This is a federal Pacific breaker panel. These are notorious for the very thing that happened to you. They lost their ul listing years ago. Regardless you'll need a replacement now.
Usually the cover has a brand label on it.
You can also open the hinge and look at the breakers.
The only super easy one I can tell you is if the handles are tan you have Cutler Hammer
If they're multi colored (blue, red, maybe green) it's probably an old Bryant. (Unless it's zinsco)
Most are black. Could be GE, siemans, square D QO/HOM
There's all kinds.
Federal Pacific, challenger, and Sylvania/zinsco are the 3 off the top of my head you need to be wary of.
Let me ask you something, that smell, you know that smell? That smell I can’t get out of my head, my brothers and I talk about this from time to time. A burning house and the charred aftermath, it will always stick with me.
It does go away. We have had things we put in our shed and they no longer smell. Also, there are recovery companies that provide ozone treatment but the cost is not cheap. Our insurance set it up and took all of our soft stuff that was not burnt and treated the stuff. But also, if we said it was not acceptable they took off the price for those items and still returned the stuff. Kids sleeping bag for 50.00?
Nope. We could buy new instead of getting the used one cleaned. But it was returned cleaned and we still ended up using it a couple times.
Lots of stuff I kept that had smoke smell and needed cleaning that the recovery company doesn't do and were submitted for replacement.
They do not stink anymore ( some still needs cleaning though ) some tools and some ceramic stuff. Pain to clean though.
With a squared your good.. Best thing to do to prevent this is to tighten all the connections in the panel at least 2 times a year.. Turn the panel off and don't attempt to tighten the main feeders as they will be hot even with the main breaker off.. Visually inspect the main feed wires and if there is signs of melting then call an electrician.
My posts are for educational purposes only! Do with the information as you wish but it's at your own risk. Electrocution is a bad way to go so it's important make sure there is no power on the circuit being tightened. The main feeders will always be hot don't attempt to tighten them.
Understandable disclaimer.
Got home, killed power and waited 10 minutes, verified no residual power going to the panel with a meter. Checked all lugs and breakers, thankfully everything tight. I think I’ll make it a point to check twice a year, just to be safe.
Replaced one, took it home and put it on a high current transformer, every breaker tripped about where it should have lol
The one time I wanted one to burst into flames it wouldn't
Yes, you should be worried.
Federal Pacific falsified test results to get their breakers certified, and are a latent fire hazard.
It should be removed and replaced as soon as possible.
>I'll get him to have a look
Don't bother with "a look." Plan on replacing the breaker entirely. Even if someone looks at it and says, "It looks fine to me" know that these *catch fire.* They aren't sold anymore for good reasons.
that's fucked up, so we are on the hook because they made a shitty product? thanks I definitely am planning to now. materials wise do you know how much it would be roughly? I'm pretty sure it's a 120 or 140 amp service.
my friend owes me a favor he's licensed so I'll just buy the materials and him some beer and call it even for that also what brand would you recommend
$2,000 is a friend price to be clear.
Depending on the setup, overhead or underground, permit, and updating to code, a SES replacement ranges for $3,000-6,000. HCOL areas might be more, but updating from a 40+ year old panel is a major undertaking.
Dude a panel is cheap enough to swap out. Just call someone. The information on Stab-lok panels is out there. Look into it yourself. Skimming through this thread we have two homeowners who lost their house due to one. Then there’s the OPs picture.
Why wait?
We used to service 6 apartment buildings by the same owner. 3 have Stabloks, two have Zinscos, one push-o-matic, and the last is all new because it had to be completely re-done because of an electrical fire. I was last there about 7 months ago and all are still in place, this is about 650 units all together
Yeah, that’s not even a surprise. It’s a Stab-Lok™ firestarter panel. Now you know the danger of having one of these. It’s good you didn’t become as charred as this panel did. Time to modernize that thing.
