Any Electricians on here? Help wiring 200amp meter.

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I'm trying to figure out what wire gauge/conductor quantity I need to run from my 200amp meter main to the service panel in my house. Anybody work in the field of residential electrical? The wiring will be buried underground.
 
2/0 copper, 4/0 aluminum. I would not use aluminum, if I were you, and I would not run direct burial cable.

Home Depot used to have a nice booklet called “ Code Check Electrical”, showing the most recent code cycle requirements. If you cannot get it there, I bet Amazon or eBay will have it.

It has excellent drawings showing service entrance requirements for conductor sizing, grounding and bonding guidelines, conduit sizing, ground rod sizing, and lots more considerations.

Stop at a local residential jobsite around lunch , preferably on a Friday, with a cooler of ice cold beer. I’ll bet one of those guys will come to your house after work and show you just how to do it. Do not take advice from workers at Home Depot, I heard more wrong info being dispensed there than I can shake a stick at.
 
Faceplant said:
2/0 copper, 4/0 aluminum. I would not use aluminum, if I were you, and I would not run direct burial cable.

Home Depot used to have a nice booklet called “ Code Check Electrical”, showing the most recent code cycle requirements. If you cannot get it there, I bet Amazon or eBay will have it.

It has excellent drawings showing service entrance requirements for conductor sizing, grounding and bonding guidelines, conduit sizing, ground rod sizing, and lots more considerations.

Stop at a local residential jobsite around lunch , preferably on a Friday, with a cooler of ice cold beer. I’ll bet one of those guys will come to your house after work and show you just how to do it. Do not take advice from workers at Home Depot, I heard more wrong info being dispensed there than I can shake a stick at.
Click to expand...

Yeah your like the 3rd guy to tell me not to use aluminum, I had 4/0 Alum. priced out, I will do copper. I was also on the fence about direct burial, popular around these parts for shorts runs to trailer homes but it didn't seem right, for how much length I need. Thank you @Faceplant!
 
The answer to your question is yes. You will be pulling some 3/0 guage for a 200 amp service (you growing?). The neutral / ground bus is typically grounded at the meter can or in the panel for older installs(house ground which is typically brought in with the service but separate) as well as @ the last step down transformer on the pole (the neutral/ground coming from the service is sourced here)

View attachment 53045
neutral/ ground wires in my panel w. labelled source .this is an old house, and the single ground rod is wired directly into the panel instead of the meter box which i believe would not meet code any longer where its installed

View attachment 53046
Bare conductor is your service ground

View attachment 53047
This is a nice drawing to sum it all up. Svc ground and ground rod both attached to neutral/ground bus in the main cabinet.(note the right panel has separate neutral and grounding busses but they all go to the same place). Don’t skimp on wire here, you need all 4. Your panel ground should never carry current, your neutral should handle all of it.

Do you have safety gear? These gloves are only $30 and protect you up to 17000 volts. Worth every penny imo
View attachment 53048
 

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Jackthereaper said:
The answer to your question is yes. You will be pulling some 3/0 guage for a 200 amp service (you growing?). The neutral / ground bus is typically grounded at the meter can or in the panel for older installs(house ground which is typically brought in with the service but separate) as well as @ the last step down transformer on the pole (the neutral/ground coming from the service is sourced here)

View attachment 53045
neutral/ ground wires in my panel w. labelled source .this is an old house, and the single ground rod is wired directly into the panel instead of the meter box which i believe would not meet code any longer where its installed

View attachment 53046
Bare conductor is your service ground

View attachment 53047
This is a nice drawing to sum it all up. Svc ground and ground rod both attached to neutral/ground bus in the main cabinet.(note the right panel has separate neutral and grounding busses but they all go to the same place). Don’t skimp on wire here, you need all 4. Your panel ground should never carry current, your neutral should handle all of it.

Do you have safety gear? These gloves are only $30 and protect you up to 17000 volts. Worth every penny imo
View attachment 53048
Click to expand...

Sick! No I'm not growing, not yet anyways! haha, I'm building a house. And am distributing power to all new construction, well, house, and pole barn.

I'm going to dig in a little more to what you wrote, I may ask you some more questions. I have a lot of experience doing electrical but nothing "professional" or legit on the job, just figuring out my own projects.
 
