Electrician HELP..

[thepumpguysc]

I'm outta my element when it comes to electricity.. as far as I'm concerned, its magic..lol
I'v made 7 calls & no answers on all 7.. atleast 1 of them had a recording that says we are only servicing Industrial & commercial accounts at this time, thank u for calling & please leave a msg..

Lemme see if I can explain this..
The panel is a sub-panel & only feeds the water pump house & the shop..
Theres 2 large wires coming into the panel.. & its 240
1 wire feeds 1 side of the pump house breaker spade & the other wire comes in & connects/branches off into a 2 spade connectors.. 1 of the spades goes to the other side of the p house breaker & the other feeds the shop breaker.
I have never seen this type of breaker before.. they have SLOTS in them for a spade type connection..
The p house has a 20 amp breaker while the shop has a 30 amp..
I unhooked the p house from the breaker & ran the shop to it & got 240 AT THE SHOP PANEL..
I fired up the compressor & let it fill up.. then went & swapped it back..
ALL THE WHILE racking my brain trying to figure out how to get 240 to that breaker..
The p house breaker has 2 slots while the shop breaker has 1.. & only feeds off of 1 side of the 240 coming in..{120}

 

[thepumpguysc]

I need to find out what the p house motor draws.. if its not much, I'll swap out the breaker to a larger 1 & double up the wires..
The compressor draws 15 amps.. & the shop is filled w/ LED's.. {8 or 10} so they dont draw much..
& the chances of the compressor running at the same time the pump house is running is slim..

 

[Tinkerer]

I am curious as to how many conductors were run to your pump hose and shop.
red, black, white and green ? I hope.
A ground is supposed to be run to sub-panels from main entrance boxes.
Do not confuse neutral and ground. They have two different purposes.
That jerk you had do the wiring is gonna kill somebody or even a whole family.
I can guarantee he does not know what the NEC is. I have spent many hours reading it.

If you do hook the pump motor and the shop on the same circuit be sure you heavy enough wires from the main entrance box to carry the current when the loads are on at the same time.
A water pump and a shop air compressor can (depending on size) be pulling a lot of current if and when they are on at the same time.

 

[Willie B]

I'd have questions for you, but I deal with this stuff often. Want to swap E mail?

 

[Delmer]

How about some numbers off the breakers in this sub panel? are these breakers mounted on a bus bar like a breaker box, or are they mounted to the back of the panel with no bus bars? Spade connectors, are these screw terminals with a wiring connector that goes under the screw? or a small 1/4" wide terminal like would fit a flat automotive fuse? or more like an 1/8" thick spade like a busbar tab in some brands of breaker boxes?

That 30 amp breaker in the sub panel, is that a two pole breaker? with two terminals on each side. and two wires connected to the breaker with at least one ground/neutral going to the shop? Maybe 10-2 UF on the plastic sheath?

 

[thepumpguysc]

Willie.. mine is my screen name @ aol dot com

 

[hosspuller]

I need to find out what the p house motor draws.. if its not much, I'll swap out the breaker to a larger 1 & double up the wires..
The compressor draws 15 amps.. & the shop is filled w/ LED's.. {8 or 10} so they dont draw much..
& the chances of the compressor running at the same time the pump house is running is slim..

Putting two wires on a single lug is a no-no. Don't do it. How many wires do you have going to the shop (sub-panel) ? Should be 4 … 2 hot, 1 neutral & 1 ground (bare wire) If not... you're screwed.

Tinker beat me to it … This is the start of fixing your problem. Four wires … No less …

Next step is how many feet to the shop from the house panel...?

How many amps of "stuff" are you gonna run ? These answers determine wire size...

 

[thepumpguysc]

It’s 50 yards. It has #8 stranded & there’s only 3 wires..
THATS WHY I was gonna double up..

 

[Tinkerer]

Jeez !
#8 is good for only 55 amps.
Doubling up isn't a good idea IMHO.
If your are going to run more wires why not 100 amp capacity from the house ?
You will never regret it.
If you ever decide to sell the place you will be doing all that inadequate wiring over again if an inspector sees it.
Keep in mind what an insurance company would do if you had a claim that was due to the wiring that isn't up to code.

 

[thepumpguysc]

Tink don’t be a bummer..!!
Lol

 

[Tinkerer]

Just tryin to look out for you !
I wish i was there with you.

 

[Delmer]

Don't double up on the breaker, keep a separate breaker for the pump, and for the shop. You have 3x #8 feeding this subpanel, what size is the wire feeding the shop? Base the size of the breaker on that wire size, 40A for #8, or 30A for #10.

