electric panel

[larry oneill]

i have a #2 wire coming from meter to double 125 main breakers. can i jumper from #2 meter wires to feed another panel maybe another 125

[Anthony in Houston]

Larry

Without knowing exactly where you will be jumping from I would say no.

Sub panels usually are supplied from a breaker after the main breaker. I dont know the exact requirements for code but im sure for a house there should be only one main breaker and then subpanels ore breakers after that. This would be for safety reasons, should you need to quickly cut power for whatever the reason you would want only one switch to throw and not several.



Anthony

[TitusCarnathan]

it sounds like you want to split off your service enterance

meter to 2 main panels if that is correct

you can not do that 1 it is illegal plus it is also very dangerous

your best bet is to get a sub panel and connect it to your main panel

you can only legally have one main panel then after that you can have as many sub panels as you want.

[jldavis1969]

What if the main breaker is outside next to the meter and the main panel is in the basement (no main breaker inside). Can you daisy chain the main feed lines?



Meter --> Main breaker -->Main Panel #1 --> Main panel #2 (Feeds Garage and Christmas light power) Located in Garage.

[Donald Puryear]

T110431 wrote:

it sounds like you want to split off your service enterance

meter to 2 main panels if that is correct

you can not do that 1 it is illegal plus it is also very dangerous

your best bet is to get a sub panel and connect it to your main panel

you can only legally have one main panel then after that you can have as many sub panels as you want.

That's not true in all areas, in Maryland you can have two main breaker panels. BUT you have two tails coming out of the meter socket, each one rated for 200 amps. If yo were to tap the main of the breaker to run to a second panel you could overload the #2 wire coming into the house. (not good)

[TitusCarnathan]

you wouldn't necessary over load the # 2 gauge wire which is actually rated for 100 amps for 200 amps you need 2/0 awg wire after 1 awg it goes to 1/0 then up to 4/0 guage after that it goes to circular mills



if you are using 2 awg wire it is only rated for 100 amp in you main panel do you have 100 or 200 written on your main braker there should be 2 100's or 2 200's

any way you would not over load your service enterance cable comming into your house because your main breaker will trip if over the rated amps tapping off the same se cable will over load it because panel 1 uses 70 amps and panel 2 is using 50 amps on 2 awg wire nonething will trip which could cause a problem the only way I could see you using 2 main panels is before your main panel you could have a service disconnect rated at a certain amperage which could be concidered a main panel

sub panels will not overload the main cable comming into your main panel because of 2 seperate breakers your main breaker and the individual breaker going over to youur sub panel you should use a double pole 40 or 50 amp breaker using 6 guage wire

[TitusCarnathan]

Like donald said

you do not connect the sub panel before the main breaker it goes in a breaker slot like every thing else in the panel does

http://www.electrical-online.com/subpanelinstallation.htm

for your sub panel you should use 6 awg depending on your amperage needs

14 awg 15 amps

12 awg 20 amps

10 awg 30 amps

8 awg 40 amps

6 awg 50 amps

4 awg 80 amps

2 awg 100 amps

2/0 or 00 awg 200 amps

4/0 or 0000 awg ??

[Steven]

It's worth repeating here, since we're talking about circuit breakers and wire gauge, and some are confused about the function of a circuit breaker. So, here are some common misunderstandings about what a circuit breaker protects. (In the below, I'm talking about ordinary circuit breakers, not GFCI or AFCI breakers, which protect other things in addition.)

A regular (non-GFCI, non-AFCI) breaker does not (directly) protect:

• People; (That's what a GFCI does.)
• from fires caused by arcs; (That's what an AFCI does.)
• Appliances; (Most have their own built-in protection.)
• Lights;
• Switches;
• Outlets.
  

So what does a circuit breaker protect? Wire. A circuit breaker keeps too much current from flowing through a wire. Therefore, the size of the circuit breaker must match the size of the wire it's protecting, as per the chart posted above.

What does the main breaker in the main panel protect? I'm not sure, but it it could be the solid bars of wire in the panel. In many cases, such as our house, the main breaker is in the same box as the meter, which is connected to the main panel through a conduit. In that case the main breaker protects the wire in the conduit.

A sub-panel is fed from a breaker in the main panel, which must be sized based on the gauge of wire the feeds the sub-panel (or the capacity of the sub-panel, whichever is less).

[Max-Paul]

Also there are two main types of plain Jane breakers. There is the thermo and the magnetic forms of breakers.

The thermo beaker uses a bi-metal release mechanism that when heated allows the spring loaded switch to open. This kind of breaker can take 100 - 105% of rating for a period of time before tripping. This is the kind of breaker that is most common in past installations in homes. Really good for circuits that have large starting currents that tapper down once the motor is off of its starting windings.

The magentic type of breaker if I am not mistaken will trip at 100% or greater of rating, instantly. I have also seen these that are controlled by remote circuity like if a door is opened on a control cabinet that could be hazardous to the person. The door has a switch that causes other circuity to cause the magnetic breaker to trip.

[lleibeck]

First, this does not show what Larry is trying to do but does show how to accomplish splitting the main.

Second, this was done by a licensed electrician with a permit issued from the city and the local power company pulling the wire and installing the new meter.

In the picture, you can see the service coming in (bottom left), going through the meter, then being split into two 200amp services. The box on the right shows the two main breakers top breaker feeds the existing house panel in the garage and the second breaker feeds the busbar located right below it..

This allowed me to split the service, no more blinking lights in the house .
Square D was running a special/rebate. The box cost me $400. Power company bill zero, Electrician, priceless.

The reason we have this setup is we went from a 200 amp service to a 400 amp service.

I know, I could have gone with LED's. But the cost of just switching out my mini trees would have cost more than the upgrade. I am building two 10 foot PVC trees sing LED's for 2010.


Lee

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