Circuit Breaker Box confusion

[Zer0Ry0k0]

I have a gas oven. no electrical anything other than a fridge, computer, rice cooker, some lighting...

There is a line coming from the pole to the top of my roof, so I'm positive I have a full line and am not running off a sub-panel.

The 90amp looks like it is the feed, yes.

The 50's and all 20's but the top have wires that control nothing apparently. (bottom 20 is open)

 

[Zer0Ry0k0]

also, from what I understand,.... the place is wired for 110. I would like to get that changed as well...

 

[Bud Spleefman]

also, from what I understand,.... the place is wired for 110. I would like to get that changed as well...

It really looks like you have 240V service. Both those big wires leading to the 90 amp are separate sides of a 240 V service feed. I also see a black wire in the same run connected to the return down at the bottom of your box. The rest of the wires connected to the return are white, right? And the grounds all connect on the upper right. If there are no wires coming out of that double pole 50 amp breaker, that could run a grow. A 240 V grow, which is always better, because that's less wire to run..... wherever the grow is will be a service panel that will connect to the 50 amp breaker. One run, probably 6 or 8 guage, 3 strand, which is 2 hots, a return and a ground (4 wires total, they don't count the ground)

Good luck!

 

[Bud Spleefman]

I think it would be really good if you got a cheap-o voltage meter at Home Depot or something, it would be less than 10 bucks. Get the one with the 2 probes, and put a probe on each side of that 90 and see if it doesn't read 240 V........

 

[Zer0Ry0k0]

Alright, I will check into this more... I'm just so confused about why the place is so limited on electricity when there are those two fat pipes coming in. Why would the people who installed everything gimp the fuck out of the place? Shoddy work? or am I missing something.

And thanks bud, you have been quite helpful.

 

[fishheadbob]

Good idea you have about the electrician, he's needed. It appears you do need a serious upgrade, it won't come cheap, but you have a setup to run some light duty 1950s cottages. Odds are most rooms have one outlet box, not the 4 or 5 you need nowadays.
New upgraded service panel, lots of new probably heavier wiring, $$$$.
In the interim, make sure there are good batteries in your smoke detectors. Seriously. I burned a few buildings down a long time ago with inadequate wiring, you don't want to go through that.

 

[EvilTwin]

Hi Zero,
So it looks like your main panel must be over on the other building where the actual service entry is and the one pictured is a sub-panel. What does the breaker box look like over there?

Far as upgrades...I don't know what brand of breakers those are, but they'll probably be hard to find. Depending on where you're going to grow, you could possibly get by fairly cheaply or you could need new panels and even a new service entry. It gets expensive when there are long runs of large guage copper wire. Copper is high because of the war. Off the top of my head, you could be looking at from $500 to $1500 depending on what all they do.
ET

PS I agree with FishHeadBob that it's the age and application...that's why the service is so scanty. They did things differently back then.

 

[sparkjumper]

The panel is being fed by the wires coming into the 90A breaker thats for sure without any doubt

 

[PharmaCan]

Weird - that panel is wired like a sub-panel. (Note the isolated bus bar for the neutrals.) There isn't necessarily anything wrong with the panel and it does have room to expand, although 90 amps for two cottages and a grow isn't much power.

The way you have described the situation with the breakers now, it sounds like someone has screwed around in a junction box somewhere, for some reason, and tied everything into one breaker. It shouldn't be all that difficult to sort things out - just take things apart, sort them out and put them back together.

PC

 

[EvilTwin]

Weird - that panel is wired like a sub-panel. (Note the isolated bus bar for the neutrals.) There isn't necessarily anything wrong with the panel and it does have room to expand, although 90 amps for two cottages and a grow isn't much power.
PC

Hi PC,
His service entry is on the other cottage and I'm thinking that's where the main breaker box is. So this one probably is a sub.

90 for one cottage isn't that bad. I've seen houses with only 60amps.
ET

 

[Zer0Ry0k0]

no, as I stated twice before, there is a cable running from the electrical pole to the building. I have my own meeter and all that.

Why do people keep thinking it's a sub panel? what gives it that look?

My main concern is the gauge of the wire that is connecting the box to the other building. I don't have a snake tool to pull the wire through the pipe to the junction box at the other building.

 

[T-type]

A Main Breaker Panel (MCB) has a Main breaker built into it. A MCB panel is used when there is only a meter just outside, and this feeder cable or conduit does not exceed 10 feet from meter to panel.

A Main Lug Only (MLO) panel only has main lugs, and is intended to be fed by a Main breaker upstream. For example there can be Main breaker at the outdoor meter, or a MLO panel can be used as a sub panel ,fed by a breaker in the Main panel.

This is a MLO panel and most people don't have them as a main panel. But you must have a main breaker at your meter that is going to that 90 amp breaker (instead of the top two screws like you would usually do). It is a very confusing setup you have there.

Edit:
Once again I am no where near qualified to answer your questions.

 

[StealthyStalks]

no, as I stated twice before, there is a cable running from the electrical pole to the building. I have my own meeter and all that.

Why do people keep thinking it's a sub panel? what gives it that look?

My main concern is the gauge of the wire that is connecting the box to the other building. I don't have a snake tool to pull the wire through the pipe to the junction box at the other building.

I think it would be very helpful if you could draw a rough sketch of the whole electrical distribution, from the pole to the box and any other obvious branches, to eliminate the confusion the guys who are trying to help are having understanding your setup.

We are only taking about segregating existing circuits so the cost would be minimal once you know what you have.

 

[PharmaCan]

T-Type Those MLO panels were quite common as mains back in the 50's and 60's. The just didn't have main breakers in them.

