No Main Over Current Disconnect between Meter and Main Distribution Panel


Just looking to see if anyone else has come across this. There isn’t a main current disconnect between the meter and the main distribution panel or on the panel itself. I have written it up as a defect with Licensed Electrical Contractor to inspect. House is 40 years old was this ever standard electrical practice?

Is that 100 amp the disconnect?

I thought that is was a 100 too. It’s a 60.

The panel is outdated and needs an upgrade! Period.

It appears to be a 60 AMP service

Hi Gentlemen,

There is no Disconnect at all. Agree. Failed it and get Electrical Contractor in.

Thank you for your responses.

Did you remove the cover? How do you know that the 2 pole 100 amp CB in the upper left isn’t back fed?

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My thought, too…it could be back fed.

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I am wrong on this. I was looking at the 60 in the middle.

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You don’t “fail” anything…Nope!

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Failed it (wrote it up as a defect) I did not use failed in the report. I could not remove the cover as there was a dryer in front of it. Too far to reach to safely remove the panel.

You may have maid a mistake stating it is a defect, and recommending an electrician repair it, unless you found additional issues that warrant their time to come to the house.
As others have noted the disconnect is most likely the 100 breaker at top.
IMO you should have tried your best to remove the cover. A dryer alone isn’t enough to prevent removing it
.

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Thank you Chris. I have already amended that section of the report.

You would not know this but the house has a bent service entrance mast. There are no GFCI’s in the kitchen or the laundry room. There is a hole drilled in a wall and an electrical cord through it supplying the over range microwave from the laundry room. There is a hot water heater located on the exterior of the house on cinder blocks which is only rated for indoors use. Those alone IMO are enough to warrant a visit by a licensed electrical contractor.

Timothy, you are correct in calling for evaluation by a qualified electrician

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Why! When he didn’t even open up the panel to find out if that hundred amp was the disconnect.
It would just be wasting the client’s money and the electricians time. If it’s correctly installed.

Hi Roy
See reply to Chris. There are numerous other electrical problems which need a licensed electrical contractor to assess.

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I think there is enough there to warrant Further Investigation and actually Repair/upgrade by an electrician, and that is just based on the one photo. Missmatched breakers (GE, Eaton, (i believe a Challenger 60A) some not able to identify, but are not GE, which I’m guessing is a GE Panel (Main 100A is GE). (From experience, with that many mismatched breakers, it is a good bet of what you would find inside…(uncle Charlie’s handy work).

No way am I going to second guess another inspector (that is there) and tell him that crawling over a Clothes dryer to remove the dead face is reasonable or Safe to do. and listing a few other problems like the lack of GFCIs, bent mast…etc. backs up your opinion that it needs an electricians attention. Good Call Timothy!

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