Adding 220 Outlets & Strip Lighting

[Brett Bobo]

We're moving here in the next several weeks and the new workshop will be a finished, attached three car garage. The house is new and already finished so all of my electrical modifications will be after the fact. For reference, the house is full two stories so I don't have attic access above the garage to run wiring.

On the 220 outlets, what are your recommendations to add 220 outlets around the perimeter of the finished garage? I'm trying to do this cleanly without tearing into the sheet rock so I've considered installing wall mounted boxes and running EMT back to the panel. However, how will I run the wiring into the panel if I'm coming from the inside of the walls?

Similar on the outlets, there are only two, four foot strip lights in the garage now so I want to add a number of additional four foot, T-8 fixtures. I believe the light fixtures are on two different circuits so my plan was to just jump off of those for the new lighting, splitting it as evenly as possible based on location to the existing fixtures. Here again, what's the simplest way to use tap off of the existing inside the ceiling for the new fixtures? Or, should I just run new wiring and circuits for the new fixtures?

Thanks,
Brett

[Doug Ladendorf]

You might want to run both 220v and 110v outlets around the perimeter alternating between two circuits each (e.g. first group [220-circuit A/110-circuit B] then next group [220-circuit C/110-circuit D] and repeat around the garage). I also put outlets in the ceiling and ran convenience plugs down the support poles for outlets in the middle of the garage. I'd suggest a dedicated circuit for your DC.

[Brett Bobo]

Thanks, Doug. I should have mentioned that there are a number of 110 outlets already installed. I'm not following you exactly on alternating between 220 and 110 so can you please clarify? Maybe this is a moot point since the 110's are already there now...

[Doug Ladendorf]

Sorry, I know that doesn't sound clear. Still may be a useful concept with just the 220. Basically this would be using two different 220v circuits that you run along the wall alternating the outlets between them so if you have two neighboring machines they can be on separate circuits. Hopefully that's more clear?

[Jim German]

How many 220 tools do you have? Most of my 220 tools stay pretty much in the same spot all the time, so I've run a dedicated outlet for each of them. I'd probably just run a few to where you think you'll need them and then maybe add one or two more.

As for lights, I actually just spent this weekend re-wiring all of my lights to be on a single switch. When I originally did them I had them on two separate switches, thinking I might not want them all on all the time. I always ended up just turning them all on anyway though.

[Brad Sperr]

It sounds like you might already have a flush mount panel in your garage. If so, you could fish the wire for your 220v circuit from the panel into the back of a surface mount junction box installed below the panel. You could then install the first 220v receptacle in that junction box and run the conduit out of the side of the box to your other receptacles.

Do the fluorescent lights that are already installed on the ceiling have a knockout in the end plate? If so, you can feed directly from those lights to the new ones that you install with some AC cable (secured properly to the ceiling). It seems strange that the two lights in your garage would be on separate circuits. Even so, I don't think you need to worry about balancing the load on these circuits since the amp draw for fluorescent ballasts is so low.

[Brett Bobo]

Brad,
You're correct, there are two panels in the garage that are flush mounted so the primary access to each panel is behind the wall. That's a good idea about adding a junction box under the panel and then making penetrations in the wall to get access to the panels.

I'm not sure about the knockouts on the strip lights but probably so. I'll have to take a look the next time I'm there and there's a chance I may just replace both of those anyways with better lighting. What's installed now is just the standard strip light with the frosted lens, similar to what you'