Box Fill???

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Little Bill

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Staff member
Location
Tennessee NEC:2017
Occupation
Semi-Retired Electrician
Had a customer wanting to add a circuit to his back-up panel. I removed all the covers to see how everything was wired. Apparently whoever wired this when they installed the generator thought adding a slew of boxes over the panel for extending the circuits was the way to go.

Aside from what looks like over-filled boxes, something doesn't seem right about how they did this. I didn't count the wires for box fill, but it was inspected and passed
It is a 400A service with two 200A panels. Looks like circuits from both panels had to be moved.
The 200A panel on the right has a 100A breaker feeding the transfer switch then to the small sub panel on the right that has the backed-up circuits.

Anyone know of a better way this could have been done?

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Flatpad

Member
Location
NJ
I am not seeing a problem. I do see that the guy who did this used the same brand of wire nuts I do. Based on this I would not question his work.
I love those too, altho I mainly use the blue/orange instead (same, but a bit shorter skirt).

Smart $, a trough would have to be surface mounted, don't you think that would be more of an eyesore in a residential setting than some cover plates?
 

PetrosA

Senior Member
I love those too, altho I mainly use the blue/orange instead (same, but a bit shorter skirt).

Smart $, a trough would have to be surface mounted, don't you think that would be more of an eyesore in a residential setting than some cover plates?

Any residential design that doesn't accommodate good, industrial design that allows exposed conduit and troughs isn't worth the crappy lumber and chinese drywall it took to build ;)
 

Smart $

Esteemed Member
Location
Ohio
...Smart $, a trough would have to be surface mounted, don't you think that would be more of an eyesore in a residential setting than some cover plates?
The trough could be inset (flush mounted). Would require revising the wall framing and a bit more drywall work, but a better installation... and should I mention the wire fill being Code compliant :slaphead:
 

kwired

Electron manager
Location
NE Nebraska
The three gang box looks kind of full, but remember if there are no devices installed you get two more conductors allowance per device, so it may not be quite as overfilled as it looks. I still think it probably has too many conductors in it though.

I like the aux gutter idea, though it presents wall framing problems if it is flush or recessed in any way.
 

north star

Senior Member
Location
inside Area 51
# # #

As **kwired** has mentioned, if a trough were installed recessed,
it would definitley be a wall framing problem.....This is an exterior
load bearing wall....Also, ...maintaining the energy efficiency......I
wonder if thermal insulation was installed behind these panels.
And yes, ...the junction box looks overfilled!

# # #
 

Little Bill

Moderator
Staff member
Location
Tennessee NEC:2017
Occupation
Semi-Retired Electrician
A trough (wireway) across the top of all three panels, with the back-up panel's top in line with the others.

Looks like the reason the sub panel is higher than the others is they just used the knockouts in the transfer switch. Might could have either punched their own holes or lowered the transfer switch a little. But that would have thrown the conduit run off.



The three gang box looks kind of full, but remember if there are no devices installed you get two more conductors allowance per device, so it may not be quite as overfilled as it looks. I still think it probably has too many conductors in it though.

I like the aux gutter idea, though it presents wall framing problems if it is flush or recessed in any way.

Pretty sure the JB on the right is over filled, the other maybe not. I didn't take the covers off the other two.

# # #

As **kwired** has mentioned, if a trough were installed recessed,
it would definitley be a wall framing problem
.....This is an exterior
load bearing wall....Also, ...maintaining the energy efficiency......I
wonder if thermal insulation was installed behind these panels.
And yes, ...the junction box looks overfilled!

# # #

I imagine the framing (studs) already have as many holes as Swiss cheese from extending the circuits over to the sub panel. Or at least one large enough to weaken them pretty good.
 

Smart $

Esteemed Member
Location
Ohio
Looks like the reason the sub panel is higher than the others is they just used the knockouts in the transfer switch. Might could have either punched their own holes or lowered the transfer switch a little. But that would have thrown the conduit run off.

...
Could have punched hole lower in transfer switch for back-up panel... same elevation as or even lower than hole for main panel feeder. No need to lower transfer switch.
 

PetrosA

Senior Member
Those four wallcases can't ALL be related to the generator panel circuits. There are only 12 120V circuits in the generator panel while it looks like more than that are spliced in just the two wallcases over the 200A panel on the right. Something else was going on here. Maybe the main panels were moved at some point. Somehow the math isn't making sense.
 

Little Bill

Moderator
Staff member
Location
Tennessee NEC:2017
Occupation
Semi-Retired Electrician
Those four wallcases can't ALL be related to the generator panel circuits. There are only 12 120V circuits in the generator panel while it looks like more than that are spliced in just the two wallcases over the 200A panel on the right. Something else was going on here. Maybe the main panels were moved at some point. Somehow the math isn't making sense.

To be honest, I didn't count the wires in the JBs to compare to the gen. panel. I just ran my wire to the sub panel and buttoned it back up. But if there are 12 120V circuits, that's 36 wire nuts!:p That could take up more room than you think sometimes. Also, (didn't look) some of the wires could have been spliced from box to box rather than trying to feed through the boxes. There was also one 240V circuit moved. That could have been in one of the boxes by its self.

As I said before, I didn't take the two left covers off, so I don't know what was in them. Could have just been covers to cover up the holes they made to extend the circuits.
 

Little Bill

Moderator
Staff member
Location
Tennessee NEC:2017
Occupation
Semi-Retired Electrician
No, that's 12 wire nuts and two bugs ;) Actually, the grounds should be nutted together, so you wouldn't have 36 wire nuts.

The grounds might should have been bugged/crimped but as you can see in the pics, they wire nutted them.
So...
hot-hot = 1 wire nut
neutral-neutral = 1 wire nut
gnd-gnd = 1 wire nut
Total = 3
3X12=36:p:D
 
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