Motronic posted:

Maybe. Is the appliance rated for that? It's not? Then no.

You would need a 50 amp plug and cord plus???....the entire path back to <whatever protection in the device> would need to be 50 amp.

There exist boat and RV shenanigans that have breakers in plugs that supposedly make this safe. None of them I've seen are tested or approved by any known lab. Draw your own conclusions on that.

H110Hawk posted:

Code couldn't give a poo poo what you do with low voltage so long as you don't mix it with regular voltage. I still suggest pvc over direct bury.

Shifty Pony posted:

Manually digging >30' of any sort of trench is hell, 200' in rocky soil is insanity. Rent the ditch witch and be done in two hours. Trust me on this one.


Or at the very least get a drat good mattock, digging bar, and a value size bottle of naproxen.

distortion park posted:

Not sure of this is the best thread to ask in. I've bought an outdoors mosquito trap that has a small fan in which is meant to run continuously. I have an existing outdoor plug socket, but it's badly placed for where I want the trap to be - I'd have to run a 10m or so cable through my garden, which seems like a lot of effort to bury and also potentially dangerous?

Right next to my ideal spot for it is a shed with a south facing roof. Given that the trap only needs a few watts of energy it seems like a small solar panel with a mini battery (for overnight) could be a good solution, but I have no idea what the cheapest viable setup is.

An additional problem is that the power connector for the fan is weird, so I suspect I'll need to plug into a standard french plug socket, therefore requiring something to convert the solar panel output to AC. Unless it's actually a standard one that I've just never seen before? Is a bit annoying as 12V DC seems to be a common output for cheap mini solar panels.

Here's the current connector and transformer.



e: something like this looks like it would be ideal if I could sort out the connector situation. this looks perfect but is about twice what I'm willing to pay £350

quote:

We have a battery cable that you can use to run a Mosquitaire off a 12v battery. We recommend at least a 12 amp hour battery which will run the trap for a day. You would need at least 2 batteries so one could charge while the other is in use. I don’t know how far is “fairly far from the house”, but you could also string together a few 10 m extension cables at $13.95 each (they have water tight connections and attach to the power supply) to get your trap close to 100 ft away https://us-shop.biogents.com/collections/traps/products/dc-extension-cable-typ-ii-10-m-10049



You can contact Hanna (cc’d) to order the batter cable as it is not listed on the Biogents USA website.

distortion park posted:

this helped me find the correct alligator clips/power connector cable online - just ordered a solar panel and the various bits, think this is going to work great!

nwin posted:

Thanks that’s what google told me. An old work shallow pan box.

This is original wiring from 1987. I know codes change, but the other side has a legit box on it. There’s no way this was ok, was it?

Skunkduster posted:

For lever wire connectors, is there any reason not to use the no-name generic connectors linked below over Wago connectors?

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0BN3M3ZNZ/

Slugworth posted:

We have this stupid master switch thing at work for our lighting throughout the clinic, that if anyone accidentally bumps, makes entire sections of the clinic refuse to light back up until we've hit the master switch thing a couple times, flipped the light switches a couple times, seemingly at random, until it works again. We all hate it, and maintenance is dragging their feet on removing it (I suspect they don't know how to fix it).

So I opened it up today, figuring I'd just tie the various hots to the various switch legs and be done. There were no wires, just a single cat5 cable. I don't need any advice, as I put it all back together and have admitted defeat, I just wanted to say how much I hate smart devices.

eddiewalker posted:

This should make me mad, right? The big wires to the outdoor AC unit apparently weren’t long enough to reach the terminals on the shutoff, so they were extended with 12ga wire.

I only discovered this because the AC failed on a 100degree day. The problem was one of those wire nuts had worked loose.

kastein posted:

Well that really depends. I see it's on a 50 amp breaker. There are specific code rules for breaker and wire sizing for HVAC units, what gauge wire are the wires past the disconnect? What fuses if any are in the disconnect?

As Motronic said, I've seen a lot worse fuckery. Depending on your answers it may or may not be to code.

Shifty Pony posted:

Found the published patent application which shows the mechanism:





Wire goes in at 118.

I don't see anything obviously wrong with it, although the clamping connection is more of a narrow guillotine type deal than wago's wide flat spring. Dunno which I will go with, but I noticed that the Leviton design is quite a bit larger than the back-clamp Eatons which might be a problem jamming them into older boxes.

Motronic posted:

This appear to be a 240v NEMA L6-20 outlet.


