Replace service panel if equipment label is missing?

[bleininger]

Electrical inspectors in Richmond, CA are requiring a service panel replacement if the equipment label is missing. Is there any precedent for this?

Thanks.

Bruce

 

[iwire]

The way you worded your question the first reaction is no.

However I look at your profile and it says solar installer so let me do some guessing.

You are trying to backfeed an existing panel from a new PV array and the inspector cannot approve it because the panel rating cannot be determined.

If that is the case I think the inspector has a leg to stand on.

Am I close?

 

[cowboyjwc]

Not that I know of, but it's very hard to verify info, such as solar companies saying that it's a 125 amp panel with a 100 amp main.

Good call Bob, your answer popped up before I finished typing.

 

[kwired]

I would like to think that if the product number is still available that one could find information on the product and proceed from there.

Even current products may not have something like 125 amp bus with 100 amp main mentioned on the label of the panel.

I mostly install Square D panels, and I can tell you that a particular cabinet has the same label attached to it regardless of what interior (panelboard) is installed, same with the covers. Some cabinets have more then one interior that fits them, you need to know what is in the cabinet to know what it's ratings are, and there usually isn't enough space for any labels that have much information on them on these interior portions, but in the Square D units they do have the catalog number on a label of the interior portion.

I have replaced interiors before with different one then the original, like converting single phase to three phase. Find one that uses the same cabinet and just swap interiors. The cabinets have the same labels even though the interiors are different.

 

[norcal]

Since the OP is talking about Richmond, CA, it may not be as simple as one thinks to swap out guts of a loadcenter as California is the land of the all in one panel & if new construction is most likely semi-flush mounted, & interiors do not swap out readily.

 

[kwired]

Since the OP is talking about Richmond, CA, it may not be as simple as one thinks to swap out guts of a loadcenter as California is the land of the all in one panel & if new construction is most likely semi-flush mounted, & interiors do not swap out readily.

Why not? If you have same cabinet and any guts that are designed for that cabinet they should be a lot easier to swap then if they were not matched to one another.

You need to disconnect from power either way, when making such a change so that is nothing to consider for the difficulty level of this.

If the all in one you pictured were semi flush mounted and had damaged bus for some reason and was still new enough they still made the same model I would likely just get a new one and swap interior parts.

 

[norcal]

Why not? If you have same cabinet and any guts that are designed for that cabinet they should be a lot easier to swap then if they were not matched to one another.

You need to disconnect from power either way, when making such a change so that is nothing to consider for the difficulty level of this.

If the all in one you pictured were semi flush mounted and had damaged bus for some reason and was still new enough they still made the same model I would likely just get a new one and swap interior parts.

Why not? Because there very little interchangeability between them, some of the old 1970's ITE panel guts could be swapped out with ease, other then the fact they used slotted screws. This only apples to the "all in ones".

By "old" I mean prior to Gould Inc. buying ITE Imperial Corp in 1976.

That panel pictured is pretty common under the Siemens & Murray brands.

 

[kwired]

Why not? Because there very little interchangeability between them, some of the old 1970's ITE panel guts could be swapped out with ease, other then the fact they used slotted screws. This only apples to the "all in ones".

By "old" I mean prior to Gould Inc. buying ITE Imperial Corp in 1976.

That panel pictured is pretty common under the Siemens & Murray brands.

I didn't intend my earlier mentioned "swapping" of interiors to apply to that old of equipment either. My recent example of swapping a QO single phase interior with a three phase interior was newer equipment. In no way would it have worked as easily with 1970's equipment.

Last summer I brought three phase service into a existing school buildings on the same campus. There were some newer panels (all 10-15 years at the oldest. I ended up converting a few of these panels to three phase and all I did was pull new feeders and change the panelboard interiors. The new three phase panels used exactly the same cabinet as the existing single phase panels used so there was no fabrication necessary to make things fit.