4 jaw to 6 jaw 400A meter / enclosure

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cosmicelectric

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Oceanside, CA
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Contractor
Hello all,

I have a client who hired a general contractor to facilitate install of a new 400a service on a commercial agricultural property.

The contractor installed a 400a rated enclosure, with a single 4 jaw meter socket

Here are specs of installed enclosure if interested: Eaton HP404040SHPVCSR

However, when the utility came to provide meter and make their connection, they declined to service because they want a 6 jaw meter socket , not a 4 jaw (which is what the enclosure is equipped with).

Utility is also now requesting an entire new enclosure be installed that is rated for 400a with 6 jaw socket. Which seems excessive . "Need 400a commercial ct panel 6 clip" are the exact words on their report.

So, my question is this, to save my customer many thousands by purchasing an entire new 400a commercial enclosure, is there a way to convert the socket from 4 jaw to 6 jaw? Or install new 6 jaw meter socket upstream? I am familiar with 5th jaw add on to go from 1ph to 3ph, but not familiar with 4 to 6. The enclosure is rated for 400amps so the original contractor was off to the right start and the work was done beautifully, the utility however is not okay with the socket.

Another thing that confuses me about this whole thing is...

Eaton has been around for years, so why would they sell a 400A panel, with 400A rated meter socket, but provide you with only a single 200A disconnect and bus bar. Where do you get the other 200A to get the full load of the 400A enclosure you paid for? What am I missing here? Anyone able to shed light? Surely Eaton sells the enclosure like this for a reason, it must work in other applications, why not this one?

Any ideas?

Thanks in advance.
 
cosmicelectric said:
Hello all,

I have a client who hired a general contractor to facilitate install of a new 400a service on a commercial agricultural property.

The contractor installed a 400a rated enclosure, with a single 4 jaw meter socket

Here are specs of installed enclosure if interested: Eaton HP404040SHPVCSR

However, when the utility came to provide meter and make their connection, they declined to service because they want a 6 jaw meter socket , not a 4 jaw (which is what the enclosure is equipped with).

Utility is also now requesting an entire new enclosure be installed that is rated for 400a with 6 jaw socket. Which seems excessive . "Need 400a commercial ct panel 6 clip" are the exact words on their report.

So, my question is this, to save my customer many thousands by purchasing an entire new 400a commercial enclosure, is there a way to convert the socket from 4 jaw to 6 jaw? Or install new 6 jaw meter socket upstream? I am familiar with 5th jaw add on to go from 1ph to 3ph, but not familiar with 4 to 6. The enclosure is rated for 400amps so the original contractor was off to the right start and the work was done beautifully, the utility however is not okay with the socket.

Another thing that confuses me about this whole thing is...

Eaton has been around for years, so why would they sell a 400A panel, with 400A rated meter socket, but provide you with only a single 200A disconnect and bus bar. Where do you get the other 200A to get the full load of the 400A enclosure you paid for? What am I missing here? Anyone able to shed light? Surely Eaton sells the enclosure like this for a reason, it must work in other applications, why not this one?

Any ideas?

Thanks in advance.
Click to expand...
It makes no difference what Eaton or any other company manufacturers.
The only entity with any say in this matter is the Utility. Many utilities have different requirements for residential vs commercial metering. Your EC errored by not checking the their requirements first.
 
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Be it upgrade in amps or a new service altogether, i have seen the utilities own designer screw this up...fwiw. Both res and commercial- mostly ag or res/ranches...
 
cosmicelectric said:
is there a way to convert the socket from 4 jaw to 6 jaw? Or install new 6 jaw meter socket upstream? I am familiar with 5th jaw add on to go from 1ph to 3ph, but not familiar with 4 to 6. The enclosure is rated for 400amps so the original contractor was off to the right start
Click to expand...
Sounds like your contractor installed a 400 amp single phase meter can, which would be 4 jaws - 2 line, 2 load.

A 5th jaw is not for making it 3-phase, that's for connecting a neutral to the meter. That's how one POCO (Evergy) in Kansas City does it.

6 jaws would be 3-phase without neutral connected - 3 line, 3 load. Some POCOs don't use 400 amp 3-phase meters. That's where CTs might come in.

3-phase with neutral connected would be 7 jaws
 
cosmicelectric said:
Hello all,

I have a client who hired a general contractor to facilitate install of a new 400a service on a commercial agricultural property.

The contractor installed a 400a rated enclosure, with a single 4 jaw meter socket
Click to expand...
A Residential grade '400 Amp' single phase 'enclosure' is really a "class 320 Amp" meter, not a 400 amp class.
Most utilities around here go to Current Transformer (CT) metering above 225 Amps commercial.
CT metering is a different animal and the all in one would need to be removed and replaced with a CT can and a CT meterbase that meets the poco specs.

You can see on the drawings that the meter is class 320 here:
https://www.eaton.com/ecm/idcplg?Id...dition=Primary&dDocName=96-5310.DWG.pdf_47851

And PG&E for example has specs for over 225A metering here:
 
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