John Beckman wrote:
Greetings,
I was looking at a 1955 bungalow with what is probably an updated electrical
panel. However, there was no typical "main breaker" at the top, there were
just two rows of breakers on each side. the stove and water heater had the
typical tied breakers that would indicate that it is a 240 volt breaker.
However, at the top left side of the panel there were three 100 amp
breakers, side by side with their handles tied together. If it was just two
tied together, I'd just say OK 100 amp service and these are the mains, BUT
there were three of them. What gives, I'm thinking of buying the place and
want to know what kind of elec service it has. Unfortunately I did not
remove the panel cover, and I don't know the brand. Suggestions? Speculation

John


I've seen three phase service on some older "large"
homes because they needed it for large AC units. At
the time the homes were built, single phase 5 ton
units didn't exist. You wrote that your example is
a bungalow so I doubt it needed a lot of power. I
have seen older Federal Pacific Electric breaker
panels that were split, sort of like an old fuse
box with heavy loads on the top and lighting on the
bottom. One of the top breakers actually feeds the
bottom half of the breaker box. I tend to refer to
them as WTF breaker panels. Be careful of those,
those panels have caused a lot of fires.

http://www.inspect-ny.com/fpe/GGPic5.jpg

http://www.inspect-ny.com/fpe/stlou022.gif

TDD