Slowly replacing my electrical panel.

[pblanton]

Hello all.

I have a house in Colorado that was originally built in 1971, then added onto in the mid eighties. The guy who built/owned it fancied himself a competent do it yourselfer (he wasn't).

We are just starting a multi-year remodel which will touch every square foot of the house, including the eventual replacement of every electrical circuit, switch and fixture. We currently have issues, where my wife vacuuming the bedroom will trip the 15Amp bedroom breaker which will kill the lights too, as well as the outlets and lights in my daughter's bedroom and bathroom on the floor below. Clearly WAAAAYY too many items on that single circuit.

I bought a new Square D QO panel, a mess of new breakers and couple-thousand feet of Romex (Mix of 14/2 and 12/2). I do have electrical experience, having wired new houses from the ground up, and re-wired a number of old houses. When I was a teenager my dad was a home-builder and I worked as an electrician for a number of years back then. Also I have hired a young man who is currently employed as an electrician apprentice. He tests for his "Residential Wireman" license in March. I have no doubt that we can do this, so I don't need any recommendations for a local contractor. I have done the straight out panel replacement before but what I want to do here is a little different, hence my question.

The location of the old panel is not ideal. The part of the house it is in will ultimately be torn down and replaced, but not for a year or so. Here's the gist...

I want to mount the new panel in the basement (the current panel is in a buttress wall inside the walk in pantry in the kitchen.) Then feed the new panel as if it's a sub-panel, off of an existing 100 Amp breaker in the old panel. The location I have chosen in the basement is across the room from the boiler, water heater tank, and water treatment systems. Above the new panel location is a vertical shaft that allows me to easily run wiring all the way up into the second floor attic, meaning I can pretty effortlessly make wire runs anywhere in the house from here.

I also plan on running the new service entry up the basement wall and outside over the concrete, back down into the ground and direct buried to the meter pole. Currently the meter pole goes up and the service entrance drops through the air to a weather head above the kitchen.

As I remodel different rooms, I will pull the old circuits out of the wall, as closely as I can get them to the old panel, then remove their breakers from the old panel and tie off their dead wires. Feeding the new circuits from the new panel as I go.

Eventually I will get to a tipping point where I have more circuits on the new panel, than the old one, at which point I will call the power company and have them switch the mains from the old panel weatherhead drop, to the new panel's underground feed.

Then I'll use the wire running the new panel as a sub off of the old one, and instead run it to feed the old panel as a sub from the new one. At this point all 220V circuits will have been replaced and the old panel will only have a handful of outlets and lighting circuits on it.

Later, after the old panel's circuits have all been replaced/switched over to the new panel, then I'll cut the sub-panel feed to it and remove the rest of its left over elements.

I imagine this will take something like a year, to get enough of the old circuits replaced to justify pulling the old panel.

Has anyone here done anything like this before and of so, did you run into any issues I should know about?

Thanks in advance!

 

[ard]

Where I've lived, the POCO will require a permit approval prior to making service changes.

The only problem I see with your plan is the challenge of getting this done under a permit- the piecemeal aspect of it (plus having the county in your shorts for all the work) would be difficult to fit into the standard 'rough inspection, final inspection' format.

Also, I'd run the wire out the basement wall directly at the depth below grade the conduit will run. Drill it. Unless there is some unusual water/structural consideration...

 

[Leaflessshadetree]

Twice I've had new panels installed at a different location. Both times I moved the large loads then ran the old panel as a sub panel for a few weeks while I rewired to the closest junction on each "new" circuit.

 

[sberry]

Do a service upgrade. Do some readiness for large circuits so they are ready to move. Have the new panel and entrance inspected, as soon as inspector leaves begin rework, have the poco come move the service to the new and cut the old, backfeed the old panel. I have the power off about 10 minutes, poco loves it in a 1 shot operation.

 

[sberry]

I have done about a hundred of these. Did one for a bud recently, he helped but said the inspector commented and mirrored just what I predicted he would say.
I do the service first, after that it's all at your convenience. It's actually a plus to relocate and change design. it allows for a changeover without delay, all in one pass.
Our relatively new inspector is a real treat compared to a couple dandys we had. Super nice guy and a real pro. I only met once on one of my own, he asked if I had been waiting on it, etc and made small trade talk. He asked me I'd I wanted him to call in the hookup order. He must have done it on the way out the drive, I was in the middle of hooking in circuits and they were there pronto, about 45 minutes.

 

[NUTTSGT]

Could you replace the meter base with one that is a combination meter base/main breaker panel ? Then after it is in, run the old panel and new panel as sub panels until the time comes to remove the old panel completely.

 

[pblanton]

Where I've lived, the POCO will require a permit approval prior to making service changes.

The only problem I see with your plan is the challenge of getting this done under a permit- the piecemeal aspect of it (plus having the county in your shorts for all the work) would be difficult to fit into the standard 'rough inspection, final inspection' format.

Also, I'd run the wire out the basement wall directly at the depth below grade the conduit will run. Drill it. Unless there is some unusual water/structural consideration...

@ard, yeah. I also worry about the inspectors being all up in my business about the whole thing for that long a time too, but I really think it important to have the work permitted.

Though, i'm positive that none of the other remodel work on this house was ever permitted /inspected, since the original construction back in 1971.

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[pblanton]

Where I've lived, the POCO will require a permit approval prior to making service changes.

The only problem I see with your plan is the challenge of getting this done under a permit- the piecemeal aspect of it (plus having the county in your shorts for all the work) would be difficult to fit into the standard 'rough inspection, final inspection' format.

Also, I'd run the wire out the basement wall directly at the depth below grade the conduit will run. Drill it. Unless there is some unusual water/structural consideration...

I also am surprised that you'd recommend going straight through the wall into the ground rather than up and over. This is my first direct burial rodeo.

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[sberry]

The reason I suggest the order I do is due to the inspection process. Service upgrade, new entrance first.

 

[pblanton]

Could you replace the meter base with one that is a combination meter base/main breaker panel ? Then after it is in, run the old panel and new panel as sub panels until the time comes to remove the old panel completely.

I was trying to avoid the complexity of my place for the first post, but since you asked...

Currently, the drop to my property comes as very high voltage drops diagonally across the front corner of my property, to a pole transformer next to my shop.

Then it drops across a fifty foot span to another pole in my backyard. This pole has the meter box, and main breaker on it.

From here, the power runs underground back to the shop, where there is a whole house generator, and a 100 Amp distribution panel for the shop.

From there, the power runs underground, back out to the pole in the backyard, where it splits to a sub - panel that powers the henhouse, barn, and greenhouse; then runs up the pole and drops to the house.

Ultimately, I want to eliminate the pole in the backyard, and the house - voltage overhead drops. The end result outside will be,

High voltage drops to the pole transformer.

Run the transformed power down the pole to the meter /main. From there run underground to the shop /generator.

From the shop, run underground to the spot where the backyard pole used to be, where there will be a new, in - ground, weatherproof junction box, where the split off to the out buildings, and house will be made, All underground from there.

Whew!

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[Bretny]

Setup your new pannel where you want it and run it as a sub pannel for the the time being. Run all new wires from it. You can also setup your new service to it. So on cut off day you just have the power company come and move the service from old to new house connections.

We did this on my house. Had them cut power in the morning, we removed the "sub pannel" wire and had them come back after lunch to hook up the new service.