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kid sinister posted:GFCI = GFCI, whether it's a breaker version or a receptacle version. Personally, I would have put it in a receptacle in the garage, just so that you didn't have to run all the way back to the panel to reset it in case you do trip it. Plus they're a lot cheaper. I was going to use the knockout on the back of the box, and really wanted to, but the space available prevented it, since I didn't want the port through the wall to be any further from the existing lines, which meant there was no space for a box right next to them. On the garage side of that wall (you can see it in one of the pictures) there's a doorway right there and I don't want crap coming out of the step in the wall under the door any more than is absolutely necessary. Part of the reason I opted to put in the gfci breaker was because I don't necessarily know what my plans are for extending that circuit to other parts of the garage, and I felt it would be easier to just ensure the entire thing was protected. As for that open-ended conduit that was already there, I'm not sure what it's for, but there are some pretty beefy lines running through it and it heads directly across that wall of the garage and through the far wall to the outside, where it dives underground and...oh, you know what, I just realized what it's for: they used to have a hot tub out on the patio, so the lines running into that conduit are connected to two tied 50A breakers... 
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Aug 13, 2012 02:32
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daslog posted:I have one of these 20.4A rated welder means 30A, 2-pole breaker. #10 wire.
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Aug 13, 2012 11:34
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Great, that's what I needed to know.
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Aug 13, 2012 12:06
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Bad Munki posted:As for that open-ended conduit that was already there, I'm not sure what it's for, but there are some pretty beefy lines running through it and it heads directly across that wall of the garage and through the far wall to the outside, where it dives underground and...oh, you know what, I just realized what it's for: they used to have a hot tub out on the patio, so the lines running into that conduit are connected to two tied 50A breakers... Ah, I didn't notice the cables going down it at first, but now I do. Still, the grommets are used for the same purpose in that instance: protecting cables being pulled down the conduit. No junction box is needed since it's a straight cable run.
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Aug 15, 2012 17:15
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Oh, what, really? You mean if I'd run my cables straight into the port/conduit I put in, I could have done without the box as well? Darnit, that would have saved me a few minutes and a little bit of money...not much, but still. It's funny because my run goes to the left into that box, then out, away from the wall, and then back to the right to make the same run as the other cable, just with a little jog in the path. On the other hand, I still needed to switch from thhn to romex so I guess the box was still needed for that. New question: Basically, I have romex between the four outlets, but thhn on the actual feed running up to the first conduit. Is it okay for me to run some 12ga thhn in that same conduit? I don't think it'd overshoot the fill restrictions, and my 12ga (20A) line would fork off before it even got to the first outlet. Maybe I'll draw a picture... e: Here's a horrible drawing:  Although the more I think about it, the more I think I might like to actually have my 20A outlet off the far end of the 15A set, which means running 12ga thhn down the whole thing, and if I'm doing that, I might as well do it right and replace that romex with thhn anyhow, in which case, the real question becomes: can I have 12ga/20A thhn and 14ga/15A thhn in the same 1/2" conduit without violating any rules? Bad Munki fucked around with this message at 17:53 on Aug 15, 2012 |
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Aug 15, 2012 17:24
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Bad Munki posted:can I have 12ga/20A thhn and 14ga/15A thhn in the same 1/2" conduit without violating any rules? Sure can. It might be crampt in that first handy box where you're making junctions, but it would still be legal there too.
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Aug 15, 2012 19:13
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Cool, guess I'm doing some rewiring tonight e: Well, that was pretty easy. Fortunately, I didn't have to pull the whole assembly down to get the romex out, since my runs were straight and so short. And of course, the thhn went in smooth as silk. Got all the outlets hooked up again, and my 12ga run is hanging out the far end, waiting for my to put in some more conduit to run out to where the outlet(s?) will be. I also need to run the 12ga romex from the junction in the basement back to the panel and drop the breaker in, but I have all the supplies for that so it should go pretty quick. Thanks a ton, guys, for all your help. I feel like the quality of work I ended up doing here was vastly superior to what I would have ended up with otherwise, and certainly cost less than hiring someone to come in and do it. On a side note, I have a couple lingo questions: I keep hearing people using "GFCI" and "GFI" seemingly interchangeably. There's no actual difference, yeah? And two, do you actually say "T H H N" or like "thin" or "thhhnnnnnn" or something? I just don't want to sound like a greenhorn.
