to splice or not to splice?

[gtokarski]

I'm finishing up my garage right now. its slow going because I dont get weekends off but rather 2 days a week that aren't necessarily together.
I ran all the wiring for 12 new recepticles and a separate circuit for shop lights. I put 3 sets of recepticles on each wall. I ran wiring from each box direct to the main panel so i could make any box its own dedicated circuit if I wanted.
problem is the panel is full! there isnt physically enough space to cram all the wires into the panel to hook em up.
I was thinking about splicing one box from each wall to its brother on the other wall and running one cable per 2 boxes into the panel. This would allow me to have 3 wires going into the main panel instead of 6. do they make special boxes/junctions for this kind of splice? is this code?
I got space saving breakers (2 in the space of one old one) rated for 20A. 12/2 wiring. 20A receptacles (2 receptacles per box), with 3 boxes on each of the 2 walls.
I also have a separate 15A circuit for the shoplights.
thanks for any thoughts.

[gjat]

You need an electrician to look at it and inform you about local codes. A basic principle of electric devices is 'fill', which is how much physical space is provided for devices and conductors. There is NEC and additionally, local codes. If you can't "cram" all the wires in, you know it isn't safe and won't meet NEC. Local codes for junctions and splices may be even more restrictive. Consider this. If your garage is attached to your house, you and your children are sleeping under the same roof. Would you want to sleep and live there if you had an old box of unstable dynamite in your garage? It's well worth the $$ to have a local compentent and licensed electrician to review your work and recommend how to complete it. No matter what, you system will be safer. You definitely have a potential safety hazard now.

[scorrpio]

I would just upgrade to a larger panel. They are not exactly expensive. Or, place a subpanel next to main panel.

[Scottydont]

I ran into the exact same thing after I remodeled my shop a couple of years ago. I had an electrician come out and install a sub panel connected to a 100 amp breaker in the main panel. $200 bucks, safe and to code. Your ability to do that would be predicated on the capacity of the feed that was originally installed. The cool part is that I can cut the power to the whole shop by flipping one breaker. Nice with a 6 year old running around. Have an electrician come out and check it out.

[stewchi]

Sounds like you did what I always do, out smarted yourself and the system, I find when I try to DIY something and make it “Better” than what is normally done it I end up creating headaches for myself.

It sounds like you ran six separate pairs of wire to the main panel, and non of the outlets are connected to each other plus lights making it 7. I if you had enough available breakers (space to install new ones) then you would have created 7 new circuits. This is probably serious overkill and wasting valuable panel space. Plus in a garage all outlets have to be GFI protected. This means 6 GFI outlets or 6 GFI breakers. That’s serious money.

The normal way to do this is pick the number of circuits you need 1 lights, 1 big tool, 1 DC is probably sufficient. This means you need space in the panel for 3 new breakers and 2 GFI outlets. Wire the outlets together so that some are on one circuit some on the other strategically located. If you really think you will need a more dedicated outlets (Circuits) in the future and you want to run the wiring now, I would still do what I described above, then pull some additional wire into the box and to the panel but not terminated to anything on either end. Make sure you label both ends of both pairs. Check the NEC rule on fill capacity (do a google search some websites have a table posted) it will give you the amount of conductors with an outlet for different size boxes).

The design I like is a double gang boxes with 2 dual receptacle outlets installed, one on each circuit. You can also break the standard dual receptacle outlets into two circuits by removing the metal tabs that connect the top from the bottom receptacle and make all of the top circuit 1 and all of the bottom circuit 2.

[gjat]

It is a BAD idea to have 2 circuits in a receptacle box like this. The danger is cutting 1 circuit, testing the receptacle, and thinking the box is dead. We don't have perfect memories and what if you sell the house? This is residential, not an industrial installation. I would suspect that most local codes would be against this in a residential application, but I'm not a residential electrician.

[gtokarski]

I guess I did outsmart myself. I hate it when i do that.
I'm gona find out how much its gona cost to put in a sub panel and solve the problem permanently.

gjat: the way i set it up each box can be 1 circuit, not 2. perhaps i didnt word that well. each box has 1 wire running to it. what i wanted to do was splice 2 boxes so I would have 1 wire going into the main panel.

