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r/YouShouldKnow · u/Planeandaquariumgeek31 jul 2026, 7:56

YSK that Stab-Lok circuit breakers (mainly manufactured by Federal Pacific) are a major fire hazard

Why YSK: These breakers are known to the Consumer Product Safety Commission to not trip when overloaded when causing a fire. When tested by the CPSC, an average of 51% of breakers failed to trip. These breakers are in basically any house in the US built before 1990. The problem with them is the fact that they use a poor design without this next problem, but the ones made specifically by Federal Pacific had their certifications falsified. The Federal Pacific ones are the *really* bad ones, the others are bad, but the Federal Pacific ones are the ones with a 51% failure rate. The branding on these panels is pretty predominant, you don’t exactly need to be an electrician to know what brand it is. Another reason to replace them is the fact that getting insurance for a house with a Stab-Lok panel is literally impossible. No insurer will touch it. Seriously, if you have one, get it replaced. It might save your house, and possible even your life.

119

Comentarios

u/alandotts821931 jul 2026, 8:04
Add Zinsco panels and breakers to the list of unsafe electrical equipment. Also screw in type fuses, not because they are fundamentally unsafe, but they can easily be replaced with the wrong fuse capacity, which in turn then makes it unsafe.
- u/Planeandaquariumgeek431 jul 2026, 8:09
  My house is from 1933 and the downstairs electrical system (the upstairs is an addition that wasn’t added till 1995 and it has a separate system) and it has screw in fuses. I don’t touch that stuff, I leave it to the electrician. I only just learned about the Federal Pacific thing like 20 minutes ago after I brought up having one of those panels on another subreddit, and was promptly informed to get rid of it
  - u/m0viestar431 jul 2026, 16:531 respuesta
- u/RandomIDoIt90531 jul 2026, 14:53
  Our house had zinsco when we bought it. Inspector said it can cause electrical arcs
  - u/Lampwick531 jul 2026, 16:181 respuesta
- u/FernandoAlonso66331 jul 2026, 16:00
  and those little fuse adapters people used to bypass tripped fuses are a whole other nightmare, basically defeating the protection entirely. wild how much unsafe legacy electrical is still out there in older houses
u/Tips4Tips2231 jul 2026, 8:13
That mainly applies for USA, but not Canada.
- u/Planeandaquariumgeek931 jul 2026, 8:17
  From what I can tell whoever made the Canadian ones didn’t cheat the tests but the Stab-Lok design has a lot of flaws anyway
  - u/montsegur531 jul 2026, 9:511 respuesta
u/IrwinJFinster231 jul 2026, 11:24
How have I not heard this before? Now this is a real “YSK.” Thank you!
- u/Planeandaquariumgeek131 jul 2026, 22:00
  Seriously. I just learned about it and saw it was never put on this subreddit and had to post it
u/SmartQuokka1031 jul 2026, 11:53
The USA needs to get its head out of it's ass, recall them, if you can't get insurance then they should be being replaced when a house with them sells and people try to get insurance which should have a high percentage already replaced. The idea being that if you have these then insurance policy or mortgage denied so they have to be replaced. I am assuming insurance just denies your claim when it fails, so you can get insurance, you just can't use that insurance when these fail and damage or burn down your home.
- u/shponglespore731 jul 2026, 12:16
  
  I am assuming insurance just denies your claim when it fails, so you can get insurance, you just can't use that insurance when these fail and damage or burn down your home.
  