Bad Munki fucked around with this message at 04:11 on Aug 16, 2012 |
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Aug 15, 2012 19:25
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Bad Munki posted:On a side note, I have a couple lingo questions: I keep hearing people using "GFCI" and "GFI" seemingly interchangeably. There's no actual difference, yeah? And two, do you actually say "T H H N" or like "thin" or "thhhnnnnnn" or something? I just don't want to sound like a greenhorn. There's no difference, just personal preference. Ground-Fault Circuit Interrupter, some people just leave out a word. It's T-H-H-N, the letters describe the characteristics of the wire. Thermoplastic High Heat resistant Nylon Coating. If I need some wire I'll call the supply house and say I need 500' of blue (or whatever color) stranded copper THHN. Some other common ones are: THWN: Thermoplastic Heat and Water resistant Nylon Coating SER: Service Entrance Round NM-B: Non-Metallic (I can't remember what the B standes for) which most people call Romex USE: Underground Service Entrance cable MTW: Machine Tool Wire There are a bunch of others, those are just the most common. You'll also see some that are dual-rated as well such as THHN/THWN.
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Aug 16, 2012 10:52
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I always say it T-H-H-N, as there's a big difference between THN and THHN when it comes to temperature rating. Not that you see THN much these days (all seems to be dual-rated THHN/THWN).
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Aug 16, 2012 10:56
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The "B" apparently designates that the insulation is rated to 90C (not sure if it stands for anything) Apparently there's also NMC cable that is rated for outdoor use in caustic environments (and different from UF) Also apparently there's something called NMS which I have no clue what its for
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Aug 17, 2012 02:35
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Quick question: I have a dedicated 220v panel on my back deck with a 50amp breaker, it has a dedicated two wires out. The previous owner of my house simply cut the wires and conduit when they removed the old hot tub. I'm getting a 110v hot tub to replace it, do I need to replace the panel or just the breaker to convert to 110v? I don't think it is attached to my house's main panel, at least there is not a breaker for it. I can upload pictures if needed, I have not taken the panel apart yet to find what feeds it, this is just research for now, Thanks!
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Aug 17, 2012 22:01
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giundy posted:Quick question: I have a dedicated 220v panel on my back deck with a 50amp breaker, it has a dedicated two wires out. The previous owner of my house simply cut the wires and conduit when they removed the old hot tub. I'm getting a 110v hot tub to replace it, do I need to replace the panel or just the breaker to convert to 110v? I don't think it is attached to my house's main panel, at least there is not a breaker for it. I can upload pictures if needed, I have not taken the panel apart yet to find what feeds it, this is just research for now, A 240V circuit is two alternately phased 120V hots. You can use just one phase and it'll be fine.
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Aug 17, 2012 23:24
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dwoloz posted:A 240V circuit is two alternately phased 120V hots. You can use just one phase and it'll be fine. Largely correct. If there's precisely two wires, you'll have to find where they eventually land and hook one of them up to the neutral bus, identify it there and at the other end. Then it'll be fine.
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Aug 19, 2012 00:41
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Ground wires for pools & hot tubs need to be handled special due to higher shock risks; it needs to be unbroken between the hot tub connection point and the ground rod, except for a few special types of permitted connections. EG, no wirenut splices for the ground!
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Aug 19, 2012 00:55
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I just moved into an apartment with knob and tube wiring and two-prong sockets. My multimeter is showing 170 volts between hot and neutral, 120 volts between hot and the center screw, and 50 volts between neutral and the center screw. What the gently caress is going on?
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Aug 21, 2012 03:20
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Knob & tube wedded to a breaker panel is a shotgun wedding. Sounds like your landlord didn't bring the right shotgun.