Brodiesel710 said:
@Jackthereaper do you think this a good choice for a 300' run from my 200A meter to my house panel? It will be inside of Sch 40 PVC, underground.

http://platt.com/p/452102
Click to expand...
For my money i would be running bigger aluminum for such a long connection. The 00 wire in the link is really only rated for 175 amps and your distance is quite long, i wouldnt risk it. I would be running 250-250-250-3/0 aluminum wire. 300 ft of 000-000-000-00 Copper to handle 200 amps is gonna be well over 4 grand , the aluminum will come in right around the thousand

Copper

Aluminum

Either way, eat your wheaties that morning. Shits gonna be heavy and hard as fuck to bend and pull through condiut. Using the 53% rule for one wire you will need some fat conduit as well. Measure the cavle, calculate its cross sectional area and then divide by .53 and round up to the next size conduit available.

Other than that its just gonna be full tilt like a peterbuilt and get it done. You have quite a project cut out
 
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Jackthereaper said:
For my money i would be running bigger aluminum for such a long connection. The 00 wire in the link is really only rated for 175 amps and your distance is quite long, i wouldnt risk it. I would be running 250-250-250-3/0 aluminum wire. 300 ft of 000-000-000-00 Copper to handle 200 amps is gonna be well over 4 grand , the aluminum will come in right around the thousand

Copper

Aluminum

Either way, eat your wheaties that morning. Shits gonna be heavy and hard as fuck to bend and pull through condiut. Using the 53% rule for one wire you will need some fat conduit as well. Measure the cavle, calculate its cross sectional area and then divide by .53 and round up to the next size conduit available.

Other than that its just gonna be full tilt like a peterbuilt and get it done. You have quite a project cut out
Click to expand...

Thank you so much, yeah when Platt shopping cart says "call for price" you know its expensive. I found that Southwire has really nice conduit fill and voltage drop calculators, so with that and your advice I'm golden. Full tilt, the only way to live.
 
Jackthereaper said:
The answer to your question is yes. You will be pulling some 3/0 guage for a 200 amp service (you growing?). The neutral / ground bus is typically grounded at the meter can or in the panel for older installs(house ground which is typically brought in with the service but separate) as well as @ the last step down transformer on the pole (the neutral/ground coming from the service is sourced here)

View attachment 53045
neutral/ ground wires in my panel w. labelled source .this is an old house, and the single ground rod is wired directly into the panel instead of the meter box which i believe would not meet code any longer where its installed

View attachment 53046
Bare conductor is your service ground

View attachment 53047
This is a nice drawing to sum it all up. Svc ground and ground rod both attached to neutral/ground bus in the main cabinet.(note the right panel has separate neutral and grounding busses but they all go to the same place). Don’t skimp on wire here, you need all 4. Your panel ground should never carry current, your neutral should handle all of it.

Do you have safety gear? These gloves are only $30 and protect you up to 17000 volts. Worth every penny imo
View attachment 53048
Click to expand...

Ok @Jackthereaper , kind of freakin' out here because I'm second guessing a lot of work I did.

First off my meter main (EATON) has a 200A service disconnect, will this trip at 200 AMPS or is it only a manual disconnect switch? The reason I ask is because my service entrance wires from here are going directly to my house 200A panel. THEN from the meter main I have another 90A breaker which is then powering my pole barn. Is this just a couple parallel circuits that could in theory over current the main?
 
Jackthereaper said:
It sounds like your concerns are warranted. Can you please draw up the situation? English was my worst subject of study.
Click to expand...


Never drew anything out officially but I figured out what would work for me, especially with your help.

Tell me this. I've laid 400' of 3" conduit with about 180 degrees of bend total, you think I could pull one run of 1/0 - 1/0 - 1/0 - 2 COPPER entrance cable or will there be hang ups?
 
you will def want some wire lubricant for thay pull. Do you have a good strong rope laid into the conduit? Pull another with the wire so you can pull more later if necessary.

Brodiesel710 said:
Never drew anything out officially but I figured out what would work for me, especially with your help.

Tell me this. I've laid 400' of 3" conduit with about 180 degrees of bend total, you think I could pull one run of 1/0 - 1/0 - 1/0 - 2 COPPER entrance cable or will there be hang ups?
[/QUOTE
Click to expand...
 
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