Supply Side tap feedback

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jaggedben

Senior Member
Location
Northern California
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Solar and Energy Storage Installer
I'm working on a project that is a step up in size for me from my usual tasks of churning out residential projects. This is a 53kW project, and I believe I need to do a supply side tap.

See picture.

The enclosure is a Circle AW product dated to 1978.
The conductors are 250 MCM, and appear to be factory installed between the meter and MCB. I'm thinking something like Ilsco Kupl-taps on those conductors.

Circle AW is Eaton now, right?
Anyone had any luck getting support for Circle AW to approve something like this?

Has anyone done a tap similar to this and what was your experience?
 

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jaggedben

Senior Member
Location
Northern California
Occupation
Solar and Energy Storage Installer
I am a little confused. Where do the conductors go? Are you saying there is a MCB (out of the picture) that is integral/or factory joined with the meter cabinet?

Sorry. Yes the MCB is in the compartment at the bottom of the picture (behind the door with the hinges).
The service conductors come in to the meter from the top left and if you peer at the letters behind the lugs you'll see that each pair says 'line' on the left and 'load' on the right.
 
Sorry. Yes the MCB is in the compartment at the bottom of the picture (behind the door with the hinges).
The service conductors come in to the meter from the top left and if you peer at the letters behind the lugs you'll see that each pair says 'line' on the left and 'load' on the right.

Oh ok I gotcha. I thought that was a 3r trough underneath. I don't think i would hesitate to replace those conductors if you need more room, length, etc...not that I try to hide things from inspectors, but how would they even know there were originally factory installed conductors there?
 

GoldDigger

Moderator
Staff member
Location
Placerville, CA, USA
Occupation
Retired PV System Designer
Sorry. Yes the MCB is in the compartment at the bottom of the picture (behind the door with the hinges).
The service conductors come in to the meter from the top left and if you peer at the letters behind the lugs you'll see that each pair says 'line' on the left and 'load' on the right.

I don't know about your POCO in particular, but the ones I have heard about would put a seal on that compartment, since it contains unmetered wires, and would not allow you to put any kind of tap conductor there, even to attach a PV disconnect.
You may be forced to figure out how to do your tap inside the "main" panel below the compartment that you show.
The meter often is not the location of the service point demarcation, and it certainly is not the service disconnect. '
In this case the Line and Load markings are not relevant to a "line side disconnect". Both sets of wires are "supply side" and both are service conductors.
 
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