Meter socket options for new shop build

[Blk88GT]

I'm going to be building a shop next month and will require a 200 amp service.

My current meter is a Thomas-Betts (Microelectric) CO2-200G.

I need to retain the 200amp disconnect on the meter because of the way the service is fed to my panel in the home.

Ideally, I would have a JS4 (dual lug) with a 200 amp disconnect for the house side. Unfortunately, the current meter is cut into some decorative stone on the side of the house.

Is it possible to take the "guts" of another meter and change them out with the existing meter, retaining the cabinet?

I have the Hydro coming out on the 27th for a cable locate but would like to know a little bit before they get here.

Thanks!

 

[pattenp]

Don't take this as gospel, but I think even if you could take the guts from one meter cabinet and get it to fit in into another it would void the certification of the unit. Devices are tested and certified as manufactured.

 

[rlitman]

Don't take this as gospel, but I think even if you could take the guts from one meter cabinet and get it to fit in into another it would void the certification of the unit. Devices are tested and certified as manufactured.

Yep. Even more important though, is that the meter must meet the exact specifications of the power company. Expect this to be much more specific than just what's stated in the code.

 

[sickjuice]

The T&B JS4 series is for 400 amps

A) No chance of switching the guts
B) A homeowner cannot do a 400a service in Manitoba

If you are mistaken on the part number and actually want a 200a meter with a main and a splitter, they do make such an animal but the enclosure is much bigger (CO2-M series)

 

[oltruckag]

Don't take this as gospel, but I think even if you could take the guts from one meter cabinet and get it to fit in into another it would void the certification of the unit. Devices are tested and certified as manufactured.

Yep - it will void the UL listing (and I'm sure the Canadian equivalent)

 

[Blk88GT]

Don't take this as gospel, but I think even if you could take the guts from one meter cabinet and get it to fit in into another it would void the certification of the unit. Devices are tested and certified as manufactured.

That was my belief as well. Thank you for clarifying.

Sickjuice, I do require a 400amp meter base. 200 for the house, 200 for the shop. The house side would require a disconnect.

What should I be looking at?

 

[Gooch]

That was my belief as well. Thank you for clarifying.

Sickjuice, I do require a 400amp meter base. 200 for the house, 200 for the shop. The house side would require a disconnect.

What should I be looking at?

what is going into this shop that needs 200 amps?
How big is the house?

 

[sickjuice]

That was my belief as well. Thank you for clarifying.

Sickjuice, I do require a 400amp meter base. 200 for the house, 200 for the shop. The house side would require a disconnect.

What should I be looking at?

Before you waste anymore time, have you gotten a price from MB hydro for a 400a service upgrade? Chances are you will drop the idea when you get the price. If your not adding any big loads like electric heat for the shop (i.e if their not going to make anymore money off you) then they charge you the full cost of upgrading their equipment to support the new service (transformer, wire, ect) Last one I did was 8k just on hydros end (plus the cost of the customers 400a installation)

T&B dosent make any 400a metering cabinets with built in disconnects.
I know their made by others but I've never used one cause their not cheap.

If your rural and have the space best way to do it is have a CT cabinet out in the yard and re-feed the house and new shop from there

But ya in Manitoba you will need an electrician anyways to do a 400a service so he will be able to go over your options with you

 

[Blk88GT]

what is going into this shop that needs 200 amps?
How big is the house?

It's 40x50, in floor heat, hoist, welder, compressor. The essentials.

Sickjuice, if it's 8k to get me 400amp service, I'll have to bite the bullet. Hydro will be out soon to survey the situation. I have an electrician doing the work but wanted to educate myself before hand.

I think the easiest scenario would be to put a new meter socket on the pole, retain the feed to the house as-is and supply a new underground service to the shop. We'll see what they think about that.

 

[Gooch]

It's 40x50, in floor heat, hoist, welder, compressor. The essentials.

Sickjuice, if it's 8k to get me 400amp service, I'll have to bite the bullet. Hydro will be out soon to survey the situation. I have an electrician doing the work but wanted to educate myself before hand.

