breakers for sub feeds

[danickstr]

I saw that in another thread there are sub-feed breakers, but I have never seen them used in residential homes for feeding garage panels, etc. I think I have seen then in commercial, but not sure. It also would seem less convenient to not be able to shut down the feeder line to service it.

Just wanted to get thoughts on this topic from the esteemed colleagues here in the forum.

 

[charlie b]

I am not completely sure I understand the description. If I had a main service panel in the house, and if I wanted to feed a separate panel in the garage, how could I do that without using a breaker on the main panel to protect the conductors between the house and the garage? If I were to use double lugs or feed-through lugs on the main panel, then the conductors would have to be sized based on some aspect of the main panel, and not based on the rating of the sub-panel. What exactly did you have in mind?

 

[LarryFine]

Charlie, I believe he's referring to the sub-feed lug unit on the right, from the Largest Breaker thread in which we both posted:

 

[danickstr]

You kind of answered it, it would only work on the sub panel end, and I just haven't seen anyone use them, but I guess you could if you did not want the convenience of shutting off the buses at hte sub end without walking back to the main.