Michael15956
Senior Member
- Location
- NE Ohio
Is a one circuit 240 volt breaker disconnect installed down stream of the main disconnect considered a sub-panel.
Disconnect/Subpanel
- Thread starter Michael15956
- Start date
- Status
- Location
- New Jersey
- Occupation
- Journeyman Electrician
A sub-panel isn't defined by the NEC what's the reason that you may need to define what it is?
JFletcher
Senior Member
- Location
- Williamsburg, VA
I gather he's asking if it's considered a disconnect or a subpanel.
Spas often have a single 2p breaker and they are disconnects, and I suppose a subpanel as well. Maybe the question is can you omit the neutral (to either) on a straight 240V load, or re: bonding/grounding, especially at a separate structure.
Michael15956
Senior Member
- Location
- NE Ohio
OK, here is what I saw in the basement of a resident the other day when I was troubleshooting another circuit.
A 100 amp SER, four wire was feeding a detached garage. This circuit was taped in the basement in a jbox. The tap run about 8 feet and ended in a disconnect with a thirty amp two pole breaker. The disconnect was fed with three wires from the jbox,, no egc. Thls disconnect fed a three wire clothes dryer receptacle.
It seem wrong to me.
A 100 amp SER, four wire was feeding a detached garage. This circuit was taped in the basement in a jbox. The tap run about 8 feet and ended in a disconnect with a thirty amp two pole breaker. The disconnect was fed with three wires from the jbox,, no egc. Thls disconnect fed a three wire clothes dryer receptacle.
It seem wrong to me.
kwired
Electron manager
- Location
- NE Nebraska
- Occupation
- EC
If it was done before 1996 NEC applied it may have been OK. After then it at least needed a separate EGC.
Not really certain if you could bond such a disconnecting means with the neutral back in those days, but it was done a lot when fuses were common instead of breakers.
jeremy.zinkofsky
Senior Member
- Location
- nj
Sounds like whoever installed it was trying to comply with NEC Tap Rules.
- Location
- Illinois
- Occupation
- retired electrician
It needed the separate EGC back then too....the only time you could omit the EGC for a dryer or range circuit was when the circuit originated at the service equipment.
jumper
Senior Member
- Location
- 3 Hr 2 Min from Winged Horses
What about that rule using a insulated grounded conductor, did it apply then also?
I omitted the other qualifiers on purpose.
david
Senior Member
- Location
- Pennsylvania
OP stated SER cable and taped a insulated grounded conductor. In addition to the need of originating from the service equipment i don't remember one being able to tap SER cable in this way.
SER cable to a detached garage would imply other metallic paths to the structure kicking in the need for a four conductor feeder
- Location
- Illinois
- Occupation
- retired electrician
Yes that applied too.
kwired
Electron manager
- Location
- NE Nebraska
- Occupation
- EC
You are probably correct. Around here the only 4 wire range/dryer circuits you ever saw was in mobile or manufactured homes, until the 1996 NEC came out, service or feeder supplied panel didn't really matter. Three wire feeders to separate structures was also normal regardless of other conditions.
But one must also know that single family dwellings typically were not inspected until about 1992 or 1993 from what I remember, and even us professionals that did try to follow code were not as on top of it as we became once they started inspecting nearly everything.
- Status