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Aug 21, 2012 03:29
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Well, assuming that my landlord isn't going to redo all of the wiring in the building, is there anything I can do? Is my apartment going to burn down?
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Aug 21, 2012 03:59
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brnai posted:I just moved into an apartment with knob and tube wiring and two-prong sockets. My multimeter is showing 170 volts between hot and neutral, 120 volts between hot and the center screw, and 50 volts between neutral and the center screw. What the gently caress is going on? As far as the electrical goes, the neutral/ground bond is bad or missing. Anything you plug in is subject to explosion, so don't plug anything in. Call your landlord and have them fix it.
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Aug 21, 2012 10:29
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brnai posted:assuming that my landlord isn't going to redo all of the wiring in the building I dont' think that's something landlords can just ignore.
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Aug 22, 2012 01:08
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insta posted:I dont' think that's something landlords can just ignore. It all depends how you play it. A frantic phone call of "ZOMG THIS OUTLET SPARKED AND SHORTED OUT MY MICROWAVE AND I PUT A MULTIMETER ON IT AND IT READS 170 VOLTS AND IT ALMOST BURNED DOWN YOUR PLACE" should get the reaction you are looking for.
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Aug 22, 2012 03:13
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Whereas "fix this or I call the fire marshall" will probably get it fixed, but you may find your rent gets hiked every month until you move out, or you get booted when your lease is up, whichever is sooner. Also depending on the quality of the place, and the quality of the landlord, he might actually PREFER the place burned down so he could collect that sweet, sweet insurance dough.
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Aug 22, 2012 03:59
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daslog posted:It all depends how you play it. A frantic phone call of "ZOMG THIS OUTLET SPARKED AND SHORTED OUT MY MICROWAVE AND I PUT A MULTIMETER ON IT AND IT READS 170 VOLTS AND IT ALMOST BURNED DOWN YOUR PLACE" should get the reaction you are looking for. Heh ... I had an outlet that I must have been running 12A on constantly at my first apartment. A big fat computer upgrade would dim the lights whenever the video card went into 3D mode (but just at the desktop was fine, this was an 8800GTX). After awhile the breaker finally gave it up, but rather than tripping, it went halfway and started arcing. I called maintenance at 10pm saying "there's a breaker shooting sparks into my laundry room", and turned it off with a broom handle. The maintenance guy shows up, looks at the charred breaker, shrugs, and goes "you got too many things plugged in mang", flips it back to on, and leaves. It took a surprising amount of harassing the landlord until they replaced it with a new breaker. I never had a problem after that.
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Aug 23, 2012 00:32
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I've mounted my TV on a wall in my bedroom, but now everything looks silly running down to the bottom of the wall to the outlet, so I want to move it up to behind the TV. Would it be okay to splice in a box on the existing wire, or should I move the original box up, or just call an electrician to come do it? code:
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Aug 24, 2012 16:15
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raej posted:I've mounted my TV on a wall in my bedroom, but now everything looks silly running down to the bottom of the wall to the outlet, so I want to move it up to behind the TV. Assuming that the existing circuit isn't already overloaded, the easiest would be to add the proposed outlet and run the circuit off the (presumably) empty side of the original outlet.
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Aug 24, 2012 16:32
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Dragyn posted:Assuming that the existing circuit isn't already overloaded, the easiest would be to add the proposed outlet and run the circuit off the (presumably) empty side of the original outlet. So run a wire up from the existing outlet to behind the TV? The existing plug would probably never be used since everything will be mounted up top with the TV.
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Aug 24, 2012 16:39
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raej posted:So run a wire up from the existing outlet to behind the TV? The existing plug would probably never be used since everything will be mounted up top with the TV. That's right. Alternatively you COULD do a splice in the old box (with wire nuts and electrical tape, do it right) and put a blank face on the old box. Personally, I'd stick with adding an outlet unless you run the risk of overloading the circuit that way. It's pretty straightforward and I did the exact same thing at my gf's in about an hour not long ago. ninja e: Goes without saying, but use properly rated wire and outlets.
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Aug 24, 2012 16:42
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Is there an easy way to tell if a circuit is close to being overloaded?
