, did you find out if that was a sub panel to the one you are dealing with or a second main?

The addition is a stove, washer, and dryer away from being a house itself. It has an oven because my mom liked to cook and she wanted another oven. It’s got a fridge, water heater, steam bath, 3-ton AC, pool pump, etc. The main breaker in the original house is 225 amps. That wouldn’t be enough to run a sub panel for the addition, would it?

I probably don’t fully understand the term, we have what I would call sub panels at other locations. To me, a sub panel is fed from a breaker in the main panel. The house in MI has a sub panel on the other side of the basement near where the hot tub is installed outside. It has breakers for the hot tub, sump pump, backup sump pump, and an a couple outlets.

At our previous house in Florida, we had two 200amp panels. Neither was connected to a breaker in the other. I have no idea how these were connected to the meter. I’m guessing that’s how my dad’s house and addition work.

The electrician said that our County has big fines if he messed with the meter, so he had to change the breaker live. Initially, he said $1,000 which included a military discount. But, since he knew what a horizontal 225amp Square D QO main breaker costs and the amount of time involved, he said $600 take it or leave it. They took it. He knows that was still high, but they were the only company that would come out before Thursday.

So I have a new rule to follow on dead circuits. It should have been obvious but apparently its not. First, unplug every damn item on that line, or even that seems like it might be. Not all that hard to do, but it does take a few minutes. Then take a small light and walk around plugging it in to each outlet you can find. That will probably find the faulty GFI and the problem. It found my one son's problem after his other grandfather coldnd't find it. Yeah, he kind of claims to be an electrician Now I'm the first one they go to. Not sure if I won or lost that round.

I did take electronics in 4H about 60 years ago, but they didn't give me a certificate that I still have. Most of electronics is just common sense an not frying your ass. Gawd I hate how they wired this house, only using 15 AMP circuits. I thought I took charge, telling the guy wiring it to put in an outlet every 6 feet. I'd have been better off asking that every circuit be 20 AMP. The only one I've overloaded is the front deck, and I can't even remember what did that. Been OK if he'd have just made it 20. We don't plug anything out there of value... wait...except my wife's Christmas decorations. That was it. See if you think hard enough it will come to you. Gotta go look at the panel and figure out if I've got room for an outlet for the electric car I don't own. I do out in the garage, the welder outlet. There's so much to think about and consider when building.

OK, I was stupid and didn't ask my buddies who'd just built. Now I'm starting to see the smart guys who'd just built and the lazy ones (I didn't count, I was in bed recovering from cardiac surgery.)

Another new rule, if you're building, ask someone who did it one or two years ago. Give him time to uncover the mistakes.

That sounds strange about the county fining you if you break the meter seal. I could see DTE or CMS Energy getting up in arms but the county?

Only reason I would thing they would be involved is if it would be in regards to a permit.

quote:

Originally posted by trapper189:
The addition is a stove, washer, and dryer away from being a house itself. It has an oven because my mom liked to cook and she wanted another oven. It’s got a fridge, water heater, steam bath, 3-ton AC, pool pump, etc. The main breaker in the original house is 225 amps. That wouldn’t be enough to run a sub panel for the addition, would it?

I probably don’t fully understand the term, we have what I would call sub panels at other locations. To me, a sub panel is fed from a breaker in the main panel. The house in MI has a sub panel on the other side of the basement near where the hot tub is installed outside. It has breakers for the hot tub, sump pump, backup sump pump, and an a couple outlets.

At our previous house in Florida, we had two 200amp panels. Neither was connected to a breaker in the other. I have no idea how these were connected to the meter. I’m guessing that’s how my dad’s house and addition work.

The electrician said that our County has big fines if he messed with the meter, so he had to change the breaker live. Initially, he said $1,000 which included a military discount. But, since he knew what a horizontal 225amp Square D QO main breaker costs and the amount of time involved, he said $600 take it or leave it. They took it. He knows that was still high, but they were the only company that would come out before Thursday.

That is crazy dangerous to change the main breaker live. Have I done it? Yes. Would I ever again? No.

Here I can pull the meter myself, just need to call the power company to replace the seal. I know how to remove and reinstall the seals, so they usually never had to call the power company. If it was MD (PEPCO) we had to call them because they'd dispatch someone if the meter was being pulled. Most times they'd need to see passed inspection to return power.

$1,000 would be reasonable if you had to schedule outage, have inspected, and return to service because of the time, coordination, and permit. Here $600 would be fair to diagnose, pick up breaker, pull meter, replace breaker, and plug meter back in.

As far as the second panel, it's probably powered by a disconnect next to original main panel most likely since there was no disruption of that power it can't be fed from the main panel.

If you do have to pull the meter, be sure all load is disconnected. I can cause nasty arcing if there’s a load.

One last update in case anyone was wondering what caused the my dad's main breaker to go bad. I was talking to him last and he mentioned the next door neighbors came down a few days ago to find all the breakers on their electrical panel were blown. He then tells me about a lightning strike a few days before that was the loudest he had every heard.

That's when I asked if that lightning strike was before or after his own electrical issues. It was before. He's got a whole house surge protector wired into the panel, so that probably did some good. The fridge compressor went a day or two later. I'm going to guess the lightning took out the main breaker and his fridge.

