There are a whole bunch of old breakers and panels that are installed in many residences that have created fires and taken lives. Here’s a little overview of the different types. This is not a deep dive into each brand, which will be coming soon.
In this video we discuss Zinsco, Federal Pacific, Pushmatic, Wadsworth, and Challenger panels and how over they years they’ve been responsible for burning down buildings, causing fires, injuries, and deaths. All of these companies have been forced to shut down and many have faced extreme legal battles as up to 60% of their products were considered faulty.
A lot of this was due to very loose adherence to UL listings, or really just a lack of listings back then. In some cases, however, brands have completely lied about their standardization methods and testing processes.