SWMBO has decided it would be nicer if I no longer took up the kitchen for hours on end, so I decided to go the electric route in the basement.
The good...we have a 200 AMP 40 space/40 circuit main panel, so there should be plenty of space for expansion.
The bad...the previous owner put an illegal apartment in the basement, so all 40 circuits are taken up and a lot of the marked circuits are wrong. The dryer outlet is on the second floor, so that doesn't help me.
I spent the better part of last week figuring out which circuit every single light and outlet belonged to. It appears that the previous owner had a 30 amp circuit in the garage at one time, but now it's a 20 amp circuit. My guess is he replaced the 240v circuit with 2 120V circuits while building the apartment, because here's where I get lucky.
1. There's a random 30 amp breaker sitting all alone next to the main panel
2. In the wall next to the main panel, there's an unattached piece of 10/3 romex.
3. Under the apartment kitchen sink, there's a nice coil of 10/3 romex with one end going back into the wall. This is right where the wire fishes into the garage from the basement, so my guess is he pulled the 10 gauge, coiled it up and replaced it with the 12 gauge now going into the garage.
I also couldn't find the outlets or lights for 2 of the circuits in the panel, so I capped the wires and pulled the breakers freeing up 2 slots for the 30 amp breaker. Put the lonely 30 amp breaker back in the panel, attached the wires and suddenly that coil of romex under the sink is showing hot red and black. As luck would have, the coil is sitting about 3 feet from where I wanted to put the brewery receptacle, so I couldn't have planned this any better. The way I see it, I saved myself the cost of a 30 amp breaker, 50 feet of 10 gauge wire and the time for an electrician to fish said wire, clean up the panel and hook everything up.
One question I have. Although I have 4 wires to work with, I started this under the impression that I would only need to use the hots and ground for the heater element, so I capped the neutral in the main panel. In researching this some more, it looks like I'll need all 4 wires if I want to run the heater elements as well as pumps from this outlet. I plan on installing a spa panel. If I keep the 3 wires from the main breaker to the spa panel, will I be able to use the neutral from the spa panel or do I have to connect the neutral back to the main panel as well? I'm assuming I don't have to connect the neutral as the both ground and neutral connect to the neutral bus on the main panel.
The good...we have a 200 AMP 40 space/40 circuit main panel, so there should be plenty of space for expansion.
The bad...the previous owner put an illegal apartment in the basement, so all 40 circuits are taken up and a lot of the marked circuits are wrong. The dryer outlet is on the second floor, so that doesn't help me.
I spent the better part of last week figuring out which circuit every single light and outlet belonged to. It appears that the previous owner had a 30 amp circuit in the garage at one time, but now it's a 20 amp circuit. My guess is he replaced the 240v circuit with 2 120V circuits while building the apartment, because here's where I get lucky.
1. There's a random 30 amp breaker sitting all alone next to the main panel
2. In the wall next to the main panel, there's an unattached piece of 10/3 romex.
3. Under the apartment kitchen sink, there's a nice coil of 10/3 romex with one end going back into the wall. This is right where the wire fishes into the garage from the basement, so my guess is he pulled the 10 gauge, coiled it up and replaced it with the 12 gauge now going into the garage.
I also couldn't find the outlets or lights for 2 of the circuits in the panel, so I capped the wires and pulled the breakers freeing up 2 slots for the 30 amp breaker. Put the lonely 30 amp breaker back in the panel, attached the wires and suddenly that coil of romex under the sink is showing hot red and black. As luck would have, the coil is sitting about 3 feet from where I wanted to put the brewery receptacle, so I couldn't have planned this any better. The way I see it, I saved myself the cost of a 30 amp breaker, 50 feet of 10 gauge wire and the time for an electrician to fish said wire, clean up the panel and hook everything up.
One question I have. Although I have 4 wires to work with, I started this under the impression that I would only need to use the hots and ground for the heater element, so I capped the neutral in the main panel. In researching this some more, it looks like I'll need all 4 wires if I want to run the heater elements as well as pumps from this outlet. I plan on installing a spa panel. If I keep the 3 wires from the main breaker to the spa panel, will I be able to use the neutral from the spa panel or do I have to connect the neutral back to the main panel as well? I'm assuming I don't have to connect the neutral as the both ground and neutral connect to the neutral bus on the main panel.