Just so you're aware: A surge that great may have taken-out the whole-house surge protector, too. Power will still get through, but, it's ability to shunt surges may be degraded or entirely non-functional.

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Originally posted by ensigmatic:
Just so you're aware: A surge that great may have taken-out the whole-house surge protector, too. Power will still get through, but, it's ability to shunt surges may be degraded or entirely non-functional.

True story, most of the designs that are worth a crap, and affordable for home use are "sacrificial". Some/most of them have indicators that let you know if they're working, he probably needs to take a look at inspecting/replacing it.

Also, if he took a lightning hit like that, I'd be VERY surprised if there are not some more random things that fail in the near future. It's been my personal experience that you'll see some more failures manifest themselves in the coming few weeks after an event like that...

Thanks guys. I just talked to him about the surge protector and it has two green lights that are both lit. He also said the electrician looked at it and thought it was fine. I’ll look at when we get back to Florida next month.

I hope nothing else goes until we get back. It’ll be a week before the new fridge shows up and he had a heck of a time even finding one that soon. He’s using the fridge in the addition and thought it wasn’t working as well because the ice was melting in the freezer and the freezer temp said 33. I told him make sure there’s nothing blocking the door, close it, and check the temp on the morning. Freezer was 0 and fridge was 36 this morning, so the freezer door was probably open a bit.

That lightning is the gift that keeps on giving. Those of you that said be prepared for more things to go were right. Last week, the fan in the air handler went.

I got back this week and today the AC in the addition quit working. Got my multi-meter out, check the capacitor and it was fine. Then I checked the voltage, 120. Checked the voltage going into the disconnect box, 240, but only 120 on the other side of the switch. Turn the breaker off and pull the disconnect switch out and you can see where it was arcing with the parts it clips on to. Hit it with a wire brush, scrapped the tabs in the box with a knife, and everything works again. A new box and switch are $18.98 at Home Depot, so I’m jusr going to go ahead and replace it. Who knows what happened inside the switch.

AC is getting 240v again and drawing 14amps.

quote:

Originally posted by stoic-one:
True story, most of the designs that are worth a crap, and affordable for home use are "sacrificial".

This sentence has piqued my curiosity. Other than a MOV (Metal Oxide Varistor), what other designs are there? Are there actually Type 1 SPDs for home use that will arrest a lighting surge? Do they make some type of arc gap device as a whole-house SPD? Also, my understanding of MOVs is that they will only sacrifice themselves when the surge is greater than their rating. IOW, the amount of surge they will arrest is not a cumulative total, but indefinite within their rated spec. Get beyond that, and the MOV will burn out all at once, so they exhibit fuse-like behavior, although their function and purpose is totally different.

I'm very curious about SPDs. I've installed them in my house, at the main service disconnect as a Type 2, and I have also installed a surge breaker in each of my sub panels. If anybody knows more that I should do, I'd love to know what that is.

One interesting observation: Every since I installed the SPDs, all the LED lights in the house will flicker A LOT when I am using my Miller 250 welder out in the shop. Because of this, when I wish to weld, I use my diesel generator to power the welder and bypass the house altogether. It's like the surge protectors are shunting transient voltage caused by the arc welder. No sense in ruining all my expensive SPDs and other sensitive electronics, in case I'm wrong about what I said in my first paragraph.

There's actually some pretty decent info on wiki:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surge_protector

My observation regarding many of the SPD's being "sacrificial" revolves around the topic at hand, which is direct or near direct lightning strikes, it's simply too much energy. All of the various "affordable" transient suppression devices that I've seen that are capable of protecting consumer grade equipment, or any grade downstream equipment for that matter, simply aren't robust enough to ride through direct lightning strikes. They'll fail in the course of fulfilling their purpose, and in the process, perhaps leave you with minimal damage.

Lightning can and generally will end up entering anywhere it wants; telecom, antennas, cable TV coax, incoming power, even up through an otherwise proper ground. A strike raising ground "potential" is usually the sneakiest and worst one, I mean, that's supposed to be where you are trying to dump that energy...

Speaking of which, regarding your welder, are you sure you have good grounding? Does the welder input have EMC/I filtering?

quote:

Originally posted by stoic-one:
Speaking of which, regarding your welder, are you sure you have good grounding? Does the welder input have EMC/I filtering?

I'm not familiar with what EMC/I grounding would look like. It's a Miller 250 with the same cord that came on it. It is 240v w/ground, connected to a sub panel with two ground rods and separate 6awg solid wires to each from the sub. Then there is a 10awg ground wire back to the main service disconnect, where that panel is grounded with a single ground rod and the RMC incoming service conduit. From that main service disconnect, a line feed goes to the two subs in the house. Everything is bonded. Is this what you mean? Or is there something in the welder itself that I should look into?

quote:

Originally posted by stoic-one:
There's actually some pretty decent info on wiki:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surge_protector

According to that wiki, the life of a MOV SPD is dependent on the number of times it is active, irrespective of the magnitude. One large spike, or many smaller ones, will change the internal structure of the MOV and render it spent. Good to know.

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Originally posted by V-Tail:

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Originally posted by .38supersig:

Are all the dead circuits on the same side of the breaker box

quote:

From the Original Post:

the non-working circuits are on both sides of the panels

A lost neutral will effect both sides of the breaker box. Call the power company.