SubFed Panelboard in Detached Garage Disconnect

[jar546]

Recently I received a phone call from an irate electrician who was bitching that one of my inspectors failed a subpanel that he installed in a detached garage for one of his customers. I asked what the problem is and he said that first he failed me for not having ground rods. To which I asked him how he fed the power to the panel and he said PVC conduit underground so I asked him what the problem was. He then understood and said that he did put the ground rods in but when the inspector returned for a final inspection after some wiring was done in the garage, he then failed him for not having a main breaker in the sub panel. He then stated that he already had a disconnect back in the house panel located in the basement. I asked him if he had any other disconnects between the house and the garage and he said no. I then asked him how many breakers he had in the sub panel and he said 8. I then asked him what the problem was with the inspection.

So, in order to correct himself, he agreed to use a backed 100A breaker to land the feeders. I asked him if he was going to bolt in the new backfed breaker, he said "huh?". I told him to contact the manufacturer to see if they make a product that secures the breaker in place.

Was my inspector wrong?

2009 IRC / 2008 NEC

 

[jwelectric]

You done good. See 225-31 through 39 and 250.32

 

[Dennis]

The only argument possible is the six disconnect rule. If the panel was rated for service equipment with 6 disconnects then he could get by with that however most ML panels I have seen are not rated for service equipment unless used with a main setup. I believe this will change a bit in the 2014 but for now I am assuming you are correct.