Electrical Upgrades

While new houses typically have 200-amp service existing houses with 100-amp service usually manage just fine. If you have an older home with 60-amp service, an upgrade may be in order. The main problem in older homes with adequate service is too few individual circuits. The number of electric conveniences has greatly increased since many houses were built. This results in overloaded circuits. The most reasonable solution is to add new circuits, not more capacity. Consider having the refrigerator and microwave put on dedicated circuits. A separate circuit for all the electronics might make sense too. This approach will take the load off existing circuits and is much less expensive than adding capacity (new service).

- Stephen Corwin

-- Anonymous, May 03, 2001