[LJR]

Putting each receptacle on it's own circuit is overkill and really not necessary. Sounds like you've got all the wires run already. I'd look at putting a junction box (say 12" by 12" by 6" deep? need to do a fill calculation) adjacent to the breaker box. Then you can do all the splicing in the junction box and not have too many wires in your breaker panel.

[gtokarski]

it was either that, or setup a sub panel. at this point i think i will go with a sub panel. The cost is not astronomical and gives all of the advantages everyone listed above:
fill capacity not exceeded
ability to turn off everything in the 'shop'
easy upgrades.
code compliance.

I'm gona see how much a service upgrade is as well. the panel is only 100A to start with
But there isnt much that runs in the house. just a fridge and lights most of the time. the big AC unit runs in the summer but I turn it off when I'm not in the house.
I dont have a big tv, stereo, pool or anything. and i have gas appliances too.

quote:Originally posted by LJR

Putting each receptacle on it's own circuit is overkill and really not necessary. Sounds like you've got all the wires run already. I'd look at putting a junction box (say 12" by 12" by 6" deep? need to do a fill calculation) adjacent to the breaker box. Then you can do all the splicing in the junction box and not have too many wires in your breaker panel.

[cwsmith]

I think you took the wrong approach. If it were my shop, I'd figure it based on the tools that may need to run at the same time and base the circuits on that. You've isolated the lighting from the circuits required for the equipment and that's a good thing. It's not a pleasant experience to have the lights go out at the same time you may still have a saw or grinder spinning down.

Take a look at your work habits, what equipment needs to be running at the same time as your table saw, etc. What equipment needs to be 220 vs 120, etc.

I'd place my main cutting tool (table saw/radial arm saw, whatever) on a separate circuit from whatever I'm using for dust control (shop vac or dust collector. Probably put the bench stuff on a third circuit, but take into account what you might want to run simultaneously, if anything. Personally, I tend not ever leave a tool running while I move on to something else.

From a purely electrical safety point of view, you NEVER have two circuits in the same box! Also, if your're in your garage, on a concrete floor, everything circuit in there needs to be a GFI to meet code.

So, fundamentally you need to have a circuit on which to run the saw and a second circuit to run the dust collector. A third 20 Amp circuit should easily handle all your plugin tools and any benchtop stuff you have. You could probably run two or three of those at the same time without overloading. If you have a 120 volt compressor, I'd probably run it off my dust collector circuit as I probably wouldn't have both going at the same time, but that depends on your habits. So, from my work point of view, the entire shop would be as follows:

1 220 volt circuit for my big saw (or 1 20 amp circuit if you don't need 220).

1 20 amp circuit for a small dust collector or shop vac system with a branch off to go to one of my shop lights.

1 20 amp circuit to feed my bench area and I'd probably branch off to recepticles in my assembly area for plug-in drivers, sanders, etc.

1 15 amp circuit to my lighting system.

Now, I'd have everything covered, big saw or planer on 220, dust collector and compressor, bench stuff and assembly, and lighting with a single light on a separate circuit, just in case.

With regard to lighting or anything else, you always need to play "what if!" LIKE, what if you're in the middle of a cut and the lights go out? With one light on a separate circuit, you have a safety margin.

Oh, I almost forgot your original "heading"... you never "splice". Not sure if you were using that term accurately, but all connections take place in a box, even if you have to provide a separate box just for that purpose. And, all boxes have covers and all boxes get grounded.

One final thought... it's a darn good idea to have all of the tool circuits come through a breakout or branch load center located in your shop area. The idea is so that you can shut everything off and lock the box! This provides that extra safety to keep your kids or snooping neighbor kids from getting hurt.

Just my thoughts,

CWS

[gtokarski]

Excelent thinking.
Originaly each box was going to be its own circuit but that would be 8 new circuits and breakers!
6 boxes, 1 220V circuit and the lights!
After comming back to reality I realized how much overkill that would be. and the fact that it wouldnt even begin to fit in the panel. [B)]
The most I will need to run AT ONCE will be:
the saw
garage AC unit (I live in Las Vegas)
DC
Lights.

