Sorry "mx" I said I would stay out of this one BUT for some reason I can't.. Sooo here goes,, The tag on the left inside of your panel will tell you that the largest breaker allowed in this panel is 110 amp.. You should not put any larger than that in there,,
Also I see alot of heating on the buss bar just under the main breaker ??? and alot of flash marks inside the panel.. hmmm someone slipped ???
OK I see you have not put your new 4/0 in the panel..good.. Is it still outside the house maybe near where the meter is ??? I might have a idea that will help if it is...
Never say your sorry, some say that's a sign of weakness.:laughing:
Oh! the flash marks, yeah a wire got away from me when I was switching wires in the box while trying to get some circuits working in a ice storm we had years ago. It was dark and I had made up a jumper to feed a few circuits in the box to get some lights and heat in the house from the new genny I was able to find after 3 days and almost 650 miles of travel to get. I thought I was going to have to kiss the guy and maybe even a little something else before he would part with it but finally I came away from there with a $400.00 machine that I had to pay $650.00 to get but at least I still had a little of my dignity left and didn't have a bad taste in my mouth so all was good now all I would have to do is make the 300 mile trip back home and hook this jewel up.
I rolled in the driveway at 3 Am and thought about just going to bed and hook it up in the morning when there was some light but I wanted to get it going. The machine was already serviced and gassed up and all I had to do was fire that baby up and hook up the jumper cord I had already made up then find the breaker that fed the garage lights so I had light o hook the rest of the things up I wanted working.
Everything was going good until my wife came busting through the door with this giant azz spotlight shining in my half dead eyes and pointing my new Rem 870 at me and all I could think of was yelling, Honey, I'm home! Then, it's me don't shoot! Then I noticed the sparks that were coming off the end of the wire I was holding. I didn't even know she was home, I thought she had gone to stay at her mom's house until I got some power going but that was two days before and she had come back home to feed all the critters and check on my progress. I had told her when I left that I wasn't coming back without a genny regardless of where I had to go to get it weather it be Texas or Calif. we were getting a genny. Anyway I found this beauty in South Carolina so I didn't have to travel across country and was back a little early but it was good to see the little lady had things fully under control while I was away.:laughing:
The burn marks on the buss next to the main all started when I installed one of those no freeze hydrants out near my fish pond. I put it right in the line from the house and the well rather than run a new line out there. The foot valve was weak and after about 6 months or so sometimes it would hold pressure and sometimes it wouldn't, which let the pump cycle one or two, too many times. By the time I realized what was going on it burned up the pump which was on it's last leg anyway because it was over 16 years old and hard worked. It locked up but it didn't trip the breaker for some reason.
My wife came yelling there is no water go fix the pump I have shampoo in my eyes & hair and I have got to get to work! I went out to the pressure switch to check to see if the contacts were dirty and not making connection again, thinking on the way that I really do need to replace that switch because it always seems to hang up at a really bad time like when you are necked with soap in your hair:ashamed: but once you get it going again the other ten million projects on my list take precedent and it gets put off until some later date.
As I was looking at the switch I heard a strange noise coming from near the panel box and now I'm thinking I need to put out some Decon because the mice are coming in for the winter but as I got near the panel I could tell it was coming out of the box. When I opened the door I could see that the breaker looked like it had tripped but when I went to flip it off and back on it was really hot and burned my finger. I thought about flipping the main off but I had been working on a job on the computer and didn't want to lose the 2 and a half hours of work I had done so I got a screw driver out of my tool bag to take the cover off to see what was going on inside.
I know, I know, why didn't I replace the battery backup that burned up when we had that big thunder storm last month and you know, you really ought to save your work from time to time when working on projects on the computer but my brain just isn't wired that way I guess so I sometimes I end up holding the bag at times.
With the cover off I could pull the breaker out of the panel to kill the power of course by then I had to replace the whole wire going to the well and pressure switch as well but this gave me a good reason to move that project to a front burner which was a good thing I guess.
I'm not sure what this part I should be getting any day now will do for me but if I have to feed the sub with a 125 amp breaker I guess that's what I'll have to do and live with it but I'm still kicking around the idea of drilling and tapping two studs in the bottom of the buss of this panel and forgetting about it....that's all a pass through box is anyway. Of course it would be modified and probably not be up to snuff as far as 'THE CODE' would go but I don't plan on selling anytime soon and if I do, I'll just unhook it and let someone else worry about it.
