What was to be a simple water heater change out from gas to electric lead to the discovery of major electrical issues inside a clients recently purchased home.
The home breaker panel was stuffed full of wiring with no concern of wire placement to the circuit breaker placement on the original set up. And many tandem (piggyback circuit breakers) producing more heat than is necessary in the home breaker panel to gain additional space.
The solution to the fix was to remove over loaded panel and replace with larger 200 amperage load center panel along with new larger wiring from pole Main Breaker to new Home breaker Sub Panel.
The Main Breaker Panel was pole mounted but was not Main Breaker protected instead it was only Sub Panel 100/amp 240/volt single phase KW. Meaning that with all breakers in the off position there was still electrical power on the buss bar. The only way to cut all power to the buss bar was to unplug utility meter from the meter base. A unskilled or untrained person could of turned all the breakers to the off position and thought that the power was off, only to find that the buss bar was indeed energised.
The solution was to remove pole mounted Sub Panel and replace with 200/amp Main Breaker weather proof pole mounted panel with enough breaker openings for further upgrades like Solar/Wind/Auto Start Generator and many other options.
By increasing the amperage from 100 to 200 amps and installing the stepping down method of the highest amperage breaker closest to the Main Breaker on down with bundled and organised wiring makes possible dissipating heat for all circuits breakers possible. A circuit breaker is designed to restrict the amount of amperage which produces heat. If piggyback breakers are used the heat factor to the buss bar is increased. The below photo acts like a heat sink and dissipates the heat factor as rapidly as possible. Any circuit breaker will only to take the designed loading and trip from fault or dead short if correctly grounded to the proper conductors, wires or cables.
Finely with these electrical issues fixed there was room for the additional breaker and wiring to be placed to operate the new water heater properly with no over loading or no overheating issues. It is much better to do the job correctly for safety reasons alone the 1st time around with no short cuts.
Consulting and Walk Thru Inspections options are available to determine if your Main Breaker is correctly installed and operating as efficiently as possible. Book a date and time from Face Book or Website.
D B Electric
Email www.elecwired@live.com
Website www.dbelectric.weebly.com
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