Panel Upgrades and Replacement

Electrical Panel Upgrades and Replacement in DFW

An electrical panel upgrade raises what your home's service can carry, usually from 100 amps to 200, and it is the job most other electrical projects wait on. We replace fuse boxes, undersized panels and the hazard brands insurers decline, across Fort Worth, Tarrant County and the wider metroplex.

TECL #41809Licensed and insuredRated 5.0 from 190+ reviews

Serving Fort Worth, Tarrant County and the wider metroplex

HomeSafe TECL-licensed electrician working on a residential electrical panel in Fort Worth, TX

Quick Answers

Scope
Full replacement, partial work, or a single breaker
Capacity
Commonly 100 amp to 200 amp
Utility
A brief disconnect. Scheduled with Oncor or Tri-County; in CoServ we pull the meter and call for a reseal
Permit
Required. We pull it and handle the inspection
Hazard brands
Federal Pacific and Zinsco are replacements, not repairs
Meter base
Replaced as part of the work. We stock them
Meter mast
Yes, assessed per job and per electrical phase
Scope

Not every panel job is a full replacement

We do all three. A full panel replacement when the panel is undersized, obsolete or unsafe. Partial work when only part of it needs attention. And a single breaker replacement when one circuit is the problem and the panel is otherwise sound. Newer Denton and Collin county builds in Frisco, Prosper and Celina are 200 amps from new, so there the question is usually capacity for what you are adding rather than replacement.

The honest answer

If a breaker is failing and the panel is fine, we will say so. Replacing one breaker is a smaller job than replacing a panel, and it is the honest answer more often than the industry admits.

Two HomeSafe technicians working at the meter and electrical panel of an older brick home
Warning signs

Signs your panel is the problem

  • Breakers that trip repeatedly on the same circuit

  • Lights that dim when the HVAC or a large appliance starts

  • A panel that is warm, humming, or smells of burning

  • Fuses rather than breakers

  • No room left for another circuit

  • An insurer or inspector asking about the panel brand

Federal Pacific and Zinsco

The two hazard brands, and why this is local

Homes built across Tarrant County between the 1950s and the early 1980s frequently carry Federal Pacific Stab-Lok or Zinsco panels. Older established neighborhoods in Fort Worth and Dallas are where we find them most often, usually alongside the 100 amp service and fuse boxes of the same era. Independent testing has found Federal Pacific breakers fail to trip during an overload at rates as high as 60%, which means the mechanism meant to cut a dangerous circuit often does not. Neither brand can be repaired into compliance, most insurers decline to cover them, and replacement is the only correction.

A Level 2 EV charger mounted on a garage wall with the cable coiled on its holster and a car parked
  on the drive

Before anything else

If you do not know what you have, it is worth finding out before any other electrical work, and certainly before adding an EV charger or a generator.

Utility coordination

What a service upgrade actually involves

Raising capacity means a brief disconnect, and how that is arranged depends on who supplies the property. In Oncor and Tri-County territory it is a scheduled appointment with the utility, and that scheduling, rather than the electrical work, is usually what sets the date. In CoServ territory we can pull the meter ourselves and call for a reseal afterwards, which keeps the utility's calendar out of the timeline.

What the quote covers

The scope includes the load calculation, the permit, the utility coordination, the panel itself and the final inspection. It is one quote covering all of it, not a panel price with the rest discovered later.

Meter equipment

The meter base and the mast

Raising service capacity often means the meter base needs replacing too, because the existing one was sized for the old service. We do that as part of the job and we stock meter bases, which means it does not add a wait for parts on top of the utility scheduling.

Mast replacement

Mast replacement is also work we do. It is more job specific, because it depends on the existing arrangement and the electrical phase, so it gets assessed rather than quoted from a list.

FAQ

Frequently Asked Questions

It depends on your existing panel, what your service can carry and what your jurisdiction requires. Our cost-factors guide explains what drives the number, and we quote after seeing the panel.

Not automatically. It depends on your existing load and what you are adding. A load calculation answers it.

Sometimes, and we will tell you when that is the right answer. When the panel is full or undersized, adding breakers compounds the underlying problem rather than solving it.

A planned outage window on the day, tied to the utility disconnect rather than to our schedule.

Yes, and we stock them, so it does not hold the job up waiting on a part. Mast replacement is also something we do, assessed per job.

Yes, and a fuse box is always a replacement rather than a repair.

Book an assessment

Book a Panel Assessment

Load calculation, permit, utility coordination and inspection handled.

TECL #41809  ·  Serving Fort Worth, Tarrant County and the wider metroplex