This can't possibly be correct

A

agtpony

Member
Location
Delaware
Occupation
Hvac
Hello fellow Contractors HVAC guy here just paid someone to put a new panel in my house and the grounds and the neutrals are connected to the panel itself does that mean all 120 volt neutral power is going through the grounding Bolt is this considered an industry standard I've never seen this before I don't believe. And let me clarify when I say the panel I mean the physical 200 amp Square Box panel they are zip screwed pretty much to the back of the panel for some reason it will not let me upload pictures to show you however there are lugs with an allen key screw holding them in place at the ends of the wire but the physical square box of the panel is now the conduit back to the neutral and ground
 
I see the pictures now.

Bare aluminum equipment grounding conductors lugged to the enclosure are okay. The neutral (white striped conductor) is not okay, needs to be terminated on the neutral bar.

The cable going to the 100A breaker at the bottom of the panel does not appear to have a neutral, which seems wrong. Is that a subpanel or something else?
 
jaggedben said:
I see the pictures now.

Bare aluminum equipment grounding conductors lugged to the enclosure are okay. The neutral (white striped conductor) is not okay, needs to be terminated on the neutral bar.

The cable going to the 100A breaker at the bottom of the panel does not appear to have a neutral, which seems wrong. Is that a subpanel or something else?
Click to expand...
All wires on 100 amp Breakers leaving the panel all go to100 amp sub panels
 
jaggedben said:
I see the pictures now.

Bare aluminum equipment grounding conductors lugged to the enclosure are okay. The neutral (white striped conductor) is not okay, needs to be terminated on the neutral bar.

The cable going to the 100A breaker at the bottom of the panel does not appear to have a neutral, which seems wrong. Is that a subpanel or something else?
Click to expand...
Also this particular sub panel has its own ground wire and ground rod and the stranded aluminum wire you see is actually the neutral
 
agtpony said:
Also this particular sub panel has its own ground wire and ground rod and the stranded aluminum wire you see is actually the neutral
Click to expand...
That's a code violation. Bare neutral is not permitted beyond the service disconnect. Also an EGC is required. The ground rod at the sub is not a substitute for an EGC and cannot be relied on it for clearing faults. i.e that setup is most likely quite dangerous. Is that sub by chance in another buidling and when was that cable installed?
 
jaggedben said:
That's a code violation. Bare neutral is not permitted beyond the service disconnect. Also an EGC is required. The ground rod at the sub is not a substitute for an EGC and cannot be relied on it for clearing faults. i.e that setup is most likely quite dangerous. Is that sub by chance in another buidling and when was that cable installed?
Click to expand...
2 subs in same unit and one going to outside shop.
 
This is a textbook example of how to do everything wrong. This would not pass inspection.

If you would permit and insect your work, you should demand that the "electrician" do so.

I don't want to give details beyond forum rules, but this is about much more than the lugs.

Any sub-panel that will have line-to-neutral loads must have a 4-wire feeder, not a 3-wire.
 
As the others have said, there are a number of issues here and as Larry said, it would not pass an inspection. Tell the electrician that you are going to pull a permit and have it inspected and give him a chance to voluntarily fix things first.
 
LarryFine said:
This is a textbook example of how to do everything wrong. This would not pass inspection.

If you would permit and insect your work, you should demand that the "electrician" do so.

I don't want to give details beyond forum rules, but this is about much more than the lugs.

Any sub-panel that will have line-to-neutral loads must have a 4-wire feeder, not a 3-wire.
Click to expand...
Can a separate ground or neutral be pulled for thr forth conducted? It runs underground in a 4in gray pipe.
 
We are guessing on some issues here, but I will speculate a little. I assume the only work done was pull the old panel off and put the new panel on. If this is correct, there were code violations already and you will need to be the one to foot the bill to bring them up to code. That would include running 4 wire feeders to ALL of your subpanels. This puts you in a conundrum. I would not have confidence in the contractor that did the change out unless a more competent "boss" made me feel better. But you still have to pay the original contractor for the correct portion of the work done.

Also, zooming in on a picture, it looks like they nicked the aluminum conductors pretty badly where the stripped them for the lugs.
 
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