Electrical Help - new workshop

[Steve Canada]

So I'm getting ready to wire up my garage. That will be the easy part. I'm doing it all in reverse, with the last thing to just hook up the lines.

Anyway, I think I've run into a bit of a snag. I'm not sure if I have room for a 60amp breaker in my box. Most likely not, as all the slots are full, but I have these extra slots at the top next to the main which I am confused about.

Can anyone tell me what I've got?

http://members.shaw.ca/thr33/web/FuseBox.jpg

[Rick Christopherson]

It looks like the bottom left 2-pole breakers are full height. If you swap these out for 1/2 height breakers, you will have the necessary slot open. You may have to do some rearranging with a couple of single pole breakers so your 2-pole breakers span both busses, but I am not sure about this. Maybe someone more familiar with this particular GE panel may know how the busses are laid out.

What is a little confusing is that breakers 1 and 3 look like they might be 2-pole, yet your half-height breakers spanning 2&4 and 6&8 clearly have a slaving bar between them.

I suspect that if you move the single pole breakers out of slots 5 and 7 down to slots 9, 11, 13, and 15; this will open up two 2-pole slots at 5 and 7--one for the original full height circuit, and one for your new subpanel.

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

Have you considered up grading to a 200 amp main box?

[Kent Fitzgerald]

A few things, Steve:

First, check the panel label for the total allowable number of circuits. You have a bunch of half-height breakers already, and adding more circuits might exceed the rated capacity of the box, at which point you could run out of neutral and ground terminals.

I suspect that "WH" on the extra slots stands for "water heater." If there is room for more circuits, you may be able to use the WH positions for additional breakers. Again, the panel label should indicate what kind of breakers can be installed where.

Since you asked about installing a 60A breaker, I assume you're adding a subpanel. It may be possible to free up some room by moving existing circuits over to the subpanel.

As Cliff suggested, a new 200A service would be nice, but it may not be necessary. A lot depends on your existing heating/AC loads, and whether these will be increasing with the addition of the garage shop. Now would be a good time to do the load calculations.

Finally, I'll just add that if you are installing a subpanel, be sure you understand how to make the ground and neutral connections in the sub. In most cases, you will need to run separate neutral and ground conductors to the sub, and isolate the neutral bus in the sub from ground. The rules get more complicated if you're running a sub in a detached building.

[Steve Canada]

Just for starters, thanks for the help.

I am indeed attempting to run a 60amp service out to a sub in my detached garage. It's about 20 feet from this box.

Also, #10 & #12 runs the current power out to the garage. It's two single 15amp circuit though, so that breaker can come out. So really, I only need to free up one slot I'm thinking.

Maybe if I can colapse 9-15 to a 40amp slimeline breaker (do these exists?) at 9/11, then I can move 14/16 over to 13/15, and replace 10 through 16 with a 60amp breaker. (just a note, I think I'm getting the terms right, but please correct me if I'm talking out my ass ;)

Thanks again.

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

The out building is detatched? Ibelieve code requires a grounding bar in the earth and a bonded neutral to ground.

Were this not in a detached blgd the neutral wouldn't be bonded.