My in laws recently moved into an older home. Not sure when it was built, but the house does contain such things as T slot receptacles and it even still has a fuse box.

The fuse box, made by Murray, has 4 30 amp fuses in it, and also has these bakelite looking things with handles on them. It has 3 of those, 2 of them sit above the fuses and the other one is slightly bigger that sort of sits off to the side.

I haven't seen a fuse boxin so many years that was still powering a home. Anyone know what was the lastyear they used fuse boxes in american residences?

Thanks in advance.

Probably the mid 70s (my 1971 house had fuses), although if you have S adapters in the edison base sockets I am not sure why you couldn't install one today.

Dawg, that sounds like a classic 60 or 100 amp split-bus fuse panel, likely from the 1940's. Most had one pullout for the range and one for the water heater (the ones at the top). The third one was the lighting section main which controlled power to the lower fuse sockets. I know that these panels are plentiful in the older areas in North Carolina. My grandmother's house had one.

The more modern ones had take-off lugs to allow the feeding of a sub panel when more lighting/appliance circuits were needed behind the lighting main.

GE even made a circuit breaker panel (60's era) that allowed plug-in breakers or plug-in fuse socket modules. These allowed for two circuits per stab on the bus bar. Obviously, they didn't last long.

Square D made modules in their "QO" circuit breaker line that had miniature fuse holders, but they used cartridge-type fuses, not the traditional Edison-base or type S. The last time I saw them "new" and still being installed was in 1978. Those didn't last long either. Why bother?

It's hard to put an exact date on the transition; in most instances, it's safe to say 'the mid-60's.'

The changeover was encouraged by two things: homes began to see more circuits (and fuseboxes with more than six 1-pole circuits were fairly cumbersome), and homeowners perceived that breakers were 'better' (no matter what the fuse makers claimed).

Personaly, I think that the changeover was also encouraged by two unrelated developments: the acceptance of Romex, and the adoption of the ground wire (bonding conductor). Breaker panels just seemed more 'friendly' to having the additional ground buss, and the use of a cable just begged for the neutral to terminate somewhere near the breaker. Toss in a few other innovations -like wire nuts- and the change seemed inevetable.

The panel in my old house in Md has about 20 edison fuses in it and a couple of 2 pole pullouts. (HVAC and Dryer).
It is 200a. The main is a breaker as I recall.
I will see if I can talk my ex into taking a picture of it.

Greg,

I remember also that there was a fuse with a little pop button in it. It looked like a fuse and worked like a circuit breaker. I only saw some of them around here but I think you have seen them down there. This back in the days of *P*, which seems like a million years ago.

Harold, I think I saw some of the fuse mini breakers in one of the big box hardware stores a little while ago. I can't remember if they were branded Buss or GB.

A friend of mine parents house had them years ago (mid 70's) in their fuse panel and they seemed to work ok.

The breakers that fit in fuse holders are made by "Miniture Breaker" and sold by Bussman. They are available in 15 and 20 amp.

Such breakers are UL listed, allowed by code, and can be used to replace Edison base fuses.

When these breakers are used in place of fuses, there is no code requirement to instal the type 'S' reducing adapters.

Harold is messing with you. I sent him a few back in the day, when he couldn't find them up north.

Here's a pic of the inside of the box if it helps...



There's another bake lite pull out that sits off to the side that doesn't have any fuses below it. In the octagon it doesn't say anything like "main" or "range" like the other 2 do. However the metal trim ring that surrounds it doe say "service disconnect". I'm guessing this is the main breaker for the box?

OK, back down memory lane, I can't recall if the mini-breaker was edison based only, or came as a S-type.

Working within the older inner cities, fuses used to be 'king'. One EC I worked for back in '70s had barrels full of edison base fuses, with the majority being 30 amps.

Fused resi is for all intensive purposes gone in the twp I work in.

John,

I too use to have buckets full of 30 amp fuses. I could never give them away fast enough. In my 1 town, I haven't seen many fuse boards around, however the other town I have still has lots of them.

the 'ol main, range & 4 wadsworth

i wish i had a nickle for every one of these i've changed out here.

and there's a world of 'em still tickin' along here too!

sometimes i think i'm doin' biz in the land time forgot

~S~

crap, image won't post....c'mon, that's a thing of nostalgic electrical beauty , kinda like those old Ridgid calendars.....~S~

{Steve, you got the original image?
If so send me a PM with a link to it, I can sure post it up.}

You are right...after doing some research I found this is indeed a 60 amp fuse box as indicated inside. Those black bakelite boxes pull out and there's cartrige fuses in them. Underneath 2 of the 3 cartridge fuse holders are 4 edison screw in fuses.

As I later learned this is actually now a sub panel for the house, as there's a breaker box outside the home that controls the water heater, dryer, stove, a/c, furnace, etc....and this fuse box inside controls all the wall outlets and ceiling lights.

I bought a house built in 1971 that had a 200a fuse panel with S adapters in it. (aluminum wire too)

I was young and dumb, the cheap price blinded me. I didn't even notice the fuses until I blew one. Fortunately the sparky left a couple spares.

1970's electrical catalogs had fusible panels listed, when they finally disappeared I cannot say.....

i don't think the farmers out here have quit....~S~

There is nothing in the code that prohibits installing a fuse panel or aluminum wire today as long as you use the new alloy wire CO/ALr devices and S adapters in the fuse box.

Getting an insurance company to cover it will be another deal.

Where are you going to find AL NM cable? From what I have heard nobody is manufacturing it & although one can find stashes of NOS (New Old Stock) AL NM, it's not 90 degree C insulation so it could not be be used IMHO. I would think that AFCI requirements would have made a fusible panel a no-go in residential applications.

I agree I have not seen NM aluminum wire since the days of leisure suits but if someone made it in NM-b, you could use it.
The strange thing is, a few years ago, there was a guy from Alcan running a road show telling inspectors what wonderful stuff aluminum wire was, explaining the AA alloy and such.
I thought at the time that they might be trying to rehabilitate the product in a climate of nose bleed copper prices.
I suppose the AFCI would cut into the chances of using fuses but we do have the "device" AFCI don't we? I am sure I saw it in the code somewhere

Greg,

I had one customer who had a 40 circuit 200 amp service panel. The main was fuses (Not breakers) but the branch circuits were all circuit breakers. He had trouble once where all the breakers tripped, but the fuses didn't blow. I think I even posted this question a dozen years ago. I never found out the problem, I always thought it was the POCO problem. I think the transformer outside was sending in a higher shot of voltage that would trip breakers but not blow fuses. After 2 or 3 service calls from me, and 1 or 2 from the POCO and a new transformer, the problem just disappeared.

Apparently small-gauge aluminum wire was outlawed in Austria and Germany recently, but for larger feeders (60 amps and up) aluminum is used all the time.