I think the easiest scenario would be to put a new meter socket on the pole, retain the feed to the house as-is and supply a new underground service to the shop. We'll see what they think about that.

Gas boiler?

what is all electric in the house? what is the house Sq. Ft.?

 

[Blk88GT]

Everything is electric, there is no gas service available. The house is 2300sqft.

 

[Angelfire]

Have you done load calcs to validate you truly need that size service? That seems awfully big unless you are running multiple high amperage tools at once. If this is a one man shop, consider what you'll be running simultaneously and do your load calcs. Keeping in mind some items can be derated depending on what they are.

 

[Gooch]

Everything is electric, there is no gas service available. The house is 2300sqft.

400A service will be a waste of money(unless you've got a large grow operation), and most(not all) utilities will require proof of need for the large service.

If you'd like i could walk you through doing a load calc to see what size service you actually need.

 

[brewchief]

400A service will be a waste of money(unless you've got a large grow operation), and most(not all) utilities will require proof of need for the large service.

If you'd like i could walk you through doing a load calc to see what size service you actually need.

I bet he will need 400 amp service, ALL electric heat in house and shop will eat up a lot of power, add in stove, dryer, water heater etc in house and I bet on a cold day with the wife cooking and doing laundry a 200 amp service won't cut it.

I don't know where in Manitoba he lives but I did a quick check in my heat load calc program and the design temps in the cites listed went from -23 to -37 degrees, that's going to take a bit of power to heat with either straight electric or geothermal.

 

[Gooch]

I bet he will need 400 amp service, ALL electric heat in house and shop will eat up a lot of power, add in stove, dryer, water heater etc in house and I bet on a cold day with the wife cooking and doing laundry a 200 amp service won't cut it.

I don't know where in Manitoba he lives but I did a quick check in my heat load calc program and the design temps in the cites listed went from -23 to -37 degrees, that's going to take a bit of power to heat with either straight electric or geothermal.

Geo or a heat pump would draw very little compared to resistive heating, heating a 2300 sq ft home with pure resistive heat would cost an insane amount.

I've done many new homes with all electric(heat pumps and geo) and i've never had a calc call for anything more than 200 amps

Like i said, i'd be happy to help the OP with doing a proper load calc for the home. and shop.

 

[awdblazer]

honestly talk to hydro, they will probably guide you in the way to go as you are probably outside the city, and well hydro does the inspections so better get it from them

 

[Blk88GT]

Gooch, a heat pump or geothermal is not an option.

I have an electric forced air furnace in the house and will have an electric boiler in the shop. We can see temperatures in the -25 to -40c range during the winter months and the last thing I want is an undersized electrical service powering my furnace and boiler.

The draw for the boiler alone is roughly 85amps. I can't see why I would go with anything smaller than a 200 amp service for the shop by the time you add in outlets, lighting, compressor, welder, hoist etc.

Let me know what you need for a load calculation.

 

[wyliesdiesels]

Is propane an option so u don't have to use electric heat. I'm sure it would be far cheaper than what must be a HUGE future electric bill! U could even switch your water heater to gas!

 

[Blk88GT]

You guys worried about the electricity bill have to remember that we pay a fraction of what you guys do for power. We pay 6.94¢/kwh right now.

I submitted my paperwork to hydro this morning, I'll see what they say about my proposed solution.

 

[wyliesdiesels]

You guys worried about the electricity bill have to remember that we pay a fraction of what you guys do for power. We pay 6.94¢/kwh right now.

I submitted my paperwork to hydro this morning, I'll see what they say about my proposed solution.

Wow! Almost 7 cents? Out here in Modesto, we pay .165/KwH for the first 500KwH and .1808/KwH over 500KwH!

Just out of curiosity, would propane or electricity be cheaper?

 

[Blk88GT]

I have no idea. Propane heat is not very popular here. We are mainly electric or natural gas.

 

[Falcon67]

We pay .116 kWh on the co-op here and propane is not cost effective enough to warrant a retro fit of our existing resistance heat unit. Our design temps aren't anywhere near Manitoba though, either! We'd be money ahead with a heat pump, but there is no cash for that right now and at 56 I'd be stupid to borrow against any equity. We're all electric, 1600 sq/ft and run just under $200/mth for the entire year average. We'd be in hog heaven to pay only .07/kWh.

