Getting ready to dig and foam the pex in starting Friday. My run is 250 feet from the Garn barn to the house just wondering what I should use for electrical wire for running the pumps or signal wire to start pumps. Just want to make sure I bury enough wire. Even if I run it in conduit I probably would not be able to pull more wire in later in that long of a run.
Direct bury wire from the Garn barn?
- Thread starter hedge wood
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Suggestion (disclaimer that I am not a pro. electrician, but have done a large amount of wiring, including a bunch of underground installations for myself and friends)-- if you are going to the trouble of the trench, foam, etc., this is your one opportunity without a lot of costs- put in a few separate runs of conduit, even if you leave one or more empty. Cap the unused one(s) and later, if you need, you can use a shopvac to pull a thing that electricians call a "mouse" (foam chunk with a hook) through with fishing line attached. Then use the fishling line to pull some polypropylene rope through- and then use the rope to pull the wire through. I've never done that on something as long as 250 ft, but have done it with good results on a run of about 190 ft with some pretty stiff wire that I was pulling (wire pulling lube helps, too).
wow 250 feet. I was moaning about the 150 feet I was gonna have to go. That is a fantastic idea pybyr. I'll do the same for mine. Still waiting on the Garn. Tore out shed floor, getting ready for concrete. Gonna put in floor heat in too. Can't wait to get finished spraying crops so I can devote full time to this project. Until then, I'm following yours hedge!
I agree with pybyr. Run at least a run of 12 gauge romex, and two or three runs of category 5 network cable....... It works great as signal wire, and if you ever go to a controller like Nofossils, you'll have network capability out there....
You may want to go with larger than 12 gauge for the Garn fan's AC supply- I don't have my conductor tables at hand, but the last thing you want is substantial voltage drop that'd cause the Garn's large fan motor to struggle and not last.
For a run like that I would think about running 10 gauge 3-wire w/ground (4 conductor) and wire in a sub-panel out in the shed. That way you could have 120V or 240V available for whatever you might do out there in the future and wire the fan motor 240V if the motor allows that and if the controls/relays could handle that.
I don't know how the fan motor is controlled; it's just my habit to run motors at high voltage any time it's on a long extension cord. If that's not possible on the Garn control then run at least 10 gauge wire @ 120V. 250 ft. is a very long extension cord and if you ever try to run it on a generator the starting inrush current for that motor will multiply the voltage drop out to your boiler and be a much larger hurdle for your generator.
I don't know how the fan motor is controlled; it's just my habit to run motors at high voltage any time it's on a long extension cord. If that's not possible on the Garn control then run at least 10 gauge wire @ 120V. 250 ft. is a very long extension cord and if you ever try to run it on a generator the starting inrush current for that motor will multiply the voltage drop out to your boiler and be a much larger hurdle for your generator.
The run to my shed was a short 65' but I used the 1" dia. black plastic water pipe as my conduit. No joints to crack. I ran two, one for the wires and one currently empty but if I need more wires or if I want fresh water out in the shed I'm all set. Like everyone has said do it now while the trench is open.
Bob
Bob
I'd run the cheap black plastic pipe also. Maybe even two 1"ers as you only have one chance to do it. I would keep it away from the heat of the regular lines. I have one and now I wish I ran two as I always seem to want another wire for something.
All good advise. 2 Pipes is always better then one. PVC pipe with glue is also easy to use and very durable. Make sure you use underground rated cable, water always finds its way in to buried pipe and Romex has a limited life in water. If you do run 2 pipes, put the power and the signal cables in seperate pipes to avoid electrical interference on the siganl cable. Your pull dificulty will come down to the size of the pipe and how many bends you have in it. If it is a straight run you should be ok with a 50 percent fill ratio. If it gets tight, dump some pulling soap in to the pipe in front of the cable, don't be afraid to load it up. You may want to make sure that if one end of the conduit ends is lower then the other, that you cap the lower of the two. I have seen a couple of basements fill up with ground water via conduit entering the building. It would not hurt to stub the conduit up above grade.
