Running Electric for the Hot Tub

 Once the pad was complete for the hot tub I started thinking about the electric.  Initially I was unable to find the spa panel that is required between 5 and 10 feet from the hot tub.  So I contacted the electrician that Christi at Valley Pool and Spa had recommended.  Tyler stopped by and I walked him through what I was thinking.

There are a couple issues with my setup, so Tyler offered to do it as a cash job.

1. My outside outlet and light out the basement door will be too close to the hot tub (has to be 5 or 10 feet away)
2. The subpanel in my basement is 60 amps, and the hot tub could pull 50 amps, so he said it might be under powered.  I will be fine, but an inspector might question it.  Mostly what the subpanel supplies is LED lights so it shouldn't be a problem.
3. I was planning to put the disconnect (spa panel) on the right side of the door and run the conduit over to the other side.  He suggested having it come out under the window on the left side.  In the summer it will be hidden by our Hosta in the winter who cares.

I said OK lets do it, so he said he would get back to me with a quote.  $1600 was the quote.  That seemed high to me, but what could I do.

2 weeks go by and I haven't heard from Tyler, I also notice that Menards has spa panels in stock now.  So I go pick up the needed materials, about $500 (the 6 gauge copper wire was $300 by itself!).

So I put it in myself took a couple hours of wrestling with that big cable, but it is ready.

Replacing our other Arc Fault Breaker

Our home was build in 2008, so we only have 2 arc fault breakers that supply the bedrooms.  I replaced our master bedroom breaker in January since we were having trouble with it tripping with our projector.

Then this summer Nick built a computer and it was tripping the breaker for the kids rooms.  So he ran an extension cord from the laundry room and that has been that for a couple months.

I finally got around to buying a new breaker for the kids room and put that in today.  Now I just need him to clean up the extension cord and hopefully everything will work fine!

Update as of 12/1/2021 everything is working well.  No more trips.

Replacing an Arc Fault Breaker

This is the view I like to see of my circuit panel, all buttoned up and happy.  However, for the last couple weeks one of our arc fault breakers has been tripping quite a bit.  Probably once a day or so.  The kids computers are on this breaker so needless to say it is quite inconvient.

It sounds like breakers do need to be replaced sometimes, so I thought I would just replace the breaker.  Turns out it is a little challenging to find the right breaker.  They don't make it the easiest.  But I was able to find a suitable replacmeent at Menards ($36, ugh so much more than regular breakers) and was able to pick it up on the bag sale, which was nice.

It always feels dicey to me to put my hand in the panel, but I was able to get the old one out and put in the new one.  Didn't realize for an arc fault you need to attach it to the neutral bar, as well as the neutral line for the circuit.

So we will see what happens now, I am hoping to not have to deal with it anymore.  Or at least for another 10 years.

We have not had any issues in the last 10 days, so that is a definite improvement.

Does this make it a Finished Basement?

I had purchased a ceiling fan for the basement some time ago when it must have been on a good sale.  We have been wiring plugs and some recessed lights in the basement when Nick comes across the ceiling fan.  He wants to put it up, so I say maybe tomorrow we need a bracket for it.

I picked up the bracket on the way home from work and we put that up.  We get the fan out and realize that we can't just mount it to the bracket it needs some drywall up as well.  Nick convinces me to put up a piece of drywall so we can proceed.

Nick did some wiring, Maddie put in the light bulbs and away we went.  We also had to buy a fan controller (light switch), we found one that will just control the fan, however they also had one that will control the fan and the light from the same switch with a dimmer for the light as well.  It was $25 vs $22 for the other.  So this way we can also put a switch in for the hall light as well. :)  A 3-way switch no less.

Structured Wiring plan

This was what I put together in October and pretty much what we went with. Didn't do the speaker in the entry way, as it is pretty open to the great room. We also don't have speakers in the master, but we did run wires in the wall.

- Circles are ceiling speaker placement, just have to run 14/2 CL2 to the box over the woodbox. Was thinking it might be nice to run the external speakers to a volume control first though. Probably need about 380 feet for the main floor.
- Boxes are the wall plates for "stuff", at this point I just want to run conduit to the basement and wire it later when I figure out what I want where. There are 6 boxes, one external one (I can run the two over the fireplace on the inside wall), so 3 low voltage brackets, a large indented bracket behind the flat panel (saw one at menards today), a 2 gang box (or larger) over the firebox, and call it 60 feet of 3/4 inch conduit (just to drop it to the basement).

- Circle is again a ceiling speaker, run that wire to the boxes over the woodbox on the first floor again 14/2 CL2 call it 60 feet.
- Triangles in the bedroom are wall speaker locations. I am thinking of just leaving the speaker wire running the length of the wall top to bottom, until we get what we want there figured out. That way we can open the wall and grab the wire, for in wall speakers, or attached to brackets on the wall. Run the 14/2 CL2 to the double box in that room, about 180 feet.
- Boxes run up to the attic, 10 boxes about 10 feet of 3/4 inch conduit per box for 100 feet.
- Blue box is a structured wiring panel, which has 2 2 inch knockouts on the top and bottom, and I think only 2 2 inch knockout on the bottom. I think there will be more wires coming into the top so we will put that up. And run that up to the attic as well. So 20 feet of 2 inch conduit and 20 feet of 3/4 inch conduit.
- Also have to run 2 inch conduit down to the basement from the blue box. Call that 60 feet of 2 inch conduit.

Pictures, pictures, pictures!

Long time no update...

Basically still at the point where the drywall is up, but now the ceiling is textured and painted. Stopped out this morning and the plumbers were out finishing connecting pipes in the basement. Also, the pressure tank for the well and water heater are in.
Here are some pictures from Monday.

Over the weekend

Over the weekend we did a bunch of work on the house. On Saturday, Greg and Joanne came down and help us run some low voltage, add a couple of outlets... Chris D. came over as well and ran speaker cable all over the place :) Then today, we finished up running low voltage and my parents came over and insulated the garage. I will get some photos up tomorrow and explain everything a little bit better as well.

Siding goes up

Today as well they are starting to put up the siding. The fascia under the porch isn't up yet, but I suspect they had to wait on that till the inspector came (which he did yesterday I guess, to the rough work in the house).

The shakes look nice and I am excited to see how to whole package will look together. The stone on the front of the garage is going up on Saturday, and I would guess most of the siding will be up by then as well.

The concrete for the garage and apron are going in on Monday and the insulation on Tuesday. Steve also mentioned that the porch floor can go in once the concrete is poured.

Tom is supposed to be out there today to move dirt around, however wasn't out there by the time I left. Steve is still concerned about the retaining wall we aren't going to pay to put in (the boulder one, below the other boulder one...).

Electric trenching

Went out at lunch today to see what was going on, and found a flurry of activity. Here is Randy digging the trench that will connect the transformer on the lot to the panel in the garage. Pretty sweet machine he has to do it too.

The blurry picture below is the light that was installed in the staircase to light it up. I expected something a little smaller, but it should look nice once the cover is on it. It takes a regular sized light bulb.

Electric going in

Here is some of the electric coming on from the garage and into the house. I wasn't too excited about the electric coming in from the garage, but it looks like it might actually work pretty well. Though I wonder what the circuits are going to look like...

Electrician

We met with the Electrician yesterday morning. He was a nice guy and walked the rooms with us. The panel is going in the garage, which I am not that excited about, but I don't want to rock the boat. At least it will be easy to wire in the garage.

He also agreed to wire the outlet in the structured wiring panel that I installed. He was curious why I was placing it in the laundry room. I want to put one there so I don't have to run conduit to the basement.

This is the lighting over our porch