If you already have a two pole 30 amp breaker, but it's only being fed from one of the wires, then you need to feed it from both wires, but that would be obvious. You say this breaker only has one slot, is it half as wide as the 20A breaker for the pump house? Maybe you just need the correct breaker.

with three wires feeding that sub panel, and you know you have two hots because you have 240, so you only have one neutral and no separate ground. This is not up to code, and probably wasn't when it was installed (if the pump is 240, then it was fine for that because it didn't need a neutral, your guy turned it into a neutral once he hooked 120 loads from the shop to the three wire feed). This is dangerous if you run an extension cord from the shop back to the house and the ground from the shop is energized from the neutral of 120V loads.

If all three of your #8's are insulated, then you could run a separate ground wire and do this right (enough) with not much extra effort.

 

[chroniekon]

The ground on a sub panel is established at the sub panel by driving a ground rod into the ground. The three wires going to the sub panel should be 2 hots and a neutral. The 2 hots being 120 volts each when measured to ground and 240 volts when measured between each other.

 

[hosspuller]

The ground on a sub panel is established at the sub panel by driving a ground rod into the ground. The three wires going to the sub panel should be 2 hots and a neutral. The 2 hots being 120 volts each when measured to ground and 240 volts when measured between each other.

I'll not argue this but... this link explains why an isolated ground is a bad idea.
https://diy.stackexchange.com/questions/52696/why-does-a-subpanel-need-separate-ground-and-neutral

 

[hosspuller]

Don't double up on the breaker, keep a separate breaker for the pump, and for the shop. ..... Base the size of the breaker on that wire size, 40A for #8, or 30A for #10.
snip...
If all three of your #8's are insulated, then you could run a separate ground wire and do this right (enough) with not much extra effort.

I made this mistake ran 250 feet of #10 Forgot about voltage drop. So I DO NOT have 30 amps of service to my shop. More like 10 amps.
See here … https://www.southwire.com/calculator-vdrop

 

[thepumpguysc]

I finally got a callback from 1 electrician.. he called to say he was on his way, just as a storm was rolling thru, rain & 30mph winds.. gotta love lake living..
Then the forecast for the next 2 days are lows in the 20s & hi's in the low 50's..
So I told him to take the rest of the day off & to keep my #'s & to call me when he thinks the weather is acceptable to work outside.. {next week sometime}
I'm easy to get along with.. I know I wouldnt work outside in this weather..

 

[Tinkerer]

The ground on a sub panel is established at the sub panel by driving a ground rod into the ground. The three wires going to the sub panel should be 2 hots and a neutral. The 2 hots being 120 volts each when measured to ground and 240 volts when measured between each other.

A detached building with a new sub-panel installation was required after, I think it was 2008 to have a four wire feed. One wire being the ground.
Two ground rods are no longer permitted as a stand alone source for the ground, now.
Correct me if I am wrong.
I wired my own shop 465 feet from my house with the four wires.
After I had it done I had a licensed electrician inspect the 200 amp service entrance in my house (feed to the shop) and the shop sub-panel.
He said he would have done it the same way.
I had him inspect it because of my concern with insurance and a maybe someday home inspector looking at it.

 

[chroniekon]

I think some of it comes down to interpretation and some to local codes overriding NEC. Also makes a difference if the sub panel is in the same building as the main panel or in a detached building. My detached shop building is wired as I described above, although I left out that it has two ground rods that are at least 6 feet apart as required. I called a licensed electrician friend this morning to verify what I was saying was correct and he agreed. He also told me that is how he is wiring his own personal shop now under construction.
I'm glad an electrician will be coming out to get this figured out. Please let us know how it all turns out.

 

[DMiller]

All our 240V systems are fed off Triplex feeds into the Main. Two sub legs are Phase angle off for 240V, just having two 120V source off the same leg is still just 120V as Not off phase. I used 2/0 2/0 4/0 triplex to feed the house and shop and barn breaker panels, fully up to code with a stand alone 8' ground rod each at the house at the shop and at the barn. I also ran it all Underground FULLY encased in PVC Conduit. Was 'Splained by a know it all only had to conduit into and out of the earth, where explained BACK that with the triplex fully encased Lightning has less chance striking the Neutral IN the ground. Major failure player in many direct burial systems. Conduit is cheap insurance and as such ALSO protects a excavator from cutting a cable as catch the Conduit first. All here buried to 28" top of Conduit. MAX Run for Triplex is 400' before get unreasonable resistance voltage drop.

Transformer on the pole drops Two hots and a Neutral to the meter base, Neutral is bus bar to a outbound lead, two hots feed thru the meter then to Individual Lugs on a main breaker.

 

[crane operator]

Find some local 8 year old, have him take pictures of your panels, and post them up. Don't be afraid of the technology man! Its not like this is injector pumps or rocket science, or electricity.