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Aug 24, 2012 17:19
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daslog posted:Is there an easy way to tell if a circuit is close to being overloaded? Well, the easiest way to tell is if you trip that circuit often when you start up appliances, right now before you've added anything. There also might be an issue with box fill. Boxes are only allowed a certain number of wires depending on their volume. Is that box very shallow?
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Aug 24, 2012 17:37
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Just out of curiosity, how do I determine how many wires are allowed?
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Aug 24, 2012 18:00
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Bad Munki posted:Just out of curiosity, how do I determine how many wires are allowed? The NEC.
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Aug 24, 2012 18:03
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daslog posted:Is there an easy way to tell if a circuit is close to being overloaded? You first need to figure out what outlets/appliances are being supplied by the circuit. Then figure out what the typical draw is. Its not a safety issue (if wired correctly) but it will be an annoyance having to reset the breaker. Things like vacuum cleaners, space heaters, desktop computers and plasma TVs are the highest draw consumers I can think of for a living room Edit: Box fill table and info http://www.hubbellcatalog.com/raco/RACO_boxes.asp?FAM=R..
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Aug 24, 2012 19:07
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Bad Munki posted:Just out of curiosity, how do I determine how many wires are allowed? There's a table in the NEC, but it's really just a formula shortcut for common box sizes. Measure and calculate the volume of that box, then add up the volume allowances for each hot and neutral wire that enters that box, then one extra allowance for the largest ground wire that enters that box. The allowances are 2 in3 for 14# wire, 2.25 in3 for 12# wire.
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Aug 24, 2012 21:09
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I had a fun couple days figuring out a 3-way switch wiring issue that started when a light was replaced and dimmer put in by a contractor. It had been left alone for months because it worked in one switch configuration. On the first day, I took out one of the switches, it only had 2 wires connected. That day was mostly exploratory, and trying some other wires in the switch box, and lots of running to the breaker panel. I decided I wouldn't get very far without the multimeter. Also, I had left it in such a way that when you flipped one switch up, the breaker tripped, no matter how the other switch was flipped. The breaker held when reset. Today I had the multimeter, so that helped a great deal. One of the leads bears the permanent mark of my stupidity when I attempted to check the voltage on a screw terminal without pulling the switch from the wall and made contact with the switch body. The spark was impressive. Speaking of shorts, the missing wire turned out to be a white wire wire-nutted with the rest of the neutrals. It was nice and burnt. It was also in there poorly. I marked it at the switch and light fixture with a piece of electrical tape because the Internet told me that was proper procedure. Maybe if the original electrician had marked it, the contractor wouldn't have thought it was just another neutral. Is it plausible that an insulating layer was burned around the wire, and that's what stopped the breaker from tripping constantly? I never touched any white wires the first day, but it was after then that the breaker started tripping. One side is one of those Leviton rocker switches, the other is a dimmer with a toggle. After the first day there was physical resistance from the rocker switch when flipping it up, but not down, which was also the action which tripped the breaker. That was fixed today when I fixed the other issues. Any ideas what that could've been? It's not like the switch can sense when flipping it is a bad idea, is it?
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Aug 25, 2012 03:14
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Sounds like the switch may have been faulty and it did not allow enough current through to trip the breaker. But who knows really. You might be able to tell if you checked the resistance across the switch. I would change that switch though no matter what you find, they should operate smoothly and if they don't just trash it. As for your meter leads they make ones with a little sheath that only exposes the very tip that are meant for electrical work, some people really hate them but I like them because I am much less likely to do exactly what you did. I would be on the look out for other problems like that. A contractor who does electrical but doesn't know enough not to attach a hot to a neutral sounds like a hazard.
