Tinkerer
Member
- Location
- Virginia
- Occupation
- Master Electrician and licensed contractor: mostly retired
I have a customer (my daughter actually) with a house, in southern Florida, built in the 50s. Her home inspection listed the ancient Zinsco service disconnect as a deficiency, and pointed out that the electrical panel grounds and neutrals are not isolated. There is 70 feet of 2" rigid pipe between the disconnect and the electrical panel. If I separate the grounds and neutrals, I will connect the neutrals to the neutral wire (correctly sized copper: good), and the grounds to the rigid pipe which is not bonded well to the boxes at either end (concentric knockouts: not-so-good). I think I can fish a new ground wire through the 70" of pipe, if it is not too big. NEC 250.66 Tells me I can use AWG 4 copper. I think I can fish this this through the 2" pipe. I don't usually do this calculation; normally I just use SER cable which has an AWG 2/0 aluminum (copper AWG 1 equivalent) ground. I wonder why SER cable has a ground which is so much larger.
Please tell me if I have thought through this situation correctly.
Doug
Please tell me if I have thought through this situation correctly.
Doug