I take the cover off the main panel in our recently-purchased, 1980 vintage , do-it-yourself log house -- the panel that the home inspector said was "serviceable", and it's messy. 200 amp service. Only one double-tapped breaker. The only other panel whose guts I've seen was much neater in that the neutral wires and ground wires were segregated to different bars. In this panel, a given wire's neutral and ground are usually screwed into the same clamp on the neutral bar. The panel itself does not appear to be grounded. Is all of this unusual? Can ground and neutral be run together on the main service wire back out to the meter, where presumably the neutral is split off to earth ground? What would you say is the best book for increasing a layman's expertise on home wiring--something not overly simplified?
Thanks, Tim