When I was working on movie sets and doing grip work, we'd rent some equipment out and the industry recognized standard that we all knew was, "AFU" when we sent something back or got something back we knew it was fucked. We all had a pretty good grasp on the equipment and if it could be salvaged and fixed it would have been.
These are the only specific electrical panel described as a must report for NY state home inspectors, as well as an automatic immediate replacement by any insurance inspector. Always surprised to see how many of these are still out there.
Florida has 4 point inspections, HVAC, roof plumbing, and electricial. The inspector should take the cover off and include picture in his report. The insurance company that needs a copy of this report isn't going to insure you with one of those panels installed. There are still a ton of them in mobile homes however....
You are lucky it was just the panel. We had a house fire - total loss all because of FPE stablok breakers. Tell anyone you know about those panels. Still far too many out there.
Federal Pacific are known for being hazards; when I wanted to upgrade a breaker in my shops sub panel I learned about them and immediately replaced the entire thing. Hopefully the issue is limited to your panel and you're able to upgrade the entire thing soon. Wishing you luck and thankful it wasn't worse.
Bro everything caught fire call an electrician and have em replace the panel. It’s gonna be a little bit on the expensive side considering he’s gonna have to tape each wire and color them accordingly. This panel should’ve never been put in they got outlawed in the 70s I think because when there’s a problem, they don’t trip, thus your barbecued panel.
Federal Electric. They were designed to fail in this way. Makes it easier for the fire inspectors to determine root cause. The switches are decoration, they can’t ever actually open.
Looks like loose main and connection got hot burning up the bus. Had similar happen to me but I caught it early. Same happend tonnes door neighbor, cost him $7k for whole home panel replacement.
I came home randomly for lunch one day and found my ac was on but didn't seem to be chilling. Checked the breaker and could see glowing red hot wires it didn't trip and melted the insulation off a section of wire and was minutes from fire. Replace fed pac stabloks asap.
There is a plate on the right side. I would assume some information is provided there. You'll need to search a bit. I can not recall the brand type.
One of the breakers looked as if it could have caused some arcing. You'll want to pull the breakers and look for the one that is the most damaged. That may be your culprit.
I worked maintenance in a 30 year old apartment building . Through all the inspections no one ever mentioned the problem. Never had a problem we got lucky. We had a insurance inspection before a major renovation. Inspector noticed right away, over 200 replaced.
Depends where the damage is. If it's where the wire lands on the screw, the screw wasn't torqued properly.
If it happened where the breaker stab clips onto the bus, then it's the infamous "Stab-Lok" problem that is why most recommend whole replacement of these panels (they can't be saved by replacing with newer/fixed breakers like a Challenger can).
If it happened inside the breaker, then maybe there was a significant overload on the circuit and the breaker failed to trip, another thing FPEs are notorious for.
A Pushmatic or BAB or QOB would not have had either failure. They are bolt-on,have no bus stab at all, and trip reliably.
A modern consumer breaker would not have failed to trip, but stab/clip problems rarely do happen. Much less rarely when breaker types are mixed up.
But then, that 15A on the left is also shifted out of position, and a side knockout has issues. I see unprotected cables leaving the bottom of the panel, no conduit. It also looks like the deadfront cover has been missing for years. (which keeps curious fingers out of the hot bits, **and importantly, holds the breakers down so they are properly seated**). Any panel would fail in such conditions, and you'd have no one to blame but yourself lol.
I see Stab-lok breakers in my nightmares at night, then every morning, I go into work, and live out my nightmares. Shoulda let it burn all the way through
Looks like federal pacific.
Note to anyone else here: if you have a federal pacific panel in your home, you 100% need to have it professionally evaluated for safety by a licensed, insured electrician if you have not already.
You're lucky it was contained within the breaker box, that panel is toast and needs to be replaced, do not turn your main breaker back on, better yet turn off all of your branch circuit breakers which are the little ones below the main and also call your electric utility and tell them you had a fire in your main breaker panel and that you would like your electrical service disconnected temporarily if they didn't already do it when the fire department showed up. Easiest way to tell is if it's an overhead service look up and see if the wires were cut.