 

[jopickens]

Why would they disallow a higher amperage service entry? Aren't they in the business of selling power?

 

[rodm1]

The power company supplies them all here.

 

[wyliesdiesels]

Why would they disallow a higher amperage service entry? Aren't they in the business of selling power?

The reason higher residential service loads are usually not offered is because amperages over 400a require CTs, a CT meter, and a very large transformer which will cause losses costing the utility revenue. This is just the reason u see underated transformers on the pole. Residential loads will rarely draw enough to balance out the losses of an overrated transformer.

 

[Blk88GT]

Each lot in my area has a 25KVA transformer dedicated to it, so luckily that's not one of the issues I'm facing.

 

[wyliesdiesels]

Each lot in my area has a 25KVA transformer dedicated to it, so luckily that's not one of the issues I'm facing.

25Kva? Do u know how much that's rated for? That's good for just over 100a. So I'd say that WILL be an issue and they will be upgrading the transformer. U should ask if u will have to pay for that! Depending on what your calculated continuos load is they'll probably put in a 37.5-50Kva transformer!

 

[socapots]

Each lot in my area has a 25KVA transformer dedicated to it, so luckily that's not one of the issues I'm facing.

may be mistaken on this.

Like above said that is rated for just about 100amps. Be putting alot on it with an all electric house.

Im in a similar boat as you. I have all electric (its the only service available) and 2100sqft (old drafty house too).
and now i want to build a shop ontop of that. that will need power for a heated slab.
What did you end up doing?

 

[wyliesdiesels]

And I didn't mention the fact that its not good to put a continuous load on a transformer that's more than 80% of its rated capacity for more than a short period of time. Otherwise, the transformer can start to suffer from saturation, @ which point it will start putting out dirty power!

 

[Blk88GT]

may be mistaken on this.

Like above said that is rated for just about 100amps. Be putting alot on it with an all electric house.

Im in a similar boat as you. I have all electric (its the only service available) and 2100sqft (old drafty house too).
and now i want to build a shop ontop of that. that will need power for a heated slab.
What did you end up doing?

I had a second 200amp service installed for the shop. So I've got 200 for the shop, 200 for the house, both fed off a 25kva transformer on two separate ~210ft underground runs.

I can't comment on the transformer thing, other than to say I am not interested in a debate. Everything has been designed and OK'd by my power company's sizing engineers and inspectors. I can't imagine they would OK something as bad as you are making it out to be. Let's move on.

 

[wyliesdiesels]

Maybe the transformer feeding you're services is larger than u think. Are u sure its only 25Kva? Or maybe they upgraded it when u weren't home. Another possibility is your calculated continuous load isn't more than the transformer's rated capacity! You didn't give all the details other than a small transformer.....

 

[Aceman]

I wouldn't even worry about the transformer. It's not your deal.

Wire the shop up, if you notice power issues, extreme voltage sags, etc that's when you call the power company.

 

[Blk88GT]

Thanks Aceman, that's exactly my thinking. I was starting to think I wasn't being clear enough.

 

[awdblazer]

blk88gt i work for the local authority and these guys are right the transformer rating is not your problem
if you overload it, you will blow the primary fuse
so dont worry

 

[Higgins]

I'm not sure what the problem is upgrading a service feed beyond 200 Amps is. 12 yrs ago, when I built the 2nd garage I wanted to add 100 amps to the garage, there wasn't enough room in the existing panel in the house to do a sub-panel, and the local power co wouldn't allow us to install a larger pedestal for a 400 Amp feed. Se we trenched in conduit and cable to the 2nd garage and had a second meter installed to support the 135 Amp panel. The wiring is large enough to support a 200 Amp panel if we need to upgrade it!

Now the interesting point in all this is, there are several mega-mansions in the area with 400 Amp services. One mansion is so big, they have their own transformer and two electric meters. (don't know what that is about!!!)