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If one were to add a new branch circuit to this panel and didn’t want to use metal conduit, where would you land your ground wire to? Would you need to add a grounding location to the panel? enter image description here

Machavity
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Pahah
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    Can usually put grounds with neutrals in a main panel(only in main, not sub panels). One of the white thick wires seem to be grounded, but in the sunlight so hard to tell. Also seem to have some rust/corrosion on the panel, which can lead to extra heating at connections. – crip659 Jun 01 '22 at 22:59
  • That white wire is crimped off and ran to the cold water pipe below. My understanding is that neutral and ground are tied together at the main panel. So landing my ground and neutral to the available bar is acceptable. – Pahah Jun 01 '22 at 23:04
  • If it grounded yes. Cold water pipes(metal) that come from the ground outside have been used to ground panels. – crip659 Jun 01 '22 at 23:21
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    make sure that it is legal in your area or occupancy to NOT use conduit. Generally if the wiring is all in conduit, it's because doing otherwise is not legal (specifically at my house, it's legal to do otherwise but I'm paranoid about burning the place down - and I've seen too much rodent damage in remodels over the years to trust cables that can be snacked on.) – Ecnerwal Jun 01 '22 at 23:24
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    Does the cover say Federal Pacific stab-lok by any chance? Adding a ground might be the least of your worries. – JACK Jun 01 '22 at 23:36
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    @JACK That might be the most important thing to know. Hope the OP checks and lets us know. – crip659 Jun 02 '22 at 00:09
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    That sure looks like a stab-lok panel. Given the current utilization, are you sure you don’t want to just replace it? – RibaldEddie Jun 02 '22 at 00:15
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    *"...didn’t want to use metal conduit"* That's not your call. You need to comply with local codes. If the last guy used all conduit, that was because Code requires it, and you can't just ignore code because of watching a few Youtube videos. Anyway, conduit is better even if it's new to you. – Harper - Reinstate Monica Jun 02 '22 at 04:27
  • Is this truly a main panel or a sub-panel? Four breakers is awfully low for a main panel. It’s also good that the wiring is in conduit because the MWBCs are phased incorrectly and are at serious risk of lighting the neutrals on fire. – nobody Jun 03 '22 at 01:29

2 Answers2

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You might as well just replace the whole panel

There's absolutely no sense trying to hunt down the correct grounding bar for your panel -- it's a FPE Stab-Lok, whose breakers and busbars are both dangerously defective. As a result, you're far better off simply getting a new panel -- you could even go with a 12 or 16 space, 100A, outdoor rated (NEMA 3R) main breaker panel if you're that pinched for budget, although I'd recommend a 24 or 30 space panel instead.

If this is directly off your meter, you'll need to coordinate shutting the power off with your utility, by the way. (Many utilities can do this remotely for free during business hours, even, thanks to smart metering!)

ThreePhaseEel
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  • Just curious. FPE had fuse boxes and the separate fuse blocks used the same "stab-lok" configuration to attach to the bus. There's a whole subdivision out here that used them and I have seen quite a few burned blocks. Were those part of the "recall"? – JACK Jun 02 '22 at 13:01
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    The idea of working on a panel with a service that hasn't been physically disconnected/locked out seems weird to me... What kind of assurance do you have that the power won't unexpectedly come back on when it's been shut off remote? – Logarr Jun 02 '22 at 13:47
  • @JACK there was no actual recall, unfortunately -- my linked answer goes into a little bit more detail as to why – ThreePhaseEel Jun 02 '22 at 22:51
  • @Logarr -- unless you want to pay for two truck rolls from your utility, the remote disco is your best bet for a service panel changeout – ThreePhaseEel Jun 02 '22 at 22:53
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    @Logarr Well, you could stop paying your bill about 4 months before you are ready to upgrade. When they cut off power for non-payment, do the panel replacement, then head on over to the utility office and pay the bill. – manassehkatz-Moving 2 Codidact Jun 03 '22 at 01:10
  • I did a panel replacement in February and I suggested they just do a remote disconnect for the afternoon and they said they weren't going to do that due to safety issues. – RibaldEddie Jun 03 '22 at 16:35
  • @RibaldEddie -- I guess your utility thinks like Logarr :) if they want to do the extra truck rolls, they have the right to do so – ThreePhaseEel Jun 04 '22 at 03:00
  • @ThreePhaseEel I was potentially going to replace my MB and I did plan to replace the conductors from the MB to the panel so pulling the meter even wouldn’t have been enough. – RibaldEddie Jun 04 '22 at 03:03
  • @RibaldEddie ah, that makes sense if you're swapping meter sockets – ThreePhaseEel Jun 04 '22 at 03:08
  • Where is your GEC if that is a main panel there should be a green or bare GEC in that panel, if it is a sub that is an non code compliant bond today but it was code compliant prior to 99 But in either case that terminal is not listed for multiple conductors. FPE stab lock panels need to be replaced and as a pro the 1 panel I will not work on other than to remove. – Ed Beal Jun 10 '22 at 01:00
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To answer your simple question "Where is the ground" on my panel.

You have a ground connector at the bottom right.

Messing with this outdated panel is at your own risk, of shorts and fire.

ground

Ruskes
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    The OP has much bigger problems than not having a ground wire, that's pretty definitely a FPE Stab-Lok from the busbar design and the breakers shown... – ThreePhaseEel Jun 02 '22 at 01:33
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    @ThreePhaseEel correct, but he asked about ground connector. – Ruskes Jun 02 '22 at 01:35
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    +1 for helping the OP learn. However, agree 100% with the "replace the whole panel" suggestion from TPE. – FreeMan Jun 02 '22 at 12:18
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    While it's true that the entire panel should be nuked from orbit I think this answer is overall useful for anyone that might stumble upon this question trying to figure out what a ground bar even looks like. I disagree with whoever downvoted this answer. – MonkeyZeus Jun 02 '22 at 12:31
  • @MonkeyZeus main issue with this answer is that the "ground connector" pointed out is actually the wire terminal on a grounding locknut/bushing used to bond the end of a metal conduit protecting the GEC to the neutral bar – ThreePhaseEel Jun 02 '22 at 22:51
  • Plagiarism is wrong. The content of rev2 was stolen from another site with no attribution. – nobody Jun 04 '22 at 02:12