Growroom Electricity and Wiring

[ganzas]

wire 4 mm² or 6 gauge support 28 amperes at 220 volts?
If yes, i will install one sub panel with 25 amperes breaker... its correct?

 

[rives]

Yes, both of those (4mm & 6 gauge) will easily support 28 amps.

If the smallest breaker that you are using in the sub is 25a, then all of the downstream components need to be rated for 25a or more.

 

[ganzas]

And if i add one breaker 25 amps and wiring 4mm, 6 gauge, 28 amps in the main panel, pull this wire until the basement, and here add 5 beakers (16 amps each) with 2,5mm wire to the equipments?
with this 5 breakers, i can install 2 wall outlets per breaker. Total 10 wall outlets is enough to connect total equipments...

 

[rives]

That should work fine.

 

[master sparky]

pay attention to the mad penguin, his posts are true. you will die, ours is one of the most dangerous and deadly profession in the private sector. It takes 50 milli amps to stop your heart or to you who don't know the math it is .05 amps.

 

[master sparky]

i went to five years of formal schooling and ojt to get my journeyman's license and even more for my masters, if you want to play handyman that's your choice, you will kill yourself in your sleep, your kids, the dog, the goldfish... if you don't know the calculations that go with this buisness. arrogant electricians die.

 

[PNW-Newbie]

I am wiring a 50A subpanel from my main 200A panel, in the subpanel I plan on installing a 30A breaker for the 240V lights (only 2x 1000w ballasts for now, 4 will be max on the 30A breaker), and a 20A breaker for the 110V hydro equipment. The subpanel is ~30' from the main panel, is 6g enough for a 30' run or should I go thicker?

 

[rives]

Sorry this is late, I've been unable to log in.

#6 will be fine at that distance. The problem with your layout is the 30a breaker for the lighting. Unless there is some downstream fusing, this is almost certain to be too much power for the circuit. Almost all cordsets are 15a, and need to be fused at either 15 or 20a. It is legal to run 15a components on a 20a circuit as long as there is more than one receptacle being fed, but a 30a circuit will blow the shit out of things if something goes awry.

 

[ganjourno]

You just need to run appropriate gauge inside hard pipe or flex to your lighting controller. So from the 30A run #10 flex from the panel into your lighting controller, timer, or relay box, and then normal 15A extensions from there to each ballast.

 

[deadhead77]

nice post!

nice post!

Great! thank you for the post

 

[rives]

You just need to run appropriate gauge inside hard pipe or flex to your lighting controller. So from the 30A run #10 flex from the panel into your lighting controller, timer, or relay box, and then normal 15A extensions from there to each ballast.

Very few controllers use appropriate downstream fuse protection on the 30a circuit, and are illegal for a residential installation. Almost all of them rely on an exclusion in the code that allows higher amperage feeds for commercial warehouse lighting that is only permissible under very tightly-controlled conditions and that you will never be able to conform with in a growing installation (power cord 15" or less long, the luminaire hangs immediately below the receptacle, the cord set is manufactured by the luminaire manufacturer and is listed for this purpose, the cord is visible over it's full length, etc).

They then make up for this with several pages of legal bullshit in the manual that absolves them of any responsibility for burning your house down.

 

[ganjourno]

Could also run from two 15a two-pole breakers in that case, one breaker for every two ballasts.

 

[rives]

Could also run from two 15a two-pole breakers in that case, one breaker for every two ballasts.

I haven't seen a controller that would accept that configuration - usually they use one power feed and a single power relay which keeps you from splitting the circuit.

The easiest/best method that I've seen is to use a power relay or water-heater timer (Intermatic T-101 or equivalent) which is fed with a dryer/range cord, and then use the output from this to feed a small sub-panel. This allows you to have the simplicity of a single, heavy feed and the capability to break the downstream circuit protection down to the correct levels.

 

[sneaky_g]

I got grounded to 277 and survived. stripped a hot wire while i was touching the flex with my other hand , and it went right through my heart... went to the ER and got an EKG starting seeing bright white lights but i ended up recovering .. electricity is no fucking joke.

 

[Swollencalyx]

Thats a good question. Don't know. I would probably start at measuring the voltage at your point-of-use receptacle. Is it a 240 or 120 ballast? Electronic or core&coil?

As a fellow brother (if your Union) thank you for having the patients to preach all you have. I really like helping but man I lose patients and time to explain as well as you do. Thanks for the rants about safety. People a lot of the time won't pay my price or think they can cut corners when it comes to installs. I treat it the same way. I'm not burning down your house or killing your dogs because I opted out of a GFCI or properly grounding and bonding something. Drives me nuts.
Good work brother.
SC. Licensed journeyman

 

[gmanwho]

Bonding grow room plastic liner.

Bonding grow room plastic liner.

got a question for you all?? Would you consider or suggest bonding the grow room liner plastic?

I know especially when installing it you can create quite a static charge. Made me think of it when i was running the gas flex line in for the co2 burner just recently. The gas line is grounded within inches of a ground rod at the foundation when it comes in, but the plastic liner in the room isnt.

so that made me think, should i bond the plastic with copper tape to #6 an run it back to the ground rod. (or how should the liner to #6 connection be made?) Or bond the liner to the 6/3 ground off the sub-panel feeds to the room?

thanks in advance & bsafe

 

[rives]

Interesting question.

I have no experience in grounding plastic like that, but have a couple of thoughts. First, it shouldn't take anywhere near a #6 wire - #6 is considered adequate in most locations for a 200a service. Static has a high potential (voltage) but virtually no current (amperage). Second, since the plastic is a dielectric (insulator) it would be easily possible to have a high static charge buildup a short distance from where the ground is attached. Most modern insulation is based on plastic.... it seems like it would take some type of mesh, grid, or foil to adequately ground plastic sheeting.

 

[Jhhnn]

got a question for you all?? Would you consider or suggest bonding the grow room liner plastic?

I know especially when installing it you can create quite a static charge. Made me think of it when i was running the gas flex line in for the co2 burner just recently. The gas line is grounded within inches of a ground rod at the foundation when it comes in, but the plastic liner in the room isnt.

so that made me think, should i bond the plastic with copper tape to #6 an run it back to the ground rod. (or how should the liner to #6 connection be made?) Or bond the liner to the 6/3 ground off the sub-panel feeds to the room?

thanks in advance & bsafe

If the liner is in contact with a bare concrete floor, it's basically grounded wrt static. I'm not sure why that would be an issue, anyway, because it's not a conductor so there's no shock hazard.

 

[gmanwho]

If the liner is in contact with a bare concrete floor, it's basically grounded wrt static. I'm not sure why that would be an issue, anyway, because it's not a conductor so there's no shock hazard.

the liner is not so much the issue itself, its cause the flex gas line is in the room as well.

there is no concrete floor. rubber roofing is used as flooring, an thats over plywood. sealed an water tight incase of a leak.

the ceiling an walls are lined with white poly, the white poly is sealed to the rubber. the gasflex hose passes thru the white poly into the room an comes in contact with the white poly. this is where the problem i think would possible arrise.

i have experienced a few weird things with rubber floors.

 

[gmanwho]

rives .....i wonder if simply using hvac foil tape around the area where the pipe comes thru the plastic an run a few inches down the pipe. place a ground wire under the foil an have a point or 2 where the wire is in contact with the foil side an not just the adhesive side of hte foil tape. an run that ground back to the sub panel ground bar.

i was told a story by a plumber that some town codes wont allow the flex tube because of static discharge isses.

bsafe