sleuth255

I'm interested to know if open risers in and of themselves represent a safety hazard. Shouldn't tread overlap be a determining factor? Here's a pic showing this: These stairs have about a 25% overlap across the entire tread radius. Safe or not from an open riser perspective I wonder? Is 30% better? How about 50%? Interestingly, I've not seen this addressed by building code but then I'm certainly no expert either. Now I agree that spiral stairs are inherently more dangerous than standard stairs. My daughter fell down a set when she was a small child. If you start your fall towards the center of these types of stairs, its like falling straight down to the floor below.... Fortunately, she wasn't' hurt badly. Should this fact be written up whenever spiral stairs are encountered though? I dunno...

Not sure when the bonding strip was added to AC. Some report as late as 1959. My place was built in '58 and has it. My understanding was that it was actually added in the 40's sometime.

So I also went looking in the NEC for the 10% rule and didn't find it either. I did find this however: 408.54 Maximum Number of Overcurrent Devices. A panelboard shall be provided with physical means to prevent the installation of more overcurrent devices that that for which the panelboard was designed, rated, and listed. For the purposes of this section, a 2-pole circuit breaker or fusible switch shall be considered two overcurrent devices; a 3-pole circuit breaker or fusible switch shall be considered three overcurrent devices. Sooo... while it has 37 circuits, this panel also has 46 overcurrent devices in it. I guess if Square-D lists a maximum number of breakers as part of the rating then you would need to compare that to see if the panel needs to be written up. I bet there isn't such a spec though or you would think that the construction of the panel itself would be a violation of 408.54. [:-bigeyes There's a few other nit-picky things that would bug me about this panel though. For example, shouldn't those white wires on the bottom 2-pole breakers be coded hot? To me that's sloppy at the very least and would cause me to become interested in the other end of the branch circuits...

ummm I count 37 circuits in that panel. If its rated for 40 isn't it ok from a number of circuits allowed perspective?

No, its the main panel with a 30A subpanel below it. That funny box on the right side is an X10 active coupler.

Thanks for the input! However, the panel is recessed about 3" back from the wall. Technically, isn't that a violation then? [] Still, access is excellent and the covers of both panels are easily removed. Does that count for anything?

Does this panel meet minimum workspace requirements? The distance from the wall to the right side of the main panel is 16"