Service Drop and Panel Questions

Specific Inspection Topics Electrical Inspections
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I’m going to go ahead and post this again, even though I can’t seem to figure out how to load my images. (Must be dumb as mud!)

First issue. The service drop lines attach near the corner of a house on the left side. Then they wrap around the corner over to the right side where they make the splice to the service entrance conductor. The drop lines are in contact with the corner of the house. My inclination is that this makes them susceptable to wear from any movement from wind? Agreed?

Second issue. Same house has a Federal Electric Products service panel, from Newark. New Jersey. Label doesn’t say Federal Pacific, but after looking at pictures of Federal Pacific panels on line, this panel looks very similar, but not identical to any I’ve seen. It very old, and may predate Federal Pacific. Other than being old and crowded, didn’t discern any specific issues with it. Does anybody have any info about Federal Electric or any other thoughts about this?

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Cancel

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Bump

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:mrgreen:

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http://www.inspect-ny.com/fpe/fpepanel.htm

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Thanks, Jeff. I have in fact looked at that link. My quandary is that my panel does look very similar to the pictures on that site, but not exactly. There’s nothing that I can see that matches my panel. My panel for the most part looks older than the samples shown, plus my panel reads **Federal Electric Products, **not Federal Pacific Electric.

I may just recommend further evaluation and possible upgrade just because of the age. I’m also thinking of taking another look at this panel, just to make sure I didn’t miss anything.

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If you like, you can email me the pictures and I’ll upload them for you.

Don’t worry about size, I have a T-1 connection.

InspectorJeff@sbcglobal.net

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They are one and the same…

See:
http://www.codecheck.com/pdf/electrical/240overcurrent/FPE%20Article%20from%20DH%20-%20Nov2003.pdf

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Thanks Joe. This confirmed my assumption that Federal Electric was the company’s name before Federal Pacific. I’m going to use my standard verbage for Federal Pacific panels.

Also, I went back to look at this panel without the realtor and client talking in my ear, and took more time. This panel was so packed with wires, that I actually missed some loose non-terminated wires, plus a double tap. Not good on my part. Need to take a deep breath and focus sometimes. But my suspicions were aroused after I was looking at my photos back at my office. At least I don’t mind biting the bullet and re-checking myself, just don’t want to make a habit of it.

Thanks for the offer Jeff of uploading the pictures, but I think that I have it under control now.