I inspect in the Midwest, and I would never recommend replacement based solely on the fact that it is a Pushmatic. They’re just fine. If you have a breaker that won’t reset, you can replace a single breaker. Generally, they’re going to be around 50 years old, so if a breaker or two fails in 50 years, replacement of individual breakers is totally acceptable. Automatically recommending replacement is just lazy and sheepish in my opinion.
Putting safety and reliability issues aside, two things are true for every Pushmatic panel:
- They are obsolete
- Most are near or at expected life span of 60 years for a service panel
Advising your client of these facts is prudent.
Richard, are you saying that these panelboards have lost their UL listing? Do you have any documentation to support that?
Lacking documentation to the contrary, I guess that statement was more of an opinion than a fact. And since UL is the standard for safety and reliability and the fact that the panel is obsolete and production is no longer subject to UL follow up, I retracted that point.