replace outdoor 100 amp circuit breaker?

tysteel · 2007-09-08T16:20:19+00:00

Hi everyone,At the moment I'm currently having a electrical problems with thelights in my house flickering on and off, and there were a couple ofrooms (living room and one of the bedrooms) in the house wherein theelectricity had completely shut off. I checked the breaker boxinside the house, but nothing had tripped. So I went outside andwalked over to where my electric meter is located, and there is a 100amp breaker in an outdoor box directly under the meter. I flipped itoff, and then flipped it back on. When I went back inside the house,all the electricity was back on in all of the rooms. But after acouple of hours, the problems resumed with the lights flickering offand on in all rooms, and the electricity again went completely out intwo rooms.I called up the electric company yesterday because I wondered if itcould be problem on their end, so they sent out a utility to crew tocheck on things with their gauges. They told me that the problem wasthat the outdoor 100 amp breaker was getting too hot and neededreplacement. Hopefully I can find one that matches at home depot orone of those other places.I was just wondering what precautions I should take before replacingthis outdoor breaker that's in this box under my electric meter? Oris this too dangerous a job and I should call an electrician? Iwould like to try and do it myself and save some money, if it'spossible.I looked the breaker over (after removing the panel) and noticed thatit's hooked up to two thick wires. When replacing this breaker,should I contact the electric company and have them cut off all theelectricity going to the meter beforehand? I'm thinking that it'svery possible that one could get electrocuted while disconnecting thebreaker when pulling it out of the slot..if one of those thick wiresmake contact.I have replaced breakers inside the breaker box in my house, butwhenever I worked on those, as a precaution I always shut off thisoutside breaker. But now I need to replace the...

Sep 08, 2007 20 Replies

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Mike Dobony 19 years ago

"Up to code" may mean totally rewiring to 200 amp service. This means new meter box, new weather post, new service wires. My son wanted to upgrade and the city refused to approve the 100 amp service. He was allowed to do all the work himself except for connecting to the pole and it cost him about $400 in materials. Compare this to the cost of a repair if the service is sufficient, maybe $100 or so, including labor, depending on local electrician rates.

Mike D.

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