Federal Pacific Circuit Panels and Breakers

[sawmill]

I had one here which I put in at the time I built the house. It seemed to work like it should but a couple years ago I had the main breaker go bad. That is when I found out about the danger. I replaced it with a Square D and here is what I found with the old panel. Several of the breakers were stuck in the on position and would not trip manually. I took one apart and it was bad. I am sure glad I changed it when I did.

[JPG]

Never blown a breaker either that I recall. Maybe that's the problem with these panels.

Sorry Beeg I had to delete thee!

MAYBE. Question is, should any have tripped.


I consider the 'problem' to be those things which cause breakers to trip.

When the condenser fan has stopped rotating on my WH AC, my FP breaker does trip due to higher compressor current.

Could there be a FP no good bias out there?(similar to SS no good bias)

For now I be keeping my head above the sand and below the sky.

Follow the money!!!

Why did my other post come out the way it did? And I can't delete it.

You put your comment(Follow. . .) in the middle of my quote.

Sure you cannot delete it?

[JPG]

MAYBE. Question is, should any have tripped.

Yes, of course that is the question. I don't recall ever having a breaker trip but memory does play tricks on you. I'm glad to see you have had a situation where the breaker should trip and it did. I'm hoping more people will come forward with their experience. I hope folks will look at their circuit boxes. Do you have one of these? Until a few days ago I paid no attention to mine unless I was rewiring a switch or outlet and needed to break the circuit for a minute or 2. I'm looking forward to a visit from an electrician friend so I can pick his brain. Wife says we have to clean the basement first.

Say, I see you're from Lexington. KY. I just started watching a TV series called "Justified" that takes place there. Pretty good show, worth checking out.

Tom

Square D resides here also(the factory - One of them).

[tomsalwasser]

I had one here which I put in at the time I built the house. It seemed to work like it should but a couple years ago I had the main breaker go bad. That is when I found out about the danger. I replaced it with a Square D and here is what I found with the old panel. Several of the breakers were stuck in the on position and would not trip manually. I took one apart and it was bad. I am sure glad I changed it when I did.

Thanks sawmill. I'm having my panel looked at by an electrician soon.

In the mean time I've replaced all the smoke detectors in our house. They were over 20 years old and I didn't have enough of them. They are all battery powered units. Code for new construction requires they be powered by house current with battery backup and networked so if one goes off they all do.

[jsburger]

You put your comment(Follow. . .) in the middle of my quote.

Sure you cannot delete it?[/quote]

I am not sure how that happened. I guess I wasn't paying attention and didn't scroll down to the end of your quote.

I tried to delete the entire post and couldn't. I guess I could have just deleted my comment and put it in the right place. I didn't try that.

[garys]

I bought a house in 1976 with a Federal Pacific breaker box. In 1981, I put on a large house addition and put in a new Cutler Hammer box as the main box and retained the Federal Pacific box as a sub panel on the new CH box. I never had any problems with the FP box or its breakers. They did trip if I put my Shopsmith on a circuit with other loads on the same circuit. I left that house in 2003, but I suspect that FP box is still in service there and having no issues.

[JPG]

It is possible that the date of manufacture may be relevant to the 'defective' status. My breakers are about 40 yrs old. Same for pre 1976 ones.