I like the 10/3 recommendation. The longer the run the larger the cable will have to be. Good luck.
I like the 10/3 recommendation. The longer the run the larger the cable will have to be. Good luck.
Hedge, I enjoyed our conversation last night. Hope I shed a little light on your project for you. I double checked the flow rates and circs we talked about and they should do what you need to do. Have fun with your project and make sure your all finished with it by the time hunting season rolls around. Send me some pictures of those whitetail wall hangers when you get time. I enjoy being jealous.
One question after I thought about it though.........You said you had 4-1" lines you were going to bury. Did you mean 4 loops (8 lines) or 4 lines (2 loops). If it's only 2 loops, you won't have the flow you need in the house. That numbers I crunched for you were for 4 loops of 1".
250' run (500' round trip) of 1" will only give you about 3-1/2 to 4gpm per loop with a 26-99 Grundfos driving it.
One question after I thought about it though.........You said you had 4-1" lines you were going to bury. Did you mean 4 loops (8 lines) or 4 lines (2 loops). If it's only 2 loops, you won't have the flow you need in the house. That numbers I crunched for you were for 4 loops of 1".
250' run (500' round trip) of 1" will only give you about 3-1/2 to 4gpm per loop with a 26-99 Grundfos driving it.
Can't beat cheap black plastic pipes. We used the shopvac technique to pull optical fiber through 650' of buried black plastic pipe between my brother's house and mine. The pipe comes in 400' rolls if you need that much. Bury at least one extra.
Thanks for all the good replies. The only power I need to run to the Garn barn is for signal wire and any reading I might want in the house. The power for the fan and pumps will come from the building the Garn barn is in as it has a 100 amp service in it so I have ran three 12 gauge circuits to the Garn barn already. Heaterman I probally need you to re-figure the pump as I have two one inch supplies and two one inch returns. The total run ended up being 230 feet as we dug it today and foamed it today. I have to run the fill water line and conduit for the electric tomorrow. I was going to run one, one inch conduit for the signal wire but I may run to town and get more conduit and run two like every one said the trench is open now. I do appreciate every one on this board as there is a wealth of knowledge on this board.
Sounds like you wont be running AC power through the conduits, but it is probably worth mentioning in any case, that you should NOT run AC and data cable in the same conduit... I believe it is a code violation, but aside from the obvious potential issues if there should be a short, you can also get inductive coupling between the data cable and the AC line that can corrupt your data transmissions, and at worst produce high enough voltages in the data cable to damage equipment...
If I were running data and AC in the same trench, I would not only use seperate conduits, but I would put the conduits on opposite sides of the trench, or at least try to maintain as much separation between them as I could.
Gooserider
If I were running data and AC in the same trench, I would not only use seperate conduits, but I would put the conduits on opposite sides of the trench, or at least try to maintain as much separation between them as I could.
Gooserider
hedge wood said:
Using only two loops, the btu available will be roughly 70-80,000 through your coils. Kinda on the tight side from what you told me about your system. If you check out the manufacturer spec's on the coils you have for your furnaces, you'll probably find that they want around 6-8GPM through them to achieve what they are rated at.
Rowcrop Renegade
I do plan on using a multi speed pumps to give me some choice on GPM. I liked your pictures on your post. I need to get better with the computer so I can post some pictures. When I went to unload my Garn I tried the JD 5603 with the 542 loader seemed too much for it so I hauled home the 941B Cat track loader from the other farm it was a good load on the cat to get it unloaded and set in the Garn barn.
I do plan on using a multi speed pumps to give me some choice on GPM. I liked your pictures on your post. I need to get better with the computer so I can post some pictures. When I went to unload my Garn I tried the JD 5603 with the 542 loader seemed too much for it so I hauled home the 941B Cat track loader from the other farm it was a good load on the cat to get it unloaded and set in the Garn barn.
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