Overhead service coming to house question

[ABSTIFFGS]

My wife and I are selling our house. We had a buyers inspection done yesterday. Our buyer is asking for us to fix a few small things. One of which is our 100 amp service that comes overhead from the poco (Xcel Energy) has compression crimps that have never been insulated. I stopped at Menards to see if they had a plastic or rubber sleeve that could be slid over the top. I saw nothing. Then I stopped at Graybar Electric. They didn't have anything either. He had suggested using a sealed Allen wrench tighten lug thing, (sorry, the name escaped me). That would require shutting off the service from the poco. I ended up buying this 3M rubber splice tape. Will this be up to snuff? Or is there a better option. Thanks for any help y'all can offer.
Ben

 

[tfi racing]

If you have to ask how to do this job,you should NOT be doing it.Call your poco and have them fix their work.

 

[ABSTIFFGS]

If you have to ask how to do this job,you should NOT be doing it. Call your poco and have them fix their work.

I have made the call. The secondary lines are customer owned. It is my problem. I am not intending to do the work myself any longer. This is out of my league. I honestly don't even know why I bought the tape. I was more curious if there existed a simple snap around type of insulator or if this is going to cost me a bundle to have the power shut off to my house and install Polaris style splices.

 

[Pwrgeek]

Five wraps of 33 and done. If you don't know how to do it without getting killed ask someone who does.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[ABSTIFFGS]

Five wraps of 33 and done. If you don't know how to do it without getting killed ask someone who does.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

That's the plan I have a buddy that is an electrician. I will be calling him for help. I just was curious if there was a better option than just 33 and done.

 

[theoldwizard1]

I ended up buying this 3M rubber splice tape. Will this be up to snuff? Or is there a better option. Thanks for any help y'all can offer.

That is good stuff ! 2 layers wrapped in opposite direction I don't think can be beat !

The only other solution is disconnect those splice install heavy, double wall heat shrink, re-connect, shrink. Not worthe the hassle !!

 

[wyliesdiesels]

I have made the call. The secondary lines are customer owned. It is my problem. I am not intending to do the work myself any longer. This is out of my league. I honestly don't even know why I bought the tape. I was more curious if there existed a simple snap around type of insulator or if this is going to cost me a bundle to have the power shut off to my house and install Polaris style splices.

Man thats a weird setup.

Every PoCo I have worked with out here owns the service drop. Are u sure they were talking about the service drop?

 

[zmaxmotorsports]

That's the plan I have a buddy that is an electrician. I will be calling him for help. I just was curious if there was a better option than just 33 and done.

I use split bolts when I do service drops,but I still wrap them the same way.
3-4 wraps with super 33 then 2-3 good wraps with the splicing tape followed by a couple more with the super 33.
Where a good pair of leather gloves and only touch 1 wire at a time,stand on a fiberglass ladder.

 

[ABSTIFFGS]

Thank you guys for the info! This was a buyers inspection. The buyer simply asked if we'd fix a few things. We crossed out this issue on our addendum. Hopefully he doesn't push it any further. We'll see. If he does, I'm going to ask my buddy to do the work for me with the splice tape I purchased.

 

[ABSTIFFGS]

Man thats a weird setup.

Every PoCo I have worked with out here owns the service drop. Are u sure they were talking about the service drop?

I "think so. They made it sound like pole to my house I own, therefore not their problem. Perhaps I had not asked the question the correct way. If this issue get pushed further, I'll make some more phone calls.

 

[rlitman]

I have made the call. The secondary lines are customer owned. It is my problem. I am not intending to do the work myself any longer. This is out of my league. I honestly don't even know why I bought the tape. I was more curious if there existed a simple snap around type of insulator or if this is going to cost me a bundle to have the power shut off to my house and install Polaris style splices.

Polaris connectors are not better than those crimped connections in any way. I wouldn't consider switching to Polaris connectors to be an upgrade.
Polaris connectors do solve the insulation issue in a better way than split bolts however.

Anyway, you need to call again. The lines FROM the splice to your meter are indeed customer owned. The service drop and those connections are utility owned.

However, because of that, do not expect the utility company to do anything. If they feel that an uninsulated splice is ok, then that's their call. It is their "equipment".
Just get that statement made officially, and you can pass it along to the buyer's inspector.

Personally, I wouldn't worry too much about it. Those wires aren't moving around anywhere. My service is triplex like yours, but connects to completely uninsulated wires on the pole. There's hundreds of feet of bare copper from there to the transformer. These routinely swing in bad weather and cross, tripping the transformer's circuit breaker. Your connections however are not going to do this.

 

[ABSTIFFGS]

Polaris connectors are not better than those crimped connections in any way. I wouldn't consider switching to Polaris connectors to be an upgrade.
Polaris connectors do solve the insulation issue in a better way than split bolts however.

Anyway, you need to call again. The lines FROM the splice to your meter are indeed customer owned. The service drop and those connections are utility owned.

However, because of that, do not expect the utility company to do anything. If they feel that an uninsulated splice is ok, then that's their call. It is their "equipment".
Just get that statement made officially, and you can pass it along to the buyer's inspector.

Personally, I wouldn't worry too much about it. Those wires aren't moving around anywhere. My service is triplex like yours, but connects to completely uninsulated wires on the pole. There's hundreds of feet of bare copper from there to the transformer. These routinely swing in bad weather and cross, tripping the transformer's circuit breaker. Your connections however are not going to do this.

Thank you very much for the advice. I should hopefully hear from the buyer today if he wants to push the issue further. If so I'll deal with it.