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Aug 25, 2012 07:46
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tworavens posted:I would be on the look out for other problems like that. A contractor who does electrical but doesn't know enough not to attach a hot to a neutral sounds like a hazard. In defense of the professional electrical industry, mistakes do happen. With the current pace of homebuilding and the tiny profit margins, speed is of the essence. It's not uncommon to have only one or two guys trim out an entire house in one working day. Sixty or so outlets, 15-20 switches, some three and four-way, can lights, normal lights, ceiling fans, exterior lights, fluorescent lights, motion sensors, and the thermostats, plus the junction boxes in the attic. That's on the order of a thousand joints in 8 hours. With a .1% error rate, that's one mistake of the kind you saw here. If the guy who roughed the switch box in didn't tape the switch leg, or the wire tail got cut by the drywall guys' rotozip, or the paint melted the tape off, or you're just going really really fast and not paying super-close attention, then these things happen. With professional license-holding electricians, .1% is actually pretty high. with the kind of people they have trimming out houses around here, it may be low. I've been to job sites where the trimout brief is "color to color. Go." with the expectation that the license-holder does the 3-ways, 4-ways, and fan switches.
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Aug 25, 2012 16:01
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I didn't measure the resistance of the switch, but I did check the voltage of both traveller terminals and measured 115. I know enough about electricity to know that if there was a resistance than the voltage would drop. Before I started on this, there definitely wasn't any difficulty flipping the switch, and now that the wiring is fixed, the switch operates fine. I don't think I imagined the part in between. It looked to me like a pretty lovely connection at the wire nut, so maybe that was what stopped any significant current from flowing. The sheath thing seems unnecessary since I could achieve the same effect with a piece of electrical tape. Or not jam the leads in tight spaces when I can pull the thing out for better access. I guess a real electrician would've tested or traced the wire rather than just rely on the standard color code? The light is wired like this, but apparently when the place was originally wired, there was no black tape on the white wire. Would that be a CEC violation? I did correct other annoyances while I was working, like what appeared to be teeny bits of insulation caught under screws. Screw did seem fairly tightly clamped on the bare wire, so I don't know. Speaking of code, when did it start requiring GFCIs in the kitchen? This place was built in the late 90s, and we don't have any. Also, all the outlets are 15 amp, and only the fridge has a dedicated circuit.
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Aug 25, 2012 16:13
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zergstain posted:Speaking of code, when did it start requiring GFCIs in the kitchen? This place was built in the late 90s, and we don't have any. Also, all the outlets are 15 amp, and only the fridge has a dedicated circuit. More likely, the builders just cheaped out and got away with it.
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Aug 25, 2012 17:21
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I happen to be in Ontario, so the NEC wouldn't exactly apply. Maybe that requirement was introduced later (if at all) in the Canadian code, as well as adopted late. Or they cheaped out. That is certainly the overal theme of this place.
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Aug 25, 2012 19:02
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dwoloz posted:Its not a safety issue (if wired correctly) but it will be an annoyance having to reset the breaker. Things like vacuum cleaners, space heaters, desktop computers and plasma TVs are the highest draw consumers I can think of for a living room My Kill-A-Watt shows that my desktop PC, with 2 LCD monitors, draws about 110 watts with everything on and light usage. The PC alone pulls about 70 at idle, though it'll shoot up to about 200 if I peg the CPU. Not really the same class as a vacuum or heater. This is an i5 system with a decent overclock (3.3 chip at 4.5) and 3 hard drives. My laser printer, on the other hand, pulls a healthy ~650 watts while warming up or printing.
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Aug 26, 2012 01:09
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zergstain posted:Speaking of code, when did it start requiring GFCIs in the kitchen? This place was built in the late 90s, and we don't have any. Also, all the outlets are 15 amp, and only the fridge has a dedicated circuit. I'm not familiar with Canadian practices and code, but in the US it would be highly possible the kitchen is protected by a GFCI located outside the kitchen. Whatever the kitchen adjoins, scope out walls there for GFCIs. Around here, for example, 80s/90s-era garages typically adjoin the kitchen, so it's common to have a GFCI-protected garage circuit and a GFCI-protected kitchen circuit originating in the garage. (Bizarrely, one of our bathroom GFCI circuits—which is nowhere near the garage—also originates in the garage, leading me to believe they just crammed every GFCI they could into the garage for some nebulous time-saving purpose.)
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Aug 26, 2012 01:18
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