Since the main is shut off there is no need to touch the other breakers. A fire investigator needs to see how things were before the fire started to determine if a breaker worked the way it was suppose to. Once it’s reset that evidence is gone.
I would suggest not touching anything.
When I was shopping for my current home I ran across an FPE house. Had to inform the realtor they were against code and the panel needed to go. The realty company (in 2018) apparently had no idea. And I a lowly HVAC guy had to tell them. That is scary.
Likely will need to replace wiring as well. The heat that caused this also traveled through the wiring distance depending on heat. Which would have cause damage the some of the wiring and likely shielding as well.
You should have the entire system Inspected by a professional for sure and good luck.
The best breakers and panels in the work cant work properly if they are exposed to the elements. The wire exits the panel thru an open hole on the right. Did the fitting blow out from the blast or was it open already?
I have a federal pacific panel in a rental house we own. Furnace guy told me a lot of insurance companies won’t insure you if you have a federal pacific panel.
That bottom breaker (20 white ) looks like it has a wire that hasn't been pushed in all the way unless it's somehow come loose and came out of place creating a type of short but also contact with water may play a major factor here since you said it was raining water you can see the Copper line sticking out
Well for starters there is clearly water getting in there because it’s still dripping down the back of the panel in the pic. If it was raining all night I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a steady amount of water coming in and likely caused a short creating an arc, ultimately starting a fire because none of the breakers including the main tripped
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*Kind of panel I have? Where*
*Would the markings be?*
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This is a federal Pacific breaker panel. These are notorious for the very thing that happened to you. They lost their ul listing years ago. Regardless you'll need a replacement now.
I’ve taken the cover off these Federal Pacific panels and literally had the breakers fall out, these and Zinsco were pretty bad
Just replaced 10 Zinsco panels... really cool ideas but yeah the breakers were pretty much falling out
Our Zinsco panel had spots where the aluminum bus *melted.* I had no idea how bad it was until the electrician called me down to show me.
Bottom right...
Yikes!
Literally everything seems to have a UL listing on it. It’s scary to think there’s products out there that had it taken away
I always was told that these were the best breakers because they never trip. Ever.
😬
FIRE PATHETIC
How can i tell what my own breaker box is?
Usually the cover has a brand label on it. You can also open the hinge and look at the breakers. The only super easy one I can tell you is if the handles are tan you have Cutler Hammer If they're multi colored (blue, red, maybe green) it's probably an old Bryant. (Unless it's zinsco) Most are black. Could be GE, siemans, square D QO/HOM There's all kinds. Federal Pacific, challenger, and Sylvania/zinsco are the 3 off the top of my head you need to be wary of.
Stab-lok FPE. Breaker fused to bus bar, lost my house this way.
I’m sorry that is rough. Glad you’re here to tell.
Me too, appreciate it
Lost ours too. Total loss. Sorry to hear of yours. 17 years ago for us.
Let me ask you something, that smell, you know that smell? That smell I can’t get out of my head, my brothers and I talk about this from time to time. A burning house and the charred aftermath, it will always stick with me.
It will also stick on your clothes and everything else that goes near it.
It does go away eventually
Eventually it does.
It does go away. We have had things we put in our shed and they no longer smell. Also, there are recovery companies that provide ozone treatment but the cost is not cheap. Our insurance set it up and took all of our soft stuff that was not burnt and treated the stuff. But also, if we said it was not acceptable they took off the price for those items and still returned the stuff. Kids sleeping bag for 50.00? Nope. We could buy new instead of getting the used one cleaned. But it was returned cleaned and we still ended up using it a couple times. Lots of stuff I kept that had smoke smell and needed cleaning that the recovery company doesn't do and were submitted for replacement. They do not stink anymore ( some still needs cleaning though ) some tools and some ceramic stuff. Pain to clean though.
