looking for some one who can help me setup a breaker box with 16 ac outlets for various fans and lights .... and how i would tie into exisiting wireing ..

ideally i would like to have the wires run from exisitng outlet in my area im setting up goto a power meter then to the subpanel then have one breaker for ever pair of outlets

and again im worried about the draw on the incoming lines to the panel i know very little about household electrical .. but basically i need to control about 8 200 watt CFL bulbs and 2 exhuast fans and some other misc stuff

Grow room eh?

You could tap off of the homes existing breaker panel and run an 8/3 cable to the new panel in your other room. Hell you may not even need 8ga wire but its better to be safe than sorry and with larger cable you can add more later without overloading it.

My old house had this done when an addition was added. They ran a line from the new breaker panel where the main line from the street came in to the old fuse box in the older part of the house. If your current panel can support it just pop in a 60-80amp breaker and run the line to your new panel and split it up from there.

As for the power meter im not sure where you would get one or why you would need it unless you want to keep a close eye on your secondary panels power consumption.


Personally unless the new box is going to be located very far away from the existing box I would just add a few breakers to the existing panel and run wires to the new room and eliminate the need for a secondary panel/meter combo.

You need a permit to do major electrical work, and it needs to be inspected too. If you care about these things.

You need to calculate your total maximum amperage, and if it's over ~40 amps or so, you should run 240v to the box. Then simply wire each circuit to a breaker.

At the main box, run the sub box to a pair of breaker slots, and install a double 240v breaker. I think you need to use armoured cable to run to the sub box.

Look up how to wire an electrical box. It's very simple, but there are all sorts of rules and regulations which you need to follow.

lol maybeee..... :P


but regardless of what im doing i want somthing that can be dismatled very quickly in the case it needs to be ....


i would preffer not to work with 240v but if need be i will technically thou it is 220 here

as for regulations and such .. well ... this not really the sort of thing you want inspecters coming in and seeing :P

as for installing more breakers to the existing box not really possible considering the wireing to the room

i just want pretty much each outlet to be set on a breaker ...

as for the meter yes your right i want to be able to monitor the power consumption of that specfic sub panel


i was more curious if anyone had any pictoral diagrams and wireing diagrams :)

cheers,

warweed

220v isn't quite what it seems. It's actually two 110v lines which are 180 degrees out of phase. Essentially you're running two 110v lines to the sub box. This evenly distributes the load over both phases, and lets you add 220v outlets later if you need them.

Do you want a simple instantaneous ammeter, or a kilowatt hour meter? For a plain ammeter, I suggest buying a cheap multimeter and sticking it in there permanently. For kilowatts hours, you'll need to buy a more expensive unit. Or pry one off a neighbour's house. Whichever.

http://www.hammerzone.com/archives/elect/panel/breaker/install.htm
http://www.doityourself.com/stry/homewiringbreakerbox

KwPH :) i found one sitting in the open at a store *whistles innocently*

220v isn't quite what it seems. It's actually two 110v lines which are 180 degrees out of phase. Essentially you're running two 110v lines to the sub box. This evenly distributes the load over both phases, and lets you add 220v outlets later if you need them.

Do you want a simple instantaneous ammeter, or a kilowatt hour meter? For a plain ammeter, I suggest buying a cheap multimeter and sticking it in there permanently. For kilowatts hours, you'll need to buy a more expensive unit. Or pry one off a neighbour's house. Whichever.

http://www.hammerzone.com/archives/elect/panel/breaker/install.htm
http://www.doityourself.com/stry/homewiringbreakerbox
I think that was a good post!
nice:D

I'd say run the wires from the meter box, to somewhere discreet, maybe the attic/roof space. Make the cables seem inconspicuous, then if the feds come and look for their warweed, then they wont find the box til later, or after they leave. Ideally hook the wires to the "in" side, ie. before the meter, but it's dangerous, illegal and will probably backfire :). Do it at night if your that paranoid. Then simply run another cable from your new box, to a box with 8-20 plugs for your lights, etc. Use fairly heavy guage wire, to allow for the extra loads. No point having a fire if you dont need 1.

Why do you want the power meter? If you're only running some lights and fans it should be pretty easy to figure out how much power you're using to within a few watts.
If you have 8x200W lights running 24hrs/day that's 200*8*24=38.4kWh per day.
A common 20" box fan uses about 150W (I think) so that'd be 3.6kWh/day, but I doubt you'd need a fan that big to be moving that much air.

If you're operation is big enough that it required you to run 240V lines (>4800W) then you're probably gonna end up getting busted b/c of light bills or your IR signature, unless you've made a deal with your local DEA agents.*

& if the cops catch on to you I think it'd probably already be too late to do anything about it by the time you find out. When they find out someone may be growing they're not going to let them get away by being careless.*

So don't get greedy and build a big operation and for fucks sake keep your fucking mouth shut. but I'm sure you already know this.

*My uncle is currently one of the heads of the dea in his state & he told me all of this ;)

thats cool but im in canada no DEA just cops who think they are a task force and a single helicopter with nor thermal imaging just infared and spot light ....

and i should know my dads the cheif aviation mechanic for the rcmp and my uncle is a edmonton judge :P

regardless i know i could estimate my draw but i want exact numbers ... i have my reasons

High Pressure Sodium, Mercury Vapor, and Metal Halide (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-intensity_discharge_lamp) are better.

High Pressure Sodium, Mercury Vapor, and Metal Halide (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-intensity_discharge_lamp) are better.That's a big negatory there on the Mercury Vapor lamps.