I'm also guessing it's a tripped GFCI you haven't found yet.

Spikes32 posted:

Well this was the winner. This shows my lack of knowledge but I didn't realize there was another set of circuit breakers on the panel on the outside of the garage next to the meter. One of those was flipped.



In addition to that, I did look behind the whole workbench and confirmed that it terminates at the left side of the bench after going up to the lights up above and has no gfci that I could find anywhere on the line. There might be one behind the "sheet rock firecode type x" where that outside electrical panel is, but for now it'll have to remain a mystery. Thanks for the product reccomendation for the 220 cover Motronic, I'm ordering that now.

SpeedFreek posted:

Quiz time, how do you ground a cabinet?

H110Hawk posted:

Know this though - that lead acid battery has a 3-5 year shelf life and will fail quietly. Assuming you only need one that's $250 per time period, plus panel, inverter, etc. Just buy a few gallons of Stabil gas for the generator and a repeating calendar reminder to use it every year or two. Then you have it when you need it.

Epitope posted:

My garage has two man-doors. The light switch is by one door. I want another switch by the other door. Does it work to run the wire on top of the drywall, in conduit or whatever? The existing switch is in a behind-the-drywall box. Can I mount the surface box over that box, or is there a box extention or something? Will this be hard, should I just call an electrician?

FISHMANPET posted:

I've got a subpanel that's about 2 feet away from where I would most likely install an EVSE (though on the other side of the wall that I'd be mounting to). Right now it's fed by a 30 amp breaker in the main panel, because of the undersized neutral feeding the panel, but I plan to eventually remediate that, most likely be getting a new 100 amp service run directly to the garage (because there's no good way to run a new feed from the main panel to the garage, and the sub panel was installed to accommodate that as it has a 100 amp main breaker).

H110Hawk posted:

Yeah I sort of assumed the rapid shutdown switch + meter-main breaker would be sufficient to de-energize the system, I don't strictly understand why they wouldn't have that relay do both. I guess so I can draw from batteries if the PV needs to be shutdown? It seems like "to kill the house" that rapid shutdown switch is in the ideal position to kill everything, then you either yank the meter or hit the 200A in the meter-main to make sure the utility isn't feeding in. I wonder if I saw the installer portal if the IQ Controller system could be configured to have that switch be a primary kill switch for everything.

I agree, very glad to have wired LV signalling to the micro inverters and batteries. gently caress praying wireless works. The utility I think signals shutdown over z-wave/zigbee/whatever the smart meters use but that's their risk to take. If it doesn't they can come have my meter, or hit the meter-main and lock out my panel. Really I wish the meter could be locked out physically open remotely so they didn't need to rely on my solar system shutting down. Then the grid would be isolated from me feeding in my generation/storage.

And yes it's all outside except the "sub panel" in the garage.

H110Hawk posted:

Yeah I think I was getting two things conflated in my head re: grid isolation vs PV/Battery shutdown. I don't believe they can remote shutdown my house, just the export. I don't know why they don't do it at the meter though, in theory it has a method to open the circuit if they can remotely turn off my power for non-payment.

quote:

This might explain why my contractor ran ethernet to my solar install location without my approval. For all I give a poo poo this thing can not be connected to the internet so long as my HVAC stays on. I literally noticed it yesterday afternoon. I guess if Edison decides (or is required) to pay me a reasonable rate for my stored power I might use it to allow some excess feed-in from my storage.

H110Hawk posted:

They definitely can do remote shutdown. They literally power cycled my house trying to get my meter working again one day and no one was in my back yard.

Harumph. And yes they are doing all the rest of my low voltage and I'm sure I will find it all fascinating but I don't want enphase doing remote software updates without explicitly warning me each time and with a change log. I work on enough computers to know that's not conducive to my power staying on. Lower stakes but remember when some high end smoker company bricked everyone's smokers on like July 4th?

His Divine Shadow posted:

Outdoor usage or indoor? If for outdoor usage then I've had bad experiences with the integrated led and detector lights, 2yr is better than what I usually got.

That's why I built my own from a separate motion / dusk detector and an outdoor lamp that takes edison socketed bulbs, the bulb is the most likely failure point so it can just be replaced without tossing the whole thing next time it acts up.

Motronic posted:

Outdoor motion sensors are a thing that has been solved since the 80s, but looking around based on your question led me to see that in the retail space this has been taken over with cheap garbage and iot gadgets.