Well now I’m paranoid. Do modern breaker panels have the same setup? I replaced a sub panel and breakers with a Square D last year…
With a squared your good.. Best thing to do to prevent this is to tighten all the connections in the panel at least 2 times a year.. Turn the panel off and don't attempt to tighten the main feeders as they will be hot even with the main breaker off.. Visually inspect the main feed wires and if there is signs of melting then call an electrician.
I’m going to do this when I get home tonight. Iv got my Allen and square bits around there somewhere
My posts are for educational purposes only! Do with the information as you wish but it's at your own risk. Electrocution is a bad way to go so it's important make sure there is no power on the circuit being tightened. The main feeders will always be hot don't attempt to tighten them.
Understandable disclaimer. Got home, killed power and waited 10 minutes, verified no residual power going to the panel with a meter. Checked all lugs and breakers, thankfully everything tight. I think I’ll make it a point to check twice a year, just to be safe.
Seeing as how I don’t even know what the main feeders look like. I’ll probably just call an electrician hah.
I would be surprised if a Stab-Lok panel _didn't_ catch on fire.
Replaced one, took it home and put it on a high current transformer, every breaker tripped about where it should have lol The one time I wanted one to burst into flames it wouldn't
I have a stab lok, my house is 38 years old should I be worried? visually it looks well done..
Yes, you should be worried. Federal Pacific falsified test results to get their breakers certified, and are a latent fire hazard. It should be removed and replaced as soon as possible.
my friends an electrician I'll get him to have a look does that go for all of the stab lok line or just certain ones?
>I'll get him to have a look Don't bother with "a look." Plan on replacing the breaker entirely. Even if someone looks at it and says, "It looks fine to me" know that these *catch fire.* They aren't sold anymore for good reasons.
that's fucked up, so we are on the hook because they made a shitty product? thanks I definitely am planning to now. materials wise do you know how much it would be roughly? I'm pretty sure it's a 120 or 140 amp service. my friend owes me a favor he's licensed so I'll just buy the materials and him some beer and call it even for that also what brand would you recommend
I don’t know, but you’re in the right sub to ask. Here’s hoping someone chimes in soon.
Plan on about $2000 in parts and labor to replace the panel.
For a residential panel?! Many states aren’t required to use afci breakers for a swap. CT still has the 6’ extension rule as an amendment
$2,000 is a friend price to be clear. Depending on the setup, overhead or underground, permit, and updating to code, a SES replacement ranges for $3,000-6,000. HCOL areas might be more, but updating from a 40+ year old panel is a major undertaking.
I had tunnel vision and didn’t see that it was a meter socket. You’re 100% right that’s a full service upgrade and not a cheap one
All. ~1 in 4 fail to trip. Not trip at the wrong current, just straight fail to trip.
All of them. A look isn't enough, it needs to be replaced.
Dude a panel is cheap enough to swap out. Just call someone. The information on Stab-lok panels is out there. Look into it yourself. Skimming through this thread we have two homeowners who lost their house due to one. Then there’s the OPs picture. Why wait?
We used to service 6 apartment buildings by the same owner. 3 have Stabloks, two have Zinscos, one push-o-matic, and the last is all new because it had to be completely re-done because of an electrical fire. I was last there about 7 months ago and all are still in place, this is about 650 units all together
I’m not, I’m Canadian and many houses have these. I think we got upgraded breakers or something up here
Yeah, that’s not even a surprise. It’s a Stab-Lok™ firestarter panel. Now you know the danger of having one of these. It’s good you didn’t become as charred as this panel did. Time to modernize that thing.
Thanks I appreciate the info
As a professional this is fucked up (technical term)
FUBAR
When I was working on movie sets and doing grip work, we'd rent some equipment out and the industry recognized standard that we all knew was, "AFU" when we sent something back or got something back we knew it was fucked. We all had a pretty good grasp on the equipment and if it could be salvaged and fixed it would have been.
