Briant Panels

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LawnGuyLandSparky

Senior Member
micromind said:
Look at it this way...Have you ever violated any traffic law? Why is it you'll think nothing of busting a speed limit, but rip anyone to shreds who doesn't always follow code to the letter?

OK, flame on!

I'm with you, and the 2 20a SABC's outside on my deck that share with a dining room and kitchen SABC prove it!

(Because we cook EITHER outside OR inside, that's why.)
 

LawnGuyLandSparky

Senior Member
inspector23 said:
I KNEW I needed that extra clip!! I am not making people do anything. The NEC requires it. It is not up to me. It is black and white. "Good enough" is why I have a security in my chosen profession an an Inspector!:cool:

110.12(C) Integrity of electrical equipment and connections. ( last sentence) There shall be no damaged parts that may adversely affect safe operation or mechanical strength of the equipment such as parts that are broken;bent;cut;or deteriorated by corrosion, chemical action, or overheating.

So, if one or two of the screw slots in the neutral bar are stripped, the whole neutral bar has to go?
 

busman

Senior Member
Location
Northern Virginia
Occupation
Master Electrician / Electrical Engineer
LawnGuyLandSparky said:
So, if one or two of the screw slots in the neutral bar are stripped, the whole neutral bar has to go?
Just the neutral bar? You need to replace the whole panel if a neutral screw strips out.:D

But seriously, that's a really good analogy.

Mark
 

Twoskinsoneman

Senior Member
Location
West Virginia, USA NEC: 2020
Occupation
Facility Senior Electrician
ceb said:
Tue. night I get a call from one of my regular customers, said that when her daughter got home some recps. in kitchen were not working. Her husband get home and starts flipping breakers, he hears a "sizzling" sound in panel. He removes cover, while looking in panel the A/C unit comes on and he sees sparking. So at 9:00pm I arrive ( daughter is 9 mo. preg., still 91 deg. NEED A/C) I wiggle 50amp DP breaker for a/c unit I hear sizzling, I pull breaker. This breaker was so burned that the jaws stayed on buss bar and all of the plastic on the bottom fell apart The two SP breakers across from that one were in the same shape, the four breakers above and below were in bad shape also. Not one of these breakers ever tripped. (Go stay with mother for the night) I cut off main until I could return on Wed. to replace panel. The inspector said he had never seen one do like that and when I told him they never tripped he could not believe it and wanted to keep the 50 amp for his collection.
Has any one ran across this with Briant panels? By the way this panel was installed some where in the early 70's. If I could figure out how to post pix I would.

What is the actual cause of this? Is it not enough holding force and contact area between the finger and the CB contacts? Am I to understand it is strictly a design issue (manufacturer defaect)?
 

busman

Senior Member
Location
Northern Virginia
Occupation
Master Electrician / Electrical Engineer
My experience is that this usually happens with the old half-size breakers that attach to the busbar with a small hook. The hooks are offset to allow two breakers on one stab, but they don't seem to make a good contact.

Mark
 

macmikeman

Senior Member
If there was such a manufacturing defect then "110.12(C) Integrity of electrical equipment and connections. ( last sentence) There shall be no damaged parts that may adversely affect safe operation or mechanical strength of the equipment such as parts that are broken;bent;cut;or deteriorated by corrosion, chemical action, or overheating." this means that all those load centers out there need to be ripped out and replaced with bolt on panel boards. And all the light fixtures made in China too, since they came with those mystery 8-32 mounting screws that won't stay put in the mounting holes provided by American manufacturers of fixture boxes.
 

jetlag

Senior Member
Panel not damaged

Panel not damaged

inspector23 said:
I KNEW I needed that extra clip!! I am not making people do anything. The NEC requires it. It is not up to me. It is black and white. "Good enough" is why I have a security in my chosen profession an an Inspector!:cool:

110.12(C) Integrity of electrical equipment and connections. ( last sentence) There shall be no damaged parts that may adversely affect safe operation or mechanical strength of the equipment such as parts that are broken;bent;cut;or deteriorated by corrosion, chemical action, or overheating.

I agree with mark and dont consider a buss damaged or inferior if the burned finger is not being used , it would make no difference if it was brand new if no breaker is on the finger. as far as 4 lugs damaged thats why they make piggy back space savers but i always check load to be sure so install on the light loads circuit
 

royta

Senior Member
busman said:
My experience is that this usually happens with the old half-size breakers that attach to the busbar with a small hook. The hooks are offset to allow two breakers on one stab, but they don't seem to make a good contact.

Mark

Yeah, those old Crouse-Hinds breakers are awful. The best thing to do with those is to replace with Cutler-Hammer BR's.



