Ask Bill Addiss here, Licensed Electrician](LicensedElectrician.com - Addiss Electric Supply Online Store) he sells many books and may have some suggestions.
I have many old catalogs, and if you search the net, Google panelboards and look for manufactures specs:
Wouldn’t really recommend you pull the pull-outs from an old panel. Reason being, they do sometimes “pull apart”, and you’ll have the handle and face of the pullout in your hand, and the guts will be stuck in the panel. Or worse, part of the guts will be on the handle yet, and part will be stuck in the panel. Pull it out at your own risk. Replacements are very hard to come by, since they are quite manufacturer and model specific.
Hmmm, I don’t. The sticker on the door of the panel would be the information you’d need. Probably older versions of HP Richter’s “Practical Electrical Wiring” would have some stuff. Published by Park Press since the 30’s.
Well said Marc I would also like to remind our newer Home Inspectors we do a visual Inspection.
I am a retired Electrician and I do not pull any thing like that apart.
Visual is as far as I go.
Any concerns in any equipment .
Recommend further evaluation by qualified person. …CRA…
( Cover Roys A$$)
…Cookie
Here’a an old book that will be helpful for inspecting old wiring systems.](http://www.amazon.com/WIRING-SIMPLIFIED-H-P-Richter/dp/B000O7LTGI/ref=sr_1_8?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1206300349&sr=1-8)
I guess you guys all have “electrical inspection of existing dwellings”? by Redwood Kardon, Douglas Hansen, and some other guy I forget. That’s a good book, right there, with lots of pictures.
I take on the risk of pulling out and inspecting all pull-out blocks with cartridges, if the dwelling is not occupied.
Why?
Because there was one home inspection, where I found copper pipes being utilized as fuse cartridges. I couldn’t believe my eyes.
I take the chance and if the pull block breaks in my hand, it failed upon testing.
That’s certainly one method, and a very good reasoning for it.
Here’s another diagram showing a 100 amp fused panel.
THAT is what I am used to seeing.
See how the line side of the left fuses goes to the bottom of the right fuses.
Agreed. That one is much more typical.
The only problem is that is a Federal panel, the fuses won’t blow 
They won’t need to. Says “no arc” right on the label.
If what you’ve been showing is typical and quite common, don’t want to inspect in your areas. Haven’t seen anything with the variations as you’ve produced!!
If you’ve never seen a “main and range, plus four” fuse panel, you havn’t seen much. I’d say that style of panel was installed for much longer than any style of breaker panel you’ll ever see. We’re talking many decades.
I will try to get a picture of my neighbor’s 4 pullout plus 8 plug fuse panel. No I am not taking the cover off.
http://www.cbchomeinspect.com/uploads/images/image002(1).jpg
Here’s a 100 amp with the main pull-out on the left and the range on the right. In a house built in the late sixties.
Marc and I live in very similar areas, but in neighboring states.
I see (read: rip out) SO many of these things. He is correct, they were VERY popular in their day, which was a long day. Their use was widespread.
Must have been a US or local preference. Worked under electrician for 3 years in 1970’s and have been inspecting since 1984, never have seen one…maybe they were already replaced!!!:shock: :shock: 
I think these split bus panels fuse were used extensively in the post WWII housing boom but the funny thing about that is sometime in the early 50s the “GI” guidelines called for breakers. The house my parents bought in 54 had an old SqD breaker panel and a grounded romex wiring method. My father said it was a GI bill requirement. I suspect the farther you got from DC the less it was enforced.