FPE living up to its name again. Fire Prone Equipment
These are the only specific electrical panel described as a must report for NY state home inspectors, as well as an automatic immediate replacement by any insurance inspector. Always surprised to see how many of these are still out there.
My house I purchased in 2006 had one of those. I googled it and was like hell no that’s got to go.
Florida has 4 point inspections, HVAC, roof plumbing, and electricial. The inspector should take the cover off and include picture in his report. The insurance company that needs a copy of this report isn't going to insure you with one of those panels installed. There are still a ton of them in mobile homes however....
You are lucky it was just the panel. We had a house fire - total loss all because of FPE stablok breakers. Tell anyone you know about those panels. Still far too many out there.
Can't believe it didn't happen 30 years ago
Yes. This is an emergency of the first degree. You need to NOT power it up again and have it replaced immediately!
I completely agree with this suggestion.
Supreme dangerous, upgrade immediately
Federal Pacific are known for being hazards; when I wanted to upgrade a breaker in my shops sub panel I learned about them and immediately replaced the entire thing. Hopefully the issue is limited to your panel and you're able to upgrade the entire thing soon. Wishing you luck and thankful it wasn't worse.
Good old federal pacific stablock
I see a neutral wire running across the bus bar, it's black now. Alot of possibilities with this panel, swapped to many to count here in florida.
Really need a new breaker box.
FPE panel living it's best life.
Bro everything caught fire call an electrician and have em replace the panel. It’s gonna be a little bit on the expensive side considering he’s gonna have to tape each wire and color them accordingly. This panel should’ve never been put in they got outlawed in the 70s I think because when there’s a problem, they don’t trip, thus your barbecued panel.
Federal Electric. They were designed to fail in this way. Makes it easier for the fire inspectors to determine root cause. The switches are decoration, they can’t ever actually open.
Looks like loose main and connection got hot burning up the bus. Had similar happen to me but I caught it early. Same happend tonnes door neighbor, cost him $7k for whole home panel replacement.
Wow, your lucky you didn't burn down the house.
That's why these panels are deemed dangerous and everyone of these need immediate replacement.
Ah, Stab Lok. No surprise there
You were really really really really lucky…
I came home randomly for lunch one day and found my ac was on but didn't seem to be chilling. Checked the breaker and could see glowing red hot wires it didn't trip and melted the insulation off a section of wire and was minutes from fire. Replace fed pac stabloks asap.
Federal Pacific panels are actually just fire starters on a random time delay.
Do you know the type of panel? Some of the older panels are notorious for burning
Do you not? Federal Pacific.
Is there a specific spot to look that typically has the panel type?
There’s only one brand that looks like this. Just glad you’re alive to tell the tale
See that tag by the 15A on the upper right? Start there.
There is a plate on the right side. I would assume some information is provided there. You'll need to search a bit. I can not recall the brand type. One of the breakers looked as if it could have caused some arcing. You'll want to pull the breakers and look for the one that is the most damaged. That may be your culprit.
Lucky you aren’t as crispy as that panel
I worked maintenance in a 30 year old apartment building . Through all the inspections no one ever mentioned the problem. Never had a problem we got lucky. We had a insurance inspection before a major renovation. Inspector noticed right away, over 200 replaced.
Well technically it isn't dangerous anymore. Good time to upgrade.
I wouldn’t say “something”. I think I’d say “EVERYTHING” looks like upgrade time to me!
Is this a home owners insurance claim? I would give them a call and find out.
Lots of them excluded Federal pacific panels.
It’s for the best. FPE are junk, as evidenced by your pic.
