Unusual A/C wiring

[Bruce A. Cargin]

Yesterday I was inspecting a home which has an unusual feeder to the A/C. What is happening is that the feed to the A/C runs directly off the meter box, as opposed to coming from a main or sub panel, through conduit to a 50 amp A/C service box. I did not pull the meter due to utility tamper wire so I can not verify how it is wired inside the meter box. FWIW the homeowner is preparing to sell and is having the inspection in preparation for sale - the A/C was added after the house was built and wired this way over tens years ago by an electrician.

[Greg Fretwell]

230.72 Grouping of Disconnects.
(A) General. The two to six disconnects as permitted in 230.71 shall be grouped. You can't have a disconnect off by itself.
The A/C disconnect may not be "suitable for service equipment".

[Greg Fretwell]

BTW this is not a "feeder". These are service conductors since there is no upstream protection

[Bruce A. Cargin]

Thanks Greg - I remember this from a class I took last year but could not put my finger on it. The idea being that all electricity can be shut off from one location using fewer than 6 actions as opposed to running all over the house trying to find shut-offs. Am I getting this right?

Bruce

[Greg Fretwell]

Yep. All 6 disconnects must be in the same area, preferably right next to each other and properly labeled.