Does she need a bigger breaker box?

[gfretwell]

A straight pull of a 2/0 triplex through a 2" is doable at 100' particularly in a straight line, 200' is probably not happening and that is why they said "trouble".

[gfretwell]

If they just need to pull in a set of new service conductors and swap the breaker, it would be less. Most of the labor on an upgrade is in swapping the panel and getting everything hooked back up. Seldom do all of the wires reach the new breaker slots. If you get permits you are also going to be replacing most of the breakers with AFCIs. I am still curious about how you got there. Did you ever answer if there is a separate service drop coming to that meter from the PoCo?

[Clare Snyder]

It's transite too - which is just another way of spellling trouble.

[gfretwell]

Was this gee whiz info or do you need the upgrade? I was getting away with 100a just fine here until I decided I wanted a spa and this is an all electric house. I was getting along fairly well on ~23a from a

5.5KW generator, just no central AC or hot water.

[micky]

Oh. All I could think of were trucks

I thought it was a house that really didn't care what happened to its friends. But I'll accept your definition.

[micky]

Sure. I called my ex-next-door neighbor. Many people no longer personalize their message, so if she has the same cell phone number, I'm sure her husband will call back soon and he'll likely know if the service is 100 amps.

I don't know exactly what your question means. but there is no other panel between any house and the Poco. These are not subpanels.

I think I did say that before.

There is a meter for each house and the breaker box only 10 feet from it. And from there it goes to the street and a transformer at the end of every building. I watched them change the transformer once and there's nothing in it but a transformer.

[micky]

What's transite?

You remind me that one of my neighbors expanded her deck, put on walls and a roof and a hot tub. She either had to increase her service or she at least determined what it was and that it was enough. I found her number, I think, but she's young enough to work so I don't want to call until evening. I hope she remembers.

I could also talk to the guy who owns her house now, and see if the breaker box is different from the rest of ours, except I accidentally parked in his spot a month ago and he might still be annoyed at me.

[Clare Snyder]

I was getting along just fineon 100 amps, with fuses. I was considering moving and know that in this area a fused panel will cost me at resale. I also know that with 100 amps being minimum that a 200 amp service would be an advantage, at virtually the same cost.

I was limited to 125 by the poco.

[Mark Lloyd]

[snip]

Yes, although the 'poop' in poop deck is something completely different.

[Mark Lloyd]

[snip]

At one time everyone in this neighborhood surrounded their yard with plain incandescent C9 lights (7W each bulb, and about a foot apart). When I looked up the street, it looked like I was at the airport. The lights were TOO bright, making it hard to see anything else. Most people have stopped using them.

Most of what I used were miniature (.5W). Note that 500 of these draw 2A and can be connected string-to-string (3A fuse and I subtract 1A to keep it from blowing too much). Now those are all LED (about 1.8W for the whole string of 50-70).

[Mark Lloyd]

[snip]

I grew up on a farm where we got water from a well. I remember several times during electric outages (used to be common there) when we went to a neighbor (who had city water) to get water.

That well water had iron in it, which could make it look like beer. It was good for drinking (it didn't taste like beer) but bad for washing (since it would take a long time to get the soap out).

I liked to watch what was going on in the pump house. The pump itself was down in the well, but I could watch the gauge on the tank and the pressure switch (I think I new then that 240V required double pole switches).

[Mark Lloyd]

[snip]

That sounds like C7 bulbs (5W, candelabra base). The ones people here used so many of were C9 (7W, intermediate base) which were even bigger.

Now, I usually use exactly ONE C9 incandescent bulb. A red one for Rudolph's nose.

BTW, the only non-holiday place I've seen intermediate-base bulbs used is in a microwave oven.

[Clare Snyder]

It is a crappy asbestos cement pipe - google it.

[James Wilkinson Sword]

They don't do that much around here. Most lights are inside, or inside windows. There are some outside, bu they're just half a watt per bulb and can only be seen at night.

[James Wilkinson Sword]

Are they still using these?

They really are quite disgusting as the shit from the previous user is never quite flushed properly, and often is on the bit you're meant to stand on.

[gfretwell]

I have no record of that ever being legal as a raceway in the US. I did live in a house that had asbestos cement siding on the second floor. I should go look at a google street view and see how many houses in the development still have it. They were pretty much all exactly the same. The only option was to flip the floor plan left to right.

[James Wilkinson Sword]

So is a man with three buttocks.

[James Wilkinson Sword]

A colleague of mine once bought a new microwave because the bulb had gone. When I asked why he didn't change it he said microwaves are dangerous. I suggested he tried unplugging it first, but he was convinced the microwaves were still in there, like with a nuclear reactor.

[gfretwell]

Americans say go big or go home

[micky]

They are still in there, and thye're very small. They get under your fingernails and even in the cracks of your fingerprints. That's why they are called *micro*waves. Then at night, they sap your strength. He did the right thing.