  Weird assumption to make. Why would an insurance company agree to insure a house without having it inspected first, and if they didn't, how would they know to blame a breaker panel that was destroyed in a fire? And if they're inspecting the houses, finding the bad panels, and insuring the house anyway with no intention of paying out, that's a clear-cut case of fraud on their part.
  - u/SmartQuokka-231 jul 2026, 12:211 respuesta
- u/m0viestar231 jul 2026, 16:59
  If you get an inspection and you have an FPE panels, most underwriters won't approve the loan. The company went out of business in 1988 and there's guidance from the CPSC to home inspectors and mortgage providers to inspect them and advise on replacement. They don't have the information available to force a recall for a company that's been gone for 40 years. How do you know where those panels exist? The bigger problem is the trend lately of waiving inspections. But also the increasingly common trend of people just not caring enough to replace items flagged on inspection. Many people roll the dice and are fine in the end.
  - u/SmartQuokka131 jul 2026, 19:55
- u/Planeandaquariumgeek131 jul 2026, 18:46
  Problem is federal pacific pulled an “I DECLARE BANKRUPTCY!” as soon as the issue came out, so there’s no real way to recall them
  - u/SmartQuokka131 jul 2026, 18:501 respuesta
u/MrPolymath231 jul 2026, 14:50
Is it a 51% instance of faulty part or of fail to trip each instance of overload? I grew up in a house with these, except I definitely tripped the breakers. I'm wondering if we were lucky and got a decent set or we lucked out each time.
- u/Planeandaquariumgeek131 jul 2026, 18:57
  Pretty sure it’s failure to trip each instance. The whole design was bad, and federal pacific made it even worse by cheating the certification
u/MisaHooksta131 jul 2026, 14:52
Insurance broker here -specialized in habitational. Federal pacific, Zinsco, challenger, Sylvania, stab-lok, fuses, murray are panels many insurance companies will not insure. Mostly in buildings between the 50s to 70s. For rentals, especially apartments, the panel manufacturer is one of the main questions on the application. You answer yes to having one of those and it is a decline. You answer no, many companies do an inspection within 60 days of issuance and if one of these are found, then your policy is cancelled.
u/SlagathorTheProctor831 jul 2026, 15:51
I bought a house (1964 build) in 2010, and the first thing the inspector told me was "replace the Federal Pacific panel". A bit surprised to hear this is still an issue, gven how often the average house turns over. I would have thought just about every house sold with an FP panel would have had them replaced.
- u/Planeandaquariumgeek231 jul 2026, 19:08
  My family bought my house in 2004, and the garage has a federal pacific panel (it’s a detached). The whole house needs to be rewired, especially the downstairs. The house is from 1933 and it’s all ancient low voltage wiring hooked up to screw in fuses. Upstairs was added on in 1995 and has a completely separate electrical system (the downstairs walls are pure plaster & concrete with little tunnels that the wiring is run through) and that has a good electrical system (Square D)
- u/PrometheusSmith11 ago 2026, 5:11
  I bought my house in 2020 and my home inspector didn't say a fucking word about the Federal Pacific panel. Instead, his report focused on a slow drain in the garage sink and a lack of a down pipe on the water heater pop off. The sellers fixed those, costing about $30 and an hour of time. I got to pick up the bill for the new breaker panels, at about 100x the cost.
  - u/SlagathorTheProctor11 ago 2026, 5:13
u/vero3581431 jul 2026, 15:55
I inherited my childhood home when my parents passed away. I had a problem with one of the breakers and i texted my electrician friend to ask for advice and he asked for a pic of the panel, and immediately texted me back that it needed to be replaced ASAP. He said it could burn our house down at any point, even though it had been in place for 45 years. That was a fun few days waiting for an electrician to come out and replace the entire panel. Smoke detector batteries replaced immediately after the text...lol.
u/peacefinder631 jul 2026, 16:18
One of the first things I did when buying my 1960s house was get an electrician in, who told me about this. I had them replace the panel and use AFCI breakers throughout. I’m pretty sure that change prevented a house fire on at least two occasions as we learned about various surprises the previous owners left for us.
u/Jackpen7731 jul 2026, 16:23
Good information but them being in "basically any house" is a stretch and region-dependent. I've lived in a few different houses in the Midwest built in the 70s and 80s and they all have had Square D QO breakers which are much safer.
- u/Planeandaquariumgeek131 jul 2026, 18:59
  IIRC they’re estimated to be in about that amount of houses. It’s basically a plague.
u/Opening-Ear-3707131 jul 2026, 18:17
Federal Pacific breakers were the "oops, we faked the safety tests" version of circuit breakers. Makes me wonder how many houses are still sitting on a ticking time bomb because replacing them seems like such a hassle.
- u/Planeandaquariumgeek131 jul 2026, 18:45
  Yea they’re seriously the Volkswagen of breakers
u/roaddog331 jul 2026, 18:42
I agree that these panels are death traps, but I've never had an insurance company ask to look at anything inside my house.
u/MagicWishMonkey531 jul 2026, 19:11
No insurance company is going to go look at what panel you have. At my last house our electrician happened to mention it a year or so after we had moved in - the inspector didn't bring it it up - so we paid to have it replaced. We were very much insured the entire time we lived with it, as were the previous tenants.
u/Twatt_waffle131 jul 2026, 21:48
YSAK that after the scandal the breakers were repaired and most were replaced. This doesn’t change the fact that the stab lock breaker design was just not good. ATP the ones that are left in the wild are likely to be ones that have good breakers in them however it is still highly recommended to replace any stab lock breaker panel. Some insurance companies, local governments, or fire departments have rebates for doing so
- u/Planeandaquariumgeek131 jul 2026, 22:02
  Federal Pacific never changed the design when they got busted, because they were also cheating tests Volkswagen style. There’s estimated to be about 7 million houses with the 50% failure rate federal pacific ones still in them (at least as of December 2019)
  - u/rechlin11 ago 2026, 4:06
u/wordscollector131 jul 2026, 22:44
No trip no trouble
u/Aivatech_byhamza131 jul 2026, 23:11
Federal Pacific breakers really need to go, the CPSC's test results are pretty damning. If your panel's from the '70s or '80s, definitely budget for an upgrade, it's not worth the risk.
u/[deleted]11 ago 2026, 7:25
[removed]
u/Jefuz11 ago 2026, 8:01
Talking of old fire hazards. The old wiring in the house my gramps grew up had paper covering the copper.
u/[deleted]11 ago 2026, 17:59
[removed]