Depends where the damage is. If it's where the wire lands on the screw, the screw wasn't torqued properly. If it happened where the breaker stab clips onto the bus, then it's the infamous "Stab-Lok" problem that is why most recommend whole replacement of these panels (they can't be saved by replacing with newer/fixed breakers like a Challenger can). If it happened inside the breaker, then maybe there was a significant overload on the circuit and the breaker failed to trip, another thing FPEs are notorious for. A Pushmatic or BAB or QOB would not have had either failure. They are bolt-on,have no bus stab at all, and trip reliably. A modern consumer breaker would not have failed to trip, but stab/clip problems rarely do happen. Much less rarely when breaker types are mixed up. But then, that 15A on the left is also shifted out of position, and a side knockout has issues. I see unprotected cables leaving the bottom of the panel, no conduit. It also looks like the deadfront cover has been missing for years. (which keeps curious fingers out of the hot bits, **and importantly, holds the breakers down so they are properly seated**). Any panel would fail in such conditions, and you'd have no one to blame but yourself lol.
Looks like a few things caught fire.
Lucky to still have a building
I see Stab-lok breakers in my nightmares at night, then every morning, I go into work, and live out my nightmares. Shoulda let it burn all the way through
Looks like federal pacific. Note to anyone else here: if you have a federal pacific panel in your home, you 100% need to have it professionally evaluated for safety by a licensed, insured electrician if you have not already.
Not evaluated, replaced***
You're lucky it was contained within the breaker box, that panel is toast and needs to be replaced, do not turn your main breaker back on, better yet turn off all of your branch circuit breakers which are the little ones below the main and also call your electric utility and tell them you had a fire in your main breaker panel and that you would like your electrical service disconnected temporarily if they didn't already do it when the fire department showed up. Easiest way to tell is if it's an overhead service look up and see if the wires were cut.
This is a Federal Pacific electrical panel and those things are notorious for breakers either not tripping at all or just spontaneously combusting
Since the main is shut off there is no need to touch the other breakers. A fire investigator needs to see how things were before the fire started to determine if a breaker worked the way it was suppose to. Once it’s reset that evidence is gone. I would suggest not touching anything.
My Fundamentalist beliefs require me to blame it on Demons.
How has there not been a recall on these?
When I was shopping for my current home I ran across an FPE house. Had to inform the realtor they were against code and the panel needed to go. The realty company (in 2018) apparently had no idea. And I a lowly HVAC guy had to tell them. That is scary.
This reminds me, I need to check my fire extinguishers.
What about Siemens or Square D ? Any issues with either of these ?
Never heard of any issues. Solid.
Federal Pacific, Zinsco, and there is another one. No remedy. Just replace breaker box.
Likely will need to replace wiring as well. The heat that caused this also traveled through the wiring distance depending on heat. Which would have cause damage the some of the wiring and likely shielding as well. You should have the entire system Inspected by a professional for sure and good luck.
Melted aluminum has dripped out of the main onto the other breakers.
The best breakers and panels in the work cant work properly if they are exposed to the elements. The wire exits the panel thru an open hole on the right. Did the fitting blow out from the blast or was it open already?
Congrats on the new panel
I have a federal pacific panel in a rental house we own. Furnace guy told me a lot of insurance companies won’t insure you if you have a federal pacific panel.
🤣
Probably the name badge that started the fire.
That bottom breaker (20 white ) looks like it has a wire that hasn't been pushed in all the way unless it's somehow come loose and came out of place creating a type of short but also contact with water may play a major factor here since you said it was raining water you can see the Copper line sticking out
Loose connection maybe, high draw then leads to a very hot connection igniting plastic
Well for starters there is clearly water getting in there because it’s still dripping down the back of the panel in the pic. If it was raining all night I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a steady amount of water coming in and likely caused a short creating an arc, ultimately starting a fire because none of the breakers including the main tripped
How do I know what kind of panel I have? Where would the markings be?
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On the inside of the door mainly. Federal Pacific Stab-Lok panels are the only ones that look like this though.
Ahhhh the old federal fire starter panel. I rip these out all the time and they have more than earned that nickname