200 amp panel with 100 amp main?

[EUREKA]

Just want to confirm a backfed breaker in a panel will safely trip. Just want to cover my bases before I do this. I plan on fabricating a metal "stop" to "lock-out" the 200A breaker and permanently identifying the 100A breaker as the main.

 

[Charles (in GA)]

Backfed breakers are used as mains all the time in smaller panels, so that is no problem. Be sure and buy the proper retaining hardware for that brand of panel/breaker to retain the breaker. A retention clip/bracket/screw, etc is required by code for quick removable breakers used as main breakers. Every brand has them, I see them hanging on the pegs in HD and Lowes all the time in electrical.

You could unbolt the 200 amp main and remove it if you never plan on using it. Just cover the hole.

Charles

 

[sickjuice]

You can't use a backfed main in canada for a service entrance panel.
You have to use a canadian panel with a barrier for the unfused feeders

 

[pattenp]

Eureka, Is this 200A panel being used as a main service panel or a sub-panel?

 

[darkk]

YES.....it's exactly what I did. I needed the extra room and wasn't ready to upgrad to the 200 amp yet. I bought a 200 amp service panel with a removable main breaker assembly. I installed the 100 amp breaker until I was ready. Everything worked out fine.

 

[jvitez]

+1 on speaking to your local inspector. Get the correct info straight from the horses mouth so-to-speak.

Personally, I've waisted enough money on temporary electrical ideas. I currently own 3 subpanels that are sitting in a box. I changed my mind several times about what I want to do, each time AFTER I bought the electrical items for my previous idea. So, my advice: WAIT! Just do it right once, and be done with it.

Wait till your funds allow, do a complete electrical upgrade, then do your basement upgrade.

If you really must finish the basement first, add a cheap small subpanel beside your fusebox, feed it from the fuse box by moving one circuit from the fusebox to the new subpanel, and feed your basement from the new subpanel. When the time comes, get a 200 amp 40/80 panel, chuck the small subpanel, and you're neatly organized with plenty of extra branch circuit spaces and 200 amp capacity.

 

[wyliesdiesels]

This particular thread is a great example of why its important to point out up front what your location is. While us electricians in the states can give u great advice and ideas, they may not be allowed by code up in canada!

 

[jvitez]

Point well taken wyliesdiesels. I have 400 amp service double tapped to two 200 amp main breaker Siemens panels, 40/80. One has most of the house branch circuits on it. It's loaded with mostly tandem 15 amp breakers. Yup, the panel is almost full. Looking at this would probably give every US electrician a cardiac arrest, yet it's perfectly code compliant here. Sloppy and crowded, yes, and not how I would have done it (electrical contractor did excellent work in some areas and really sloppy work in others. The journeyman had a 2 snot-bag young apprentices working with him during our house build.....grrrrrrr), but still signed off on by the inspector.

The CEC and NEC are close in many areas, and getting closer it seems, but still significantly difference in critical areas.

 

[dscheidt]

se. Since this already protected by the 100amp breaker in the house can I run the existing aluminum feed wire directly into the lugs on a new 200 amp main panels or would they be too small to properly secure them there.

The panel has a spec sheet that says what size wire you can attach to the main lugs. For most square D panels, they go down to #4 wire, which is probably smaller than what you have. You should have at least #1 wire, but probably have #2, which is only good for 90A when feeding a subpanel.

If you have smaller wire, after you replace the breaker in the house with a suitably smaller one, you can splice the wires inside the panel.

 

[Jim greengo]

We were not suggesting removing the 200 amp breaker and replacing it with a 100 amp. Instead we were suggesting leaving the 200 amp main breaker in the panel in place, just not connected to anything, and supplying the panel with a 100 amp double pole breaker that will plug onto the stabs of the panel, and then back feeding the panel thru this breaker. The 100 amp will act as the main for the panel, until such time as the original poster decides to upgrade his service and replace the wires from the pole to the meter can, the meter can itself and the wires from the meter to the panel, at that time he can connect to the 200 amp main and then remove the wires from the 100 amp breaker. He could re-use the 100 amp breaker as a sub feed to another panel (in a garage or shop) or remove it from the panel alltogether.

If the OP does this, he needs to be sure and tape over the 200 amp breaker and mark it unused/dead and mark the 100 amp as MAIN DISCONNECT so someone won't trip the 200 amp thinking they were turning off something. As an alternative, the 200 amp could be removed from the panel and stored until it is needed for the 200 amp upgrade, but this is overkill.

Charles

 

[Jim greengo]

your best solution, considering your situation is to install a sub panel. the likely hood of you exceeding 100amps is not high.

all residental homes in the US have a minimum of a 200 amp panel and only a SMALL percentage people actually come close to reaching it.

anyone who has a 200amp panel...place an amp probe on one leg, with your a/c unit running and you will be lucky to see it drawing 50amps....that is just one leg.

the majority of people have space problems, not a lack of power available.

That's news to me,I wire lots of homes and have never come across a 200a minimum rule.

 

[Jim greengo]

Says who?

Minimum service requirement is typically quoted as 100A based on NEC 230.79(C) in regards to the service disconnect.

Around here, it is a requirement that the meter socket be rated for 200A w/ a bypass lever, but that says nothing for the service. Hell I just installed a 150A this weekend.

 

[Jim greengo]

i would love to see a picture of that 150a.....someone please show me a picture of a NEW construction home or one done in the last 10 years with anything less than 200amp service. trailers and mobile homes don't count.

multi families are also exempt from this as the rules are different.

Drive through any newer sub div within 50 miles of Omaha neb there's plenty of new houses with 150a services in in them.
There's lots of 200a services also,but they are by no means required on a new build around here any way.
I just got an inspection on a remodel/addition job in c.b Iowa a couple weeks ago with a new 150 service.
100a would of been plenty but who ever did the original remodel of house back in the day decided to run a separate circuit for each damned outlet in the house!
So I needed the bigger panel to get enough spaces.

 

[Jim greengo]

ok BigJohn.........

the NEC does state that....but if you have a license and you have or do wire for a living you know multifamily is different.

go ahead and wire a house with a 100 amp panel......how many breaker spaces are in it....unless you are wiring something the size of a shed you WILL NOT have enough spaces. even with most 200 amp services breaker spaces are limited, unless you purchase a larger panel. this is especially true with the AFCI rules.

i am not going to argue with you about this....i know what i am talking about and anyone that has bought a single family residence in the last 15-20 (my actual experience) years knows (if they look at a panel) it is a 200amp service. and an electrician (who actually does this for a living) knows what i am talking about.

there may be unique situations that require more or some that require less, very few.


anyways...his cheapest option is to get a sub panel......

Well last time I checked I was still a licensed semi retired master electrician.
I install plenty of 100a services and panels in houses,the majority of them have plenty of room in a 24sp panel.
There are exceptions to every rule of course.

 

[Jim greengo]

I may have found what you're looking for...

It's a panel that's capable of being a main or a sub, and there's a knockout for when it's used as a main for the main switch. That would mean that the switch is modular, which might also mean that there are different main switches available.

It's a Square-D, looked decent. It was in one of the sites that I work in.

You can do the same with a sq d homeline panel.

 

[Jim greengo]

I may have found what you're looking for...

It's a panel that's capable of being a main or a sub, and there's a knockout for when it's used as a main for the main switch. That would mean that the switch is modular, which might also mean that there are different main switches available.

It's a Square-D, looked decent. It was in one of the sites that I work in.

Just buy the panel with main breaker and unbolt it till you're ready to use it,the sq d panel covers all come with that knock out filler whether they have a main breaker or main lugs.