cts | Volt a Day | Meter Completed November 06, 2010

We are very close to the end of the meter muddle story. In fact, I doubt there will be another update. Wednesday was an amazing day of people at the house. I hope I can keep it all straight. I should have kept notes.

Southern California Edison arrived with their contractor. Their contractor was three guys in two trucks. They started taking things apart almost immediately. It was clear they needed some parts, so I told them about the electric wholesale place down on Pico. (They were from Orange County, so they were glad to get the tip.)

They were there to remove the old dual meter adapter and provide a new electrical service. The old dual adapter they had installed in 2000 (I paid for the installation back then, but the specifications were all from SCE) had not been rated to carry any weight. So the weight of the EV meter was putting stress on the connectors on the regular meter mount. It could be a fire hazard, something SCE definitely didn’t want.

There is a special “meter team” from SCE, which is really just one guy in this case. He

comes by and has huge rubber mitts and a yellow-tinted faceshield and pulls off the EV meter. He says he’ll be back with it when we have the new service up and running.

So they uninstalled the old adapter and begin installing a brand new service. Their plan was to use the conduit which contained the circuit to the Magnacharger for the Rav4 EV, and run another circuit for the Voltec charger. That would mean we wouldn’t need a breaker in the garage sub-panel for the Voltec, which really took the sub-panel out of the equation entirely.

Then Mr. Electric pulls up with their trucks. I try to explain that they don’t need to make the corrections to the sub-panel that were called out by the inspector since their work is essentially negated by the work the SCE contractor is going. They listen, but they decide they want to make the inspector happy just in case. They take apart the sub-panel in the garage (downing my Internet connection), and the tiny plastic part they have to lock the new main-cutoff breaker into the panel doesn’t seem to fit. They spend over an hour messing around with it. I give them the address for the electrical wholesale place, and an additional hint for where the nearest Home Depot is and they runoff to get (possibly) an entire new sub-panel box.

The inspector shows up. That seems awfully fast for an inspection, but the SCE guys are talking with him. Bob, from SCE, showed up at the beginning, but he’s headed back to the office now. The inspector is not as angry as the first inspector we had, but he says, “That’s a second meter, and a second service drop. We don’t allow that on a residence in Santa Monica.” (An aside: a lot of the building code is used to reinforce the zoning code. This is R-1 zoning, which means it is single-family housing. So they don’t want us to install a second kitchen, or a second electric meter, because we might try to rent out half our house to another family. That sounds crazy, but they are trying to use all the clubs they have to beat the citizens into obedience.)

The inspector leaves with the SCE contractor in a state of limbo. Their not sure if they are wandering down a dead end. They call and talk to Bob, who says he’ll make sure things are straightened out.

The installation of the new service is substantial. It is also not as nice as I would probably do if I were just moving into the house. (I like the electric service panel to be installed in a wall cavity and the weather head to come up through that cavity. That’s how the new 200amp panel was installed on the house when we moved to the house in 2000.) There is

a lot of work to attach the large conduit for the service feed to the stucco wall. They have to run the mast up through the roof and properly flash that opening.

They pull another three wires out to the garage and they splice a junction box in just before the Magnacharger. Now they can run the Voltec charger feed from that new junction box over to the charger.

They get that all wired up. Mr. Electric returns and reveals that they were trying to get the main breaker for the panel into the wrong position, that they don't need a new panel, they just need to install it in the right location. They do, complete with the little red plastic doodad that keeps it from popping out. A lot of hours for one little modification, which is no longer necessary since the charger is no longer in the sub-panel. They pack up and are gone. (I have printed out the installation manual for the Voltec charger which they faxed me. The original, angry inspector from the City wanted to see that.)

Bob calls back from SCE and says that things are straightened out with the City.

The SCE contractor seems to be wrapping things up. Now a gentleman from the City of Santa Monica shows up. He seems to be the head of all inspectors. He goes through the new service panel really carefully. He says that this installation has caused quite a stir down at the City and they are all following it carefully. He said that SCE has another dozen of them to do in the city, so it is good for him to come take a look at the first one. He thanks us for being so forward-looking and so interested in the green technology.

While he is going through every detail (and allowing us to energize the panel even though we don’t have the engraved labels for the service panels), Bob shows up. They talk a bit and my doorbell rings. It’s the crew from SCE to splice in the service for the panel. I mention it to Bob, who runs out to keep them off the property until the head inspector okays the rough work. He does, and in moments there is a guy climbing up a ladder to hook up the service.

It is amazing how many people came to the house on a single day, all moving this forward and getting it straightened out. SCE says that all of our patience is really helpful because it is making it possible to figure out the process for the people who will come after us.