Federal Pacific Electric Breaker Box

The breakers inside the panel are designed to guard your home against serious electrical problems by preventing circuit overload short circuits and outside power surges coming into.

Federal pacific electric breaker box.

If your home was built between 1950 and 1990 and is equipped with a federal pacific electric fpe circuit breaker panel with stab lok circuit breakers you run a significant risk of breaker malfunction and fire. How to identify a federal pacific electrical service panel. Federal pacific stab lok breaker panels are normally easy to recognize. The breakers would stab into slots in the bus bar and lock into place.

What is a federal pacific electric breaker panel. A circuit gets overloaded this often happens when plugging in too many high powered devices and appliances into a low voltage circuit. A federal pacific electric fpe circuit breaker panel can appear to be working properly for years. They are typically clearly labeled with the words federal pacific electric or fpe also when you open the door you will often see the words stab lok in the center or on the side of the breaker panel.

However although the panel had benefits issues began to emerge as some officials suspected that the panel was causing house fires. The most popular breaker panel installed was the federal pacific stab lok breaker. The main panel federal pacific sold was the stab lok named after its breaker functionality. The breaker box door usually says federal pacific electric or fpe once you open the door you will usually but not always see the words stab lok in the center or.

But experts warn that if a federal pacific electric panel experiences an overcurrent or short circuit it may not keep the electrical circuits from overheating and could possibly pose a fire hazard. Federal pacific electric will likely be written on the door of the breaker box. Inside look for the name stab loc the brand name of the circuit breakers. Reliance electric the parent company for federal pacific electric company or fpe was producing some of the most widely used circuit breakers in north america in the period between 1950 to 1980 and they can be found in properties built up until the year 2000.

A federal pacific electrical panel as well as other brands and derivatives of fpe breakers are supposed to function as follows.