Condominium Panel

Specific Inspection Topics Electrical Inspections
1

Hey guys

I inspected a condominium town home (late 1980’s) yesterday and the panel did not have a main disconnect nor a grounding conductor coming off the neutral bar. Also the dryer circuit was protected by 40amp breaker but the wire was awg10.

I assume that the main disconnect and grounding conductor are in a separate utility space with the meter.

Questions:

  1. Would my assumption be correct? Is this a common arrangement for condos? If so how does bonding of hot and cold water pipes work in this case?

  2. Is there some kind of exception to the rule for a dryer circuit that it can be overfused? I have seen this arrangement in a number of service panels lately.

Any advice is appreciated.
Craig

2

  1. Common for condos, yes. Bondinding of components is typically near the service equipment with jumpers at water heaters.

  2. No exception for 240V dryer receptacles (that I am aware of). Paul?

3

3 wire or 4 wire feeder?

4

The feeder to the panel has 2 hot, 1 Neutral and a bare copper ground.

5

Thanks Jeffrey.

6

Jeff,

Yes, you are correct in that the grounding will take place at the FIRST point of Service Disconnection probably at the main panels location for the condo’s in the mechanical room. I also suggest they make sure the proper wiring is to the " Remote Distrubution Panels" in the condo units themselves.

On the Dryer wiring, no exceptions on branch circuits for a # 10 AWG to be protected by anything other than a 30A breaker or smaller…in this example.

While smaller would most certainly cause a TRIP issue, you can’t fix it by placing it on a larger breaker…ranges can be on 40 or 50A breakers in certain case…but not in regards to a 30A appliance as stated.