That makes 4 circuits. now that I realized a sub panel would make everything much easier, thats what im planning for. I figure a 50-60A panel should do it.
The main panel is only 100A so I'm not sure if that will be enough to run the above stuff in the garage AND the main AC unit for the house as well as interior lights etc. I can turn that stuff off when im in the garage anyway. Someone mentioned you can have a sub-panel that, combined with the already exisitng circuits, exceeds the rating for the main panel. But I think I will look into upgrading the service anyway just to be on the safe side. If i get an air filter in the garage, a big tv in the house or a jacuzzi I will have to anyway.

quote:Originally posted by cwsmith

I think you took the wrong approach. If it were my shop, I'd figure it based on the tools that may need to run at the same time and base the circuits on that.
<snip>
Just my thoughts,

CWS

[crokett]

George,

Looks like your original question is moot, but I will answer it anyway. They don't make "special" junction boxes for splices. Receptical boxes can be junction boxes as well as outlet boxes, so long as you don't stuff too many wires in and go over the cubic inch restrictions in the box. For splices use the larger round boxes. They are larger, so easier to work in plus they can hold more wires - you don't bump into the space restrictions as quickly. Just remember that any splice you do has be be accessible.

[gtokarski]

Thanks! Thats the answer to my original question. I will still have to put some junction boxes in and splice some wires or just buy a sub-panel big enough to physicaly hold that many wires (I ran separate wires from each box to the panel rather than put them in series )

quote:Originally posted by crokett

George,

Looks like your original question is moot, but I will answer it anyway. They don't make "special" junction boxes for splices. Receptical boxes can be junction boxes as well as outlet boxes, so long as you don't stuff too many wires in and go over the cubic inch restrictions in the box. For splices use the larger round boxes. They are larger, so easier to work in plus they can hold more wires - you don't bump into the space restrictions as quickly. Just remember that any splice you do has be be accessible.

[Tim Clark]

At the risk of repeating what someone else may have posted...

Your panel box IS a junction box so you can splice in there. AND, as others have mentioned you DON'T want to have two circuits in one outlet box. Instead put two or three outlet boxes on one circuit (splicing them in the panel since the wires are already there) and you can split them up as you need to later when you install a larger panel.

By "12 new recepticles" do you 6 duplex recepticles? Since there are SIX wires going to the panel rather than 12 I'm guessing you have six duplexes.

Put your saw and any other powerhog on it's own circuit and any hand power tools (circular saw,etc.) or small bench tools (like a grinder) that you will only be using one at a time can be on a circuit(s) with multiple outlets. It's all about what you use and how many you will run at the same time.

Personally, I'ld put three or four outlets at a time on the same wall together (depending on usage and load requirements) and dedicate however many seperate circuits I needed.

Hope this helps.

[gtokarski]

Thanks for all the input.
I had an electrician come out and look at the setup and give me a quote:
1. I forgot to do GFCI receptacles. [B)]
2. my feeders are big enough to upgrade to 200A without pulling new wire from the street. YAY!
3. he thinks splicing the separate runs together in their own boxes is a good idea.
4. he thinks he can 'clean up' the panel and fit all the wiring inside without getting a larger panel. he mentioned something about the grounds being bundled up with the neutrals which may cause problems. Also he wants to grease up the breakers to service them.
5. he wants about $1000 for doing all of that. [:0]
Thats quite a bit of $$ to spend and not get any increase in capacity or future expansion so I sent him on his way.
I found GFCI receptacles at the BORG for about $13 each (no contractor packs for a discount ) I picked up 8. I couldn't find any wholesale places online that had them for much cheaper. BTW: any recommendations for finding electrical gear for cheap?
I will install those myself.
I think the best way to go is going to be to get a sub-panel for the garage. I will have plenty of room for growth and flexibility as well as shutting down everything with one main switch. No need to get a new main panel, yet.
I put the project on the back burner temporarily due to lack of free time.