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	Subject - NO MAIN BREAKER IN SERVICE PANEL bobo hello, I just noticed that the house which i moved into about7 months ago, has no MAIN breaker in the service panel. This is the first time ive seen this in a main service panel. Is this out of the norm??? Also, the house has a subpanel in the hall just outside the room where the main panel is located, but why? the house is a one level ranch style brick house, dont know the square footage, but its not REAL big. the only reason i can think of, is the main service panel was too small (14 slots)for the breakers needed for the entire house, and maybe it was cheaper to install a subpanel, than replace the main breaker panel with a new one. I rent the house right now, so cant make any changes, but was curious about this. Any ideas about this will be greatly appriciated. bobo Wirenutz FPE was notorious for split buss panels, always confused people... luckyshadow Sounds like you have what is called a split buss panel. The top breakers are 2 pole to feed the 240 circuits. One of those 2 pole breakers should shut off the lower part of the panel which should contain the single pole breakers the feed the 120 circuits. kbsparky You might have a split-bus panel as referred to by lucky, or there may be an additional outside disconnect at your meter box. Look for the words Service Disconnect marked on several breakers in your "main" panel to determine whether you have a split-bus panel. The number of "service disconnects" are limited to 6 in those panels. JimmyDee Back in the 60s that is all we put in. They did an OK job but they sure confused the home owner. We were installing CH split buss panels. Jim bobo hello, Thank you all for ur replies. It is a split buss panel, a GE. I read the scymatic on the panel door, and it mentions the 6 disconnect breaker limit for that box. It lists 22 slots on the door panel also. It still has room for 8 more single pole breakers in the panel, but the subpanel is what stumps me, it is full, and has two high amp breakers in the panel, one tandam with two 30amp breakers, and the other tandem with two 40amp breakers. This subpanel is a GE also. Also the outlets are all two prong, no ground, and wired with what looks to be romex 12ga-2. I checked for continuity between the commmon white wire on the outlet to the metal outlet workbox and there is none, and then with power on, checked for 120v between the hot black wire and metal outlet workbox, and no power, so the outlets r not grounded. The main service panel is grounded tho, but that isnt going to help the non grounded outlets any, right? Im not gonna touch, change anything, not my place, but should i mebtion it to the landlord????