If you want a motion like that just works it starts with something like this motion detector from your local electrical supply house: https://www.denneyelectricsupply.co...lighting.sms500

If you've got a picture of the area you want to mount it and some requirement I can suggest some possibilities of fixtures where you can mount the motion detector and the socket. Probably things you can order form supplyhouse.com if you don't have a local place.

Motronic posted:

Lots of the nicer ones even have power fail sequences where you can tap out "stay on all the time" vs. "motion only at night" with your light switch feeding it.

Motronic posted:

We do the emergency switches (Pennsylvania) but not the heat detector/cutoff. I kinda like that idea actually, especially for oil furnaces that can leak and then light up in interesting and terrible places.

Power is required to open the gas valve. It fails closed when power is removed, so that covers most situations that would be a furnace malfunction of something even kinda sorta maintained.

Motronic posted:

That sounds like a service switch. We have to have them in places like at the top of the basement stairs if the furnace is in the basement. I also havew one right on the heater because yeah......service switch..... I like being able to see it from the heater I'm working on.

TooMuchAbstraction posted:

I'll be hiring an electrician to do some work on the house I'm buying. Specifically, what I want them to do is:

- Replace the main panel (which is full) with a larger one, and install GFCI breakers for all circuits (assuming that this isn't unreasonable, but my impression was that the code is kinda heading that way anyway)
- Replace the main ground wires (one running to a grounding rod, and one running to the water pipes), which were both spliced, with continuous wires
- Install an EV charge port (exterior outlet, 50A/240V, with a cover)
- Upgrade the service from 100A to 200A

First off, he's probably going to want me to select a brand of breaker/panel. I used Square D for my workshop at the old house; any reason I shouldn't use that for this job? Second, I want to verify that my understanding of the service upgrade process is accurate:

1. Get a permit from the city
2. Schedule a time for the power company to shut off power
3. Electrician installs new main breaker that can handle higher current
4. Power company does something (runs a new power line from the pole?) to deliver higher current
5. Inspectors review work
6. Power company restores power

Assuming it works basically like this, then I should assume that the power will be out for at least a couple of hours at the house, right? Not that there's much there at the moment, but e.g. the furnace wouldn't be able to run, and I should make sure this happens when other contractors aren't trying to get work done.

Any other advice?

TooMuchAbstraction posted:

Thanks, y'all! To address some specific points:

1. I don't plan on getting solar anytime soon. It's not a great part of the country for it (Philadelphia), and the house roof both isn't an amazing shape/layout and is only 5 years old.

quote:

3. I'd meant GFCI, but if AFCI is the recommendation, then I'm happy to go with that. Mostly I know that my workshop had to have GFCI protection on all circuits because it was classed as a garage, and that I'd heard rumblings about the rules around circuit protection getting more stringent. I know that GFCI breakers are more expensive than a regular breaker plus a GFCI outlet, but only having one place to go if a protection trips is a nice convenience IMO.

Danhenge posted:

Isn't this exactly the sort of scenario you want the arc fault breaker for?

H110Hawk posted:

They were finally able to get started on this today! Nothing is wired up yet, and they have 3 more batteries to install Monday pending some change they have to ask the fire department about. 2 of the battery modules were supposed to go on the block wall to the left but some last minute measurements realized a mistake in their initial ones. Now we're going up. They need to verify the vertical clearance required by the FD - Enphase (and UL) say these specific modules can do 6", standard plans/prior generations required 36" or something. I don't care how high they go, that's my neighbor's and the electricians servicing them's problem.

The hilarious wire coming out of the conduit in the ground there was a whoopsy doodle once they were done moving the main panel and couldn't figure out where the heck the pool pump was getting its power. It will be cleaned up / figured out by the time final inspection rolls around. Yes we have gotten 3 feet of rain so far this year and yes that is a NEMA 3R rated splice, why do you ask? What are you a narc?

H110Hawk posted:

Extant Artiodactyl posted:

never saw it in action but enphase does have a way to do "sunlight backup" in iq8 systems without batteries to power circuits through a relay that kicks on and off with available power. i think it was limited to 1/10th or 1/6th of the system's continuous current. something like that.
you basically have to have all of the battery equipment to do this so its a really strange use case

Motronic posted:

Yes, but you need a 20A breaker that is rated for 8 gauge (not all are, whether you can find one or not depends on what flavor of breakers you need). The connection in the j-box needs to be appropriate as for the two different wire gauges involved (I'd probably default to split nuts there if there is sufficient space in that box).