Stab-Lok Circuit Breakers: What You Should Know

If you have an older home, your electric panel may have been manufactured by Federal Pacific Electric, Federal Electric, Federal Pioneer, or one of a number of related companies that produced Stab-Lok circuit breakers, and if so, it's a matter of some urgency that you replace your panel. Stab-Lok breakers have been identified as being hazardous because they don't always work as intended, and when they malfunction, circuit wires can overheat and start a fire.

Here's why Stab Lok breakers are so dangerous, how to identify one in your home, and how to replace it.

The main electrical panel in a building is the interface between the power grid and all the electrical circuits in the building, and each circuit is required by code to pass through a circuit breaker in the panel. It's a safety device that trips, or shuts off, automatically the instant the current passing through it exceeds its preset current rating. This prevents a current surge from passing through the wires, overheating them and starting a fire.

The problem with Stab-Lok breakers is that they don't always trip. Although they may function normally nine times out of 10, the odds of failure aren't negligible, and that's unacceptable when it comes to the safety of your home and family.

Stab-Lok breakers do not comply with Underwriter's Laboratory (UL) standards. A 1983 investigation by the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission into whether Stab-Lok breakers constituted a risk to the public was inconclusive, but that's only because the CPSC admitted that it lacked the budget to study the matter in detail. In 2005, a New Jersey court ruled against Federal Pacific in a class-action lawsuit, finding that it fraudulently marketed Stab-Lok breakers knowing that they did not meet UL standards.

Your home is most likely to have Stab-Lok breakers if it was built when Federal Pacific Electric was manufacturing electrical panels. Here's what to look for on your circuit breaker to determine whether or not you have Stab-Lok breakers:

• If you see a label with the name Federal Pacific Electric (FPE), Federal Electric (FE) or Federal Pioneer (in Canada) on the panel, and it's a breaker panel — not a fuse box — it has Stab-Lok breakers.
• They have red stripes on the toggle faces.
• You may also see a label that says Stab-Lok or the labels of companies affiliated with FPE, such as Challenger Electric, American Circuit Breaker Company (ACBC), Connecticut Electric, Electrical-Mechanical Industries, Inc. (EMI), or Federal NOARK.

If you have a Stab-Lok panel and one of the breakers is faulty, you can replace it either with a reconditioned FPE breaker or a third-party substitute. Reconditioned and third-party Stab-Lok breakers contain upgraded components that meet all contemporary safety requirements, but they are expensive and considered more of a band-aid than a permanent repair.