 

[Falcon67]

Anyway, you need to call again. The lines FROM the splice to your meter are indeed customer owned. The service drop and those connections are utility owned.

However, because of that, do not expect the utility company to do anything. If they feel that an uninsulated splice is ok, then that's their call. It is their "equipment".
Just get that statement made officially, and you can pass it along to the buyer's inspector.

This. AEP would tell you "it meets our requirements". IF - if - you had a sympathetic engineer, they might re-terminate the feed for you. Most likely the POCO will not service what's not broke. If the buyer doesn't like it, tell them to take it up with the POCO. Also, uninsulated crimps are common here from what I've seen. And there are a lot of old houses with the feeds that come up under the eve. I would NOT under ANY circumstances get on a ladder and try to mess with those connections. When I fixed that issue on our old house, I had the POCO pull the feed, then I mounted a new weather head to the meter box, running the feed pipe through the eve and placing the weather head 24" above the roofline. POCO then came back and re-hung the power line.

 

[wyliesdiesels]

Polaris connectors are not better than those crimped connections in any way. I wouldn't consider switching to Polaris connectors to be an upgrade.
Polaris connectors do solve the insulation issue in a better way than split bolts however.

Anyway, you need to call again. The lines FROM the splice to your meter are indeed customer owned. The service drop and those connections are utility owned.

However, because of that, do not expect the utility company to do anything. If they feel that an uninsulated splice is ok, then that's their call. It is their "equipment".
Just get that statement made officially, and you can pass it along to the buyer's inspector.

Personally, I wouldn't worry too much about it. Those wires aren't moving around anywhere. My service is triplex like yours, but connects to completely uninsulated wires on the pole. There's hundreds of feet of bare copper from there to the transformer. These routinely swing in bad weather and cross, tripping the transformer's circuit breaker. Your connections however are not going to do this.

This is true. PoCos typically use a hydraulic crimper to crimp these. Any splice connection available at the store or supplier will not compare to these.

And transformers dont have breakers. They have cutouts which are essentially fuses. Have u ever heard one pop? Sounds like a 12ga shotgun being shot!!

 

[rlitman]

This is true. PoCos typically use a hydraulic crimper to crimp these. Any splice connection available at the store or supplier will not compare to these.

And transformers dont have breakers. They have cutouts which are essentially fuses. Have u ever heard one pop? Sounds like a 12ga shotgun being shot!!

I am aware of what you are talking about. Explosive disconnectors are used for bigger transformers and other high power stuff. Not so much on residential cans. At least, not in my area.

Mine certainly has a breaker.
There's a ring at the end of an arm on top that can be reached with a hot stick with a hook end that can be used to reset it after it is tripped.
There is also a red indicator lamp across the breaker that lights up after it trips. I've only seen it manually reset about 2 dozen times in the past 10 years...

The can across the street from my house (NOT the one I am connected to; I'm connected to one around the corner), blew up from over-use several years ago. That one had a fuse on the top of the can that was attached to the wire going up to the 11.2kV line.
I saw the fireball of boiling/burning oil as it came down on my neighbor's driveway. The fuse ended up on my lawn. Not from being explosively disconnected (this too was not explosive, but was a fusible link contained within a phenolic tube), but from the top of the can being blown in the air.

A couple of those times, the open-wire shorts in bad weather were bad enough to cause the wire to melt and break in spots. The power company sends a crew to install one of those hydraulically crimped connectors (and shorten the higher wire to increase the spacing), and call it a day.

 

[zmaxmotorsports]

Just call the power co and tell them you think you have a loose connection at the weather head if you want them to fix it,theyll come out.

 

[laser3kw]

I question the "drip loop".
Looks to me more of a water direct path down the weather head than a drip loop. It might of been tight when new, but age has probably eroded any sealing around incoming wire.
I'd prefer to see the lowest part of the wire loop at least 3 or 4 inches below the weather head entrance.

 

[zmaxmotorsports]

There might be enough slack in the wires to put more of a loop in there,Cant tell from the picture though.

 

[ABSTIFFGS]

Just got word from my realtor that the buyer signed off on us not having to fix it. Not my problem any longer.

 

[Stuart in MN]

The person you talked to at Xcel Energy must have been blowing you off. I work with them on a daily basis, and they are responsible for the overhead service right up to and including those splice points. It's clearly shown in their installation guide manual. ( https://www.xcelenergy.com/staticfi...207StandardsforElectricInstallationandUse.pdf pages 49 and 50, if you want to look.)

 

[The FIB]

Just got word from my realtor that the buyer signed off on us not having to fix it. Not my problem any longer.

Glad it all worked out for you.

That service would have never been energized in our neck of the woods, the service drop has to be attached below the weather head, with a proper drip loop.

Covering the splices with rubber tape and then friction tape is a common practice around here, simple but effective.

 

[wyliesdiesels]

The person you talked to at Xcel Energy must have been blowing you off. I work with them on a daily basis, and they are responsible for the overhead service right up to and including those splice points. It's clearly shown in their installation guide manual. ( https://www.xcelenergy.com/staticfi...207StandardsforElectricInstallationandUse.pdf pages 49 and 50, if you want to look.)

I figured that was the case.

I dont think Ive ever heard a situation where the customer owns the service drop.

 

[ABSTIFFGS]

I figured that was the case.

I dont think Ive ever heard a situation where the customer owns the service drop.

I'm guessing I did not ask either the correct question or talk to the right person. Oh well, not my problem any longer.