Zer0Ry0k0 - for what you want to do, It doesn't make any difference if that breaker box is a main panel or a sub-panel - you get the same electricity out of either one. The thing is, you have a confusing situation here and, without actually being able to see your installation, it's hard to try to diagnose the problem. One thing that would be helpful is if you started referring to cottage A and Cottage B, or something lol. I for one am having a little difficulty following which building you are talking about.

From the information you have provided so far, this is what I think your set-up should look like - a power drop to the meter, then a disconnect of some kind (could even be some fuses in the meter base??) A disconnect isn't going to affect the flow of electricity, it's just there might be one there somewhere. If not, no biggie. On to the other cottage (underground did you say?) then into the panel. From that one and only panel it goes back to the other cottage.

The wire that is feeding your panel is probably not big enough to handle what you want to do. However, the wires are adequate to service a new sub-panel in the other cottage, which is probably the route you should take if you want to sort this all out and upgrade your service.

I may or may not completely understand your situation, but here's what I'd probably do.

One way or another, get a decent power supply to the cottage with panel (panel cottage). The least expensive way to do this would be to install a new 200 amp, surface mount, service panel w/ meter on the panel cottage and have the PowCo pull their wires over to it. If this is not possible then you need to install some big cable between the meter and the panel. (You may have to upgrade the meter base to do this - the PowCo may have to upgrade their lines - there are other variables here. I'm just trying to give you an overview.) Edit - After looking closer it appears the existing panel is surface mount. In that case, just remove the old panel and run the existing wires directly into the new panel.

Anyway, you now have a new 200 amp service in your panel cottage, and, obviously, plenty of capacity to do whatever you want to do. You can then use the existing large cables to power back to the other cottage, where you would install a sub panel to power that other cottage. You'd have to sort out the wiring on both cottages, but there aren't that many wires there so it's probably just a matter of taking everything apart and putting it back together right.

If your main power usage is going to be in the other cottage, you'd want to mount your main panel there, near the meter or just use a panel w/ meter and install a new service drop. At this point the parts are cheaper than your Sparky's time and it might be cheaper to install all new parts than to dick around with old ones. You could then use the existing large cables to power the panel cottage, and you could do a few minor things to the existing panel and continue to use it.

As far as pulling wire through your conduit - use one of the existing wires to pull the new wires through.

Edit: Where's your power coming from? Overhead or underground? Some of those things I said about cost assumed overhead power. If it's underground, you could do essentially the same things but you'd have a fixed starting point at your existing meter base - more or less. lol



PC

 

[choch]

From what we can see here it would appear that the wire running to the other cottage would be rated for 20 amps max. Will you need more than that? Can't remember if you listed what your electrical load is going to be in the other building.

As it sits you could have 20 amps to veg in one cabin and 50 amps to flower in the other without running any new wire between them.

 

[Zer0Ry0k0]

Alright, thanks for the replies again guys. Great info there.

Pole sends wire to cottage A roof, drops down to panel.
Panel sends wire to cottage B through pipe and junction box at other end.

what I am getting so far is I can change the wire gauge that is running underground to the junction box to a thicker one that will support higher amperage and install a sub panel at cottage B.
Would I need a sub panel at cottage B if the older panel is at cottage A where the line comes in?

Before I ask my next question I should say the distance from the box to the junction box is about 50 feet as the wire travels.
How much load could I put on what gauge wire without installing a sub panel...... oh.... I see.... if I did that the wires in the walls of cottage B would probably heat up.... so I need to split the thick wire to the thinner ones that are inside the walls.

Okay, how many hundreds of dollars am I looking at if I just buy the parts?
50' wire proper gauge
1 sub panel
some breakers
maybe a main panel or just some breakers to go in the one I have...

I will have about 30 amps constant load in cottage B
under 20amps load constant in cottage A
edit: cottage A has 1 fridge, 1 computer, 1 water heater
I don't use the microwave usually, planned on removing it. I have a 26" TV and xbox360 that I don't use often. and a space heater that I have used for 2 weeks during the super cold nights.

Please don't get a headache trying to calculate the amperage when I'm not even checking the labels myself... I just want ballpark numbers at this point.

 

[SicKSKills]

bout 5-700 for just main line and parts depending on size amperage youre planning on pulling, youll need to find Zinsco style replacement breakers(old school), which can sometimes be difficult depending on the area but i dont think youll have a problem, they are just more expensive because the original company that made them is out of biz and its kinda like a specialty item....if it were me, id just get a breaker and feed a dedicated line from your main box, to a sentinel light controller or similar and skip the whole sub panel thing if there is other 120v already wired in the rooms.

 

[EvilTwin]

no, as I stated twice before, there is a cable running from the electrical pole to the building. I have my own meeter and all that.

Why do people keep thinking it's a sub panel? what gives it that look?

My main concern is the gauge of the wire that is connecting the box to the other building. I don't have a snake tool to pull the wire through the pipe to the junction box at the other building.

No need to be irritated Dude...we're trying to help you. And this post of yours shows the sort of confusing messages you've given us. In this post alone is a contradiction. Is it sourcing from the meter and pole or this mysterious other building? You need an electrician because this thread isn't sorting things out for you.

To really understand your wiring, you need to know how it was wired originally (50-60 years ago)...and then what mods have occurred over the years.
ET

 

[PharmaCan]

You don't need a sub-panel, it's just an easier way of distributing the electricity in cottage B. If you plan on making any upgrades to your grow as you go along, you'll probably wish you had one, but...

I think I have a better picture of what you have, what you want to do, and your budget. (I see we've gone from "I'm gonna call an electrician." to "How can I do this myself.") But that's okay. You can work with what you have.

First things first. What is the size of the wire that is attached to the 90amp breaker?

What is the size of the conduit that runs from the panel to cottage B?

PC

 

[LolaGal]

Zero: Dude it was nice knowing ya. Call an electrician out and bite the bullet. good luck.