Goose
Well-known Member
A couple of weeks ago, I ran an underground electrical line to a new shop building that's a work in progress.
What I did, was had the local power company move the meter for the old/current shop to a transformer pole located approximately midway between the two buildings, about a hundred feet from both. I then abandoned the old underground line to the old shop and trenched new underground lines from the meter to each shop, 4 guage to the old shop and 2 guage to the new building.
Everything worked great, power to the breaker box in the new building as expected, and power same as ever to the old shop. Until today I went to the old shop and had no lights.
I tracked it down, and found one line from the meter to the shop was dead when it should have been hot. Checked at the box under the meter and all was as it should be. So how can a new length of 4 guage underground stranded wire that has had nothing done to it except unrolled into a trench, and run through 1 1/4" PVC conduit on each end, have proper electricity fed into it on one end and be dead on the other? Particularly since it worked fine for a couple of weeks? Damage doesn't seem possible since that stuff is so tough it takes a bolt cutter to cut it.
I'll think about it overnight.
What I did, was had the local power company move the meter for the old/current shop to a transformer pole located approximately midway between the two buildings, about a hundred feet from both. I then abandoned the old underground line to the old shop and trenched new underground lines from the meter to each shop, 4 guage to the old shop and 2 guage to the new building.
Everything worked great, power to the breaker box in the new building as expected, and power same as ever to the old shop. Until today I went to the old shop and had no lights.
I tracked it down, and found one line from the meter to the shop was dead when it should have been hot. Checked at the box under the meter and all was as it should be. So how can a new length of 4 guage underground stranded wire that has had nothing done to it except unrolled into a trench, and run through 1 1/4" PVC conduit on each end, have proper electricity fed into it on one end and be dead on the other? Particularly since it worked fine for a couple of weeks? Damage doesn't seem possible since that stuff is so tough it takes a bolt cutter to cut it.
I'll think about it overnight.
