[PLUG-TALK] Stablok electrical boxes

[Keith Lofstrom]

> On Mon, 29 Mar 2010 23:57:08 -0700
> Keith Lofstrom <keithl at kl-ic.com> dijo:
> >We just bought a 1960's era house, which contains a Federal Pacific
> >Stablok load center aka circuit breaker box.  These have a nasty and
> >well deserved reputation for starting fires.  An electrician will
> >be replacing it soon, but apparently not soon enough.

On Tue, Mar 30, 2010 at 08:34:20AM -0700, John Jason Jordan wrote:
> I assume you have already checked, but just in case it has not occurred
> to you, check for recalls. I had a service panel that was recalled and
> the company paid for replacement, including the permit and labor. When
> I called them they tried to weasel out of it by claiming there was a
> disclaimer on the instructions that came with the panel, but after I
> pointed out that you can't contract out of liability (fundamental
> principle of contract law), they caved.

The house and the box is 50 years old.  Federal Pacific was driven
out of business by lawsuits.  The company that bought their assets
was driven out of business by lawsuits.  I assume the few remaining
executives are 90 years old and still serving back-to-back life
sentences in prison, with their children castrated and salt sewn on
their ancestral lands unto the seventh generation ( a long wait,
given the castrations).

BTW, I originally assumed that the problem stemmed from some doofus
act while I was replacing wall sockets.  In fact, the only doofus
act was plugging in a 40 watt work light in parallel with a shorted
ceiling fixture, poorly installed by the Major Doofus Previous Owner.
This drew many amps, but did not trip the #%&!$ Stablok breaker. 
>From the looks of things, this melted the wire, plus all the other
wires crammed into the knockout on the panel.  Not as much wire to
replace as I had feared, though we will be stringing lots of wire
to separate some of the runs, and create more branches.  We will
also pull inspect every light and appliance added by MDPO and 
look for more bogosity.

The remaining doofus act was not using my infrared thermometer
on the breaker box - I imagine that wire got hot - but before
it failed, who woulda thunk it?

I'm very glad we bought the house.  Besides the wiring, it is an
excellent structure.  Had the MDPO had more time to "improve" it
before losing it in a foreclosure, or most other people bought it,
it would likely have burned and perhaps killed people.

Keith

-- 
Keith Lofstrom          keithl at keithl.com         Voice (503)-520-1993
KLIC --- Keith Lofstrom Integrated Circuits --- "Your Ideas in Silicon"
Design Contracting in Bipolar and CMOS - Analog, Digital, and Scan ICs