NevadaDada
New User
- Location
- Lake Tahoe, CA
- Occupation
- Retired
Hello all. I'm new to the Mike Holt forums. This is my first post. I had a question regarding a short which caused a gas fire that damaged my furnace and could have potentially burned down my house.
I have a main panel which, from the PG&E smart meter feeds a 125A breaker. From the main panel, there was a 70A breaker which jumped from the exterior of my house and fed a sub-panel which all of my house circuits ran off of. The 70A breaker kept popping so I decided to upgrade to a 100A breaker. I first shut off the 125A and 70A breaker at the main panel. I then replaced the subpanel as well as all of the breakers and hooked everything back up at the subpanel. I then removed the existing #4 nmb and replaced it #2 nmb wire. I connected the ground, neutral, primary and secondary hot at the subpanel. However, when I was dropping in the new #2 at the main panel, the ground wire brushed across the primary and secondary lines before the 125A breaker and shorted the lines, arcing to the panel simultaneously. I quickly pulled the new line up to stop the arcing. I then proceeded to hook the ground up to the bus bar. However, 5 minutes later, my wife came running out of the house yelling, "There's a fire in the furnace!". I ran into the house and to the closet containing the furnace. There was flame shooting through the middle of the door that looked like a flamethrower. I opened the door and extinguished the fire. Gas was still humming through the line so I then shut the valve off. Upon visual inspection, the gas had ignited at the flex line.
My question is:
Is this a normal occurrence when shorting out a ground across the main panel?
Also, is this a sign of improper grounding? I pose this question because I believe that if the line was grounded properly, in the occurrence of the gas line becoming energized due to a energy back feed into the circuit, I believe that if the line were grounded to Earth, the energy would've dissipated through the ground rod. After the fire, I checked the gas at the main and there's no ground clamp from the gas pipe to the ground rod.
If you've made it this far, THANK YOU. Any and all input would be greatly appreciated.
I have a main panel which, from the PG&E smart meter feeds a 125A breaker. From the main panel, there was a 70A breaker which jumped from the exterior of my house and fed a sub-panel which all of my house circuits ran off of. The 70A breaker kept popping so I decided to upgrade to a 100A breaker. I first shut off the 125A and 70A breaker at the main panel. I then replaced the subpanel as well as all of the breakers and hooked everything back up at the subpanel. I then removed the existing #4 nmb and replaced it #2 nmb wire. I connected the ground, neutral, primary and secondary hot at the subpanel. However, when I was dropping in the new #2 at the main panel, the ground wire brushed across the primary and secondary lines before the 125A breaker and shorted the lines, arcing to the panel simultaneously. I quickly pulled the new line up to stop the arcing. I then proceeded to hook the ground up to the bus bar. However, 5 minutes later, my wife came running out of the house yelling, "There's a fire in the furnace!". I ran into the house and to the closet containing the furnace. There was flame shooting through the middle of the door that looked like a flamethrower. I opened the door and extinguished the fire. Gas was still humming through the line so I then shut the valve off. Upon visual inspection, the gas had ignited at the flex line.
My question is:
Is this a normal occurrence when shorting out a ground across the main panel?
Also, is this a sign of improper grounding? I pose this question because I believe that if the line was grounded properly, in the occurrence of the gas line becoming energized due to a energy back feed into the circuit, I believe that if the line were grounded to Earth, the energy would've dissipated through the ground rod. After the fire, I checked the gas at the main and there's no ground clamp from the gas pipe to the ground rod.
If you've made it this far, THANK YOU. Any and all input would be greatly appreciated.
