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You also don't have to pull by hand. The electricians who pulled my new service on Tuesday used their pickup truck to pull the wires. There were two 350 MCM wires and a 4/0 wire in a triplex cable (which I assume was URD although I didn't look closely). They mounted a pulley above the conduit...

Is there a global option to turn off the animated smilies? Every time the animation cycles, my browser hangs for a second or two, and the browser CPU usage goes to about 100 percent. I note there is an option to turn off smilies when I'm posting, but I want to turn them off everywhere. I...

The seriousnes of dimming also depends on how your pole transformer is connected. At my place in Port McNeill, I shared a transformer with my neighbor. When I built my garage, the power company specificially mentioned that any large loads might cause dimming. If there was a complaint from the...

All the outlets in my garage are connected to GFCI breakers. I think GFCI of some kind is required out here in Washington state (NEC 2008). We have four breakers that service eighteen outlets (one on each pole). The actual outlets are simply spec grade standard fifteen amp outlets. There's a...

xscorex, I have recent experience on installing new service. Puget Sound Energy (PSE) connected a new service to my garage less than twenty four hours ago. They ran about 120 feet of 350 MCM aluminum cable for a new 200 amp underground service. The charge from PSE will be just under $1000...

I use plastic hinged "deli" containers from a local restaurant supply. You can see the entire contents from all angles. The tops lock nicely. They fit on narrow shelves made from 1x6's, so there are a lot of places I can put them. I suppose they're a little lame compared to nice industrial...

Sounds like a good deal to me. If you're short on money, only do the safety stuff now. You can always do the upgrades later. My electrician was happy to split my too-expensive project into two pieces - one for now (new power service, lights, outlets), and one for later (welder/compressor...

xscorex, A licensed electrician will certainly charge more than "0", but will also know what he's doing. I've been very pleased with the electrician doing my initial wiring on my shop. The $65 per hour seems like a lot until I figure out how much he gets done in that hour. There are a lot of...

It's too late for this time, but next time, check to see if the contractor is licensed. It's the first thing I do when I hire somebody. I note that Florida has a website for such lookups. That doesn't necessarily mean they're going to do a good job, but it means they've at least met the...

High voltage transmission is used to increase the "power". Multiply amps times volts, and you get watts, which is the measure of power. The amperage capacity of a wire is related to its resistance and the amount of heat you're willing to accept from the wire. The amperage is relatively fixed...

WIP, They used solid wire for the ground. I would think that stranded is more subject to corrosion, with all the extra surface area. Norcal, No, the panel isn't sideways. The software I use to display pictures automatically rotates, but the forum doesn't. ___________________ The...

I just returned from inspecting the new trench for power feed to my new shop. Here are a couple of pictures. The electricians wired my ground rods in series. The ground wire goes to the ground bar in the panel. This is a separate service from the power company, not a sub panel from the...

redline9k, We didn't do any photometric studies on my 50x74 shop, we just installed what fit. So I guess our rule-of-thumb was "install what fits". In my case, there was room for thirty five "eight foot fixture with four T-8 four foot lamps". There are five lights each on the five trusses...

Weedwaka, If you're looking for flexibility in your switch positions and wiring, you might consider installing a low-voltage relay system. They've been around for decades, mostly in commercial buildings. If you google around, most of what you'll find is large multi-relay panels with fancy...

Ed, Maybe it's just my eyes or my personality, but I dislike task lighting very much. There's never enough light where I want it, and I constantly have to reposition the lights. I'm installing brain-surgery-bright overhead fluorescents in my 50x74 shop to avoid that problem. However, I'm not...

Oops. Sorry, missing info. The cabling will be in a pole barn, with OSB below eight feet, and girts above. The cables will probably run along the OSB, just below the conduit for the power wiring.

The electricians are just about finished with the power wiring on my new shop. They're using standard metal conduit for everything. I'm going to do the cat 5E cabling myself. I've done quite a bit of cat 5E cabling (for a homeowner), but it's never been very good. The data gets thorough OK...

The electricians wiring my new shop are placing all the cross-conduit about eight feet up (the top of the OSB). Then, drops go to each outlet. There's an outlet on every pole. They're IBEW, so I trust their choice. And, yes, I'm going to paint the rest of the OSB in the shop. I just didn't...

BioHazard, Before you spend too much time fooling with external water cooling, look closely at the unit you're acquiring. I bought an 8000 btu unit a couple of years ago that has "internal" water cooling. The condensation water from inside goes to the outside of the unit, and then is blown...

Does this 31 year old compressor have a safe, non-rusted tank? Is the motor over 7 1/2 hp? Every place I've ever lived, the power company has told me "no motors over 7 1/2 hp" on single phase service. If the motor is 7 1/2 hp 3 phase, with a phase converter you may be over that limit. How...