Copperline Electric has wired inside one county line since 1996. Most calls start with somebody wanting to add one more thing to a house that is already running, and the honest first answer is arithmetic, not a quote.
Where the amps go
| Electric range | 40 A |
|---|---|
| Central air conditioner | 30 A |
| Clothes dryer | 30 A |
| Well pump | 15 A |
| Lighting, receptacles and everything else | 30 A |
| Left over | 55 A |
These are typical demand figures for a common house, put here so the arithmetic is visible rather than asserted. The calculation that decides your job is done at your panel, with your equipment, and it costs nothing. A 1950s house still on 100 amp service has no room at all in this drawing, which is a different and shorter conversation.
Against fifty five amps
Solid is what the house already uses. Hatched is the new thing. The heavy line is 200 amps.
40amps
A 240 volt circuit run to the garage wall, up to about forty feet from the panel. The load calculation happens before the quote, because on some houses the honest answer is that the panel goes first. $675 to $1,250.
Fits. 185 of 200, fifteen left.
50amps
A GFCI disconnect within sight of the tub, which is almost never where the deck already is, and a buried feed out to it. Quoted by the job once we have seen where the tub is going.
Fits, barely. 195 of 200.
50amps
Fits on its own. It does not fit alongside the charger, and it does not fit alongside the tub. Any two of these three and the service is the job, not the outlet.
Fits alone. Not twice.
60amps
Underground feed out to the building, a panel and disconnect at the far end, lights and receptacles and whatever runs in there. Farm and shop work is most of what we do, and it is also the thing that most often ends the arithmetic. By the job.
Over by five. The service goes first.
30amps
The one nobody expects to fit, and the one that usually does. Bonus room over the garage, an addition, a mini split in the shop. By the job.
Fits. 175 of 200.
When it does not fit
It runs out before the list above even starts. A range, a dryer and an air conditioner is most of a hundred amp service on a July afternoon, and everything after that is a negotiation with a breaker.
Newer house, three things already added, and the next one puts it over. Nothing is wrong with the panel. There is simply no more service to sell you.
New load center, meter socket and mast, grounding brought up to current code, utility coordination, the permit, and a panel schedule that is actually legible in ten years.
Standby power
A generator does not add amps to your service. It decides what still runs when the co-op line is down, and how the house is separated from that line while it does. That separation is the whole job. Done wrong, a generator backfeeds the wire a lineman is standing on.
Which circuits stay live is a decision you make with us before anything is ordered. Well pump, furnace blower, refrigerator and one branch of lights is the usual answer out here.
When it is not a planning question
If a breaker is hot to the touch, something smells like burning plastic, or the panel is making noise, shut the main off and call. Do not wait until Monday. That is what emergencies only means.
Inside those hours the phone is answered at the shop or in a truck. Outside them, leave the address and what the problem is doing, and the call comes back the same day.
No trip charge inside twenty miles of Lathrop, and no charge at all to quote a job you are planning.
Two names worth knowing
Both are still in a lot of houses out here. Breakers in them are widely reported not to trip when they should, insurance carriers do not like finding one, and there is no repair for it. The panel is replaced or it is not.
If you do not know what is in your garage, take a photo of the inside of the panel door and send it. We will tell you what you have, for free, and if it is fine we will say that too.
The permit
We pull it and we meet the inspector. Homeowners underestimate that part, and it is the part that keeps a bad panel from turning up on closing paperwork in ten years.
What is required differs by city and by county. Your local building official and your electric co-op are the authority on your address, and we deal with both of them either way.
This spring
None of these are showcase jobs. They are the ordinary work of a rural electrical contractor, which is what you actually want to see before handing somebody the keys to your house or your shop.
The shop
Marty Ostrander started this company in 1996. It has been two trucks and a small crew since about 2004. He is on one of them most days, so the person who quotes your job is usually the person who does it, and when he is not, it is somebody who has worked for him for a decade.
Almost all of the work comes from people who have used us before, or who were told to call by somebody who has. That is a good problem right up until a stranger with an actual emergency cannot find a phone number, which is why this page exists.
Marty Ostrander, Lathrop
Service area
123 Main St
Lathrop, MO 64465
It is a pole barn and a gravel drive and there is nothing to look at. Estimates happen at your place. If you do stop by, call first so somebody is actually there.
Towns we cover: Lathrop, Plattsburg, Turney, Trimble, Holt, Kearney, Smithville, Cameron, Gower, Polo, Osborn, Stewartsville, Excelsior Springs, and the county roads through Clinton, Clay and DeKalb County.