NateInOregon
New member
Hello everyone, I’m running wire to a detached garage and have a few questions. I’ve been doing research on-line and have learned a lot here but I would appreciate people with much more knowledge and experience than me letting me know if I’m on the right path or if I should do something different.
I have a ranch house with the main box on the far opposite side of where the detached garage has been built. The main box is on the outside of a single garage attached to the house that is on a slab (house has crawlspace). I was wanting to run cable in the attic and drop down to the crawl space in an interior wall. And I was planning on hiring a professional to upgrade the main box (it’s totally maxed out with no room) and double check my work. The subpanel in the detached garage is 100 amp and I was going to use an 80 amp circuit from the main panel to feed it. In the future I will probably upgrade to a 220 volt welder and large air compressor. And I would also like to be able to charge an electric commuter car while I’m working on the old rusty projects.
Here is a description of what I was thinking of doing. Running 80’ of aluminum 2-2-2-4 SER from the main house panel up to the attic and then to an interior wall. Dropping down through the wall and continuing in the crawl space to a 12’’ x 12’’ x 6’’ junction box where a terminal block connector will be used to connect to aluminum 2-2-2-4 mobile home feeder wire that is around 45 feet long. The MHF will be in 2’’ schedule 40 conduit coming out of the junction box where it will exit the house and follow a 2’ deep trench to the garage. And once inside the garage the conduit will continue to the subpanel.
I have a few questions about this that I’m still not clear about
1. I was thinking of running the cable down through a wall in the kitchen that is going to be remodeled in the future. Does the SER cable have to be run along and connected to the 2x4 stud? Should the holes in the drywall be kept open for an inspector?
2. Can that cable in the wall share the space between 2 wall studs with anything else such as a water line or vent piping? Does it have to be a certain distance from water lines?
3. I know schedule 80 is preferred but it’s hard to find around here and 40 would be so much easier. Is any inspector going to complain? The buried part is in the yard covered with grass and could possibly have a vehicle or garden tractor driving over it.
4. The contractor who built the garage left a piece of rebar sticking out of the garage foundation right under where I put the subpanel. I was going to link that with the ground but with that and being linked back to the main house panel ground do I need more than that (a copper rod)?
5. Do connections in a terminal block need to be covered with electrical tape or anything special done to them?
Thank you and I really appreciate any input to help me figure this out.
I have a ranch house with the main box on the far opposite side of where the detached garage has been built. The main box is on the outside of a single garage attached to the house that is on a slab (house has crawlspace). I was wanting to run cable in the attic and drop down to the crawl space in an interior wall. And I was planning on hiring a professional to upgrade the main box (it’s totally maxed out with no room) and double check my work. The subpanel in the detached garage is 100 amp and I was going to use an 80 amp circuit from the main panel to feed it. In the future I will probably upgrade to a 220 volt welder and large air compressor. And I would also like to be able to charge an electric commuter car while I’m working on the old rusty projects.
Here is a description of what I was thinking of doing. Running 80’ of aluminum 2-2-2-4 SER from the main house panel up to the attic and then to an interior wall. Dropping down through the wall and continuing in the crawl space to a 12’’ x 12’’ x 6’’ junction box where a terminal block connector will be used to connect to aluminum 2-2-2-4 mobile home feeder wire that is around 45 feet long. The MHF will be in 2’’ schedule 40 conduit coming out of the junction box where it will exit the house and follow a 2’ deep trench to the garage. And once inside the garage the conduit will continue to the subpanel.
I have a few questions about this that I’m still not clear about
1. I was thinking of running the cable down through a wall in the kitchen that is going to be remodeled in the future. Does the SER cable have to be run along and connected to the 2x4 stud? Should the holes in the drywall be kept open for an inspector?
2. Can that cable in the wall share the space between 2 wall studs with anything else such as a water line or vent piping? Does it have to be a certain distance from water lines?
3. I know schedule 80 is preferred but it’s hard to find around here and 40 would be so much easier. Is any inspector going to complain? The buried part is in the yard covered with grass and could possibly have a vehicle or garden tractor driving over it.
4. The contractor who built the garage left a piece of rebar sticking out of the garage foundation right under where I put the subpanel. I was going to link that with the ground but with that and being linked back to the main house panel ground do I need more than that (a copper rod)?
5. Do connections in a terminal block need to be covered with electrical tape or anything special done to them?
Thank you and I really appreciate any input to help me figure this out.