As long as it's just the finger that's been overheated, then I don't see it as a problem. If the overheating went so far as to get into the buss itself, then there's a problem. The finger is not relied upon to supply power to other fingers.
 

dduffee260

Senior Member
Location
Texas
inspector23 said:
I KNEW I needed that extra clip!! I am not making people do anything. The NEC requires it. It is not up to me. It is black and white. "Good enough" is why I have a security in my chosen profession an an Inspector!:cool:

110.12(C) Integrity of electrical equipment and connections. ( last sentence) There shall be no damaged parts that may adversely affect safe operation or mechanical strength of the equipment such as parts that are broken;bent;cut;or deteriorated by corrosion, chemical action, or overheating.

Ok, so if the end of a feeder wire burns off, the wire has a loop in it which provides plenty of slack to reterminate. Do you require that they repull the entire feeder run or just cut off the burned end and reterminate it?
 

electricman2

Senior Member
Location
North Carolina
Occupation
Retired Electrical Contractor
mdshunk said:
I will happily remove a damaged breaker, blank off the cover plate for that slot, install a new one in a new slot, and reterminate the conductor. Call me crazy, but I call it prudent.

I agree 100%. Done it many times. As long as there is a clean spot on the bus and everything else is OK, relocate and abandon the bad slot. With Zinsco though, you quickly run out of unburned spots.:roll: I too remember the QO replacable fingers. A matter of economics I guess, cheaper to make the bus one piece.
 

inspector23

Senior Member
Location
Temecula, CA
dduffee260 said:
Ok, so if the end of a feeder wire burns off, the wire has a loop in it which provides plenty of slack to reterminate. Do you require that they repull the entire feeder run or just cut off the burned end and reterminate it?

Why would you repull the entire feeder? If you remove the damaged part (cutting it off) and replace it (reterminating the feeder), you no longer have a damaged part.

When you simply blank off the damaged finger area, you are intentionally leaving a damaged part in the panel.

In part, 110.12 (C) states: "There shall be no damaged (my emphasis) parts that may adversely affect safe orperation or mechanical strength of the equipment."

The mechanical strength of the fingers have definitely been compromised. When the choice is made to ignore this and simply cover it up, the installer has made a conscious decision to violate this code section.
 

dcspector

Senior Member
Location
Burke, Virginia
Inspector23.....I have been an Electrical Inspector for ten years and an electrician for almost 20.....What the hell is up with the GLOCK....joking or not leave at the house and not here!
 

dduffee260

Senior Member
Location
Texas
inspector23 said:
Why would you repull the entire feeder? If you remove the damaged part (cutting it off) and replace it (reterminating the feeder), you no longer have a damaged part.

When you simply blank off the damaged finger area, you are intentionally leaving a damaged part in the panel.

In part, 110.12 (C) states: "There shall be no damaged (my emphasis) parts that may adversely affect safe orperation or mechanical strength of the equipment."

The mechanical strength of the fingers have definitely been compromised. When the choice is made to ignore this and simply cover it up, the installer has made a conscious decision to violate this code section.

But what about the lug that the wire was in? What about the heat stress on the wire? I agree with you here that the wire would be ok, it would not be feasable to change the feeder.

What if you cut off the damaged finger in the panel? You are then removing the damaged part. Would it be ok then? When you are talking about the average homeowner you have to think safety first, but if there is a way you can correct the problem in a fair and safe manner, you are helping a customer.
 

andinator

Senior Member
Location
Lilburn Georgia
electricman2 said:
With Zinsco though, you quickly run out of unburned spots.:roll:


I experienced my first Zinsco (actually, it was a sylvania) this week doing a kitchen remodel for a large GC who gives our shop a ton of work. Fortunately the panel was in the basement and I could put almost all of my new homeruns into junctions without climbing into this the scariest panel I've ever seen. On an interesting side note we have locally an off the wall breaker outlet and I was able to get a 100A DP breaker for only $100. The kicker was the new breaker was twice the size of the old 70A DP.:mad:
 

inspector23

Senior Member
Location
Temecula, CA
dcspector said:
Inspector23.....I have been an Electrical Inspector for ten years and an electrician for almost 20.....What the hell is up with the GLOCK....joking or not leave at the house and not here!

Interesting..... You qualify your comment about a running joke (several threads over the months) with your credentials as an inspector and an electricain. Not sure I follow the logic.

Any time you deal in a public arena, you are always subject to offending someone with different experiences and viewpoints than your own.

The moderator of this site, along with countless other duties and responsibilities, has the authority and obligation to invoke censorship when he feels the content is inappropriate. That has not occurred here, nor in any other of the numerous threads where this humor has been used. Not a single person (whom I was directing the comments to or otherwise) ever complained or contacted me asking me to stop. In fact, many people in different threads have added to the subject with their own personal humor along the same lines.

This particular reference has obviously hit a nerve with you. For that, and that alone, I apologize.

However, until the moderator of this site informs me otherwise, I shall continue to inject my view of humor into my posts.
 
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jim dungar

Moderator
Staff member
Location
Wisconsin
Occupation
PE (Retired) - Power Systems
inspector23 said:
In part, 110.12 (C) states: "There shall be no damaged (my emphasis) parts that may adversely affect safe orperation or mechanical strength of the equipment."

The mechanical strength of the fingers have definitely been compromised.

I do not see how a heat damaged or even a burned/pitted bus bar finger ONLY compromises the mechanical strength of the panelboard.

It definitley compromises the electrical connection so no future breaker should be installed there (but the NEC deals with the present and not what someone else may do wrong in the future). And if the damage was to the "main bus bar" not just a finger or if the overheating damaged any insulator around the finger then of course 110.12(C) is applicable.
 

inspector23

Senior Member
Location
Temecula, CA
jim dungar said:
I do not see how a heat damaged or even a burned/pitted bus bar finger ONLY compromises the mechanical strength of the panelboard.

I would have to disagree. It does comprise the mechanical strength of the panelboard, as it is all one piece construction. You cannot separate them or replace one. We may call them two different names (panelboard and bus fingers) but in fact they are one inseparable piece of equipment.

jim dungar said:
(but the NEC deals with the present and not what someone else may do wrong in the future).

Again, in this particular instance, I would disagree. The last sentence of 110.12(C) states: There shall be no damaged parts that may (my emphasis) adversely affect safe operation or mechanical strength of the equipment.....

Our jurisdiction takes the position the word "may" in this sentence gives credence to future safe operation or mechanical strength.

Since you can no longer use the damaged bus fingers, the "equipment" (by definition this includes the panelboard, which is one piece and inseparable) is compromised and should be replaced.
 
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mpd

Senior Member
I don't see where relocating a couple breakers would even involve an electrical inspection, this is up to the contractor to make the determination about the condition of the existing panel, would not involve a electrical inspeciton unless he changes the panel or the power was disconnected by the utility
 

Twoskinsoneman

Senior Member
Location
West Virginia, USA NEC: 2020
Occupation
Facility Senior Electrician
inspector23 said:
Interesting..... You qualify your comment about a running joke (several threads over the months) with your credentials as an inspector and an electricain. Not sure I follow the logic.

Any time you deal in a public arena, you are always subject to offending someone with different experiences and viewpoints than your own.

The moderator of this site, along with countless other duties and responsibilities, has the authority and obligation to invoke censorship when he feels the content is inappropriate. That has not occurred here, nor in any other of the numerous threads where this humor has been used. Not a single person (whom I was directing the comments to or otherwise) ever complained or contacted me asking me to stop. In fact, many people in different threads have added to the subject with their own personal humor along the same lines.

This particular reference has obviously hit a nerve with you. For that, and that alone, I apologize.

However, until the moderator of this site informs me otherwise, I shall continue to inject my view of humor into my posts.

This on-going joke does seem to be in poor taste. JMHO
From my assumption the joke makes light of taking someone's life due to a squable over work...?
 

inspector23

Senior Member
Location
Temecula, CA
Twoskinsoneman said:
This on-going joke does seem to be in poor taste. JMHO
From my assumption the joke makes light of taking someone's life due to a squable over work...?

No, that assumption is not, and was not, the intent of the joke at all. When it began, it was a joke about "sticking to your guns" and enforcing the requirements of your job as an inspector when you are getting hammered on, (much like this thread!:grin: ) with the old excuse of "we have always done it that way" and "everyone else does it this way," you don't like me", etc.

It's August. It's hot. It's Friday. It's time to unwind. It's also not a big deal to me. It was an attempt at humor, which I sprinkle on my views of life and my professional career. So you did not find it humorous. I fail to see the humor in that band leader on David Letterman. Life goes on. However, since Jay Leno has not returned my calls, I shall quit using the Glock jokes and search for new material references......

This is not life or death. This is an avenue for a variey of people to respectfully express their views on a variety of electrical issues. And yes, I used the word respectfully , even with the Glock references. I have no control over what is taken out of context by anyone.

I would suggest we all take a deep breath, turn down our sensitivity meters, and enjoy the weekend!:cool:

Thanks for your view, and the Glock references are over. But I'm still going to "stick to my guns" on the OP and my initial response to Marc about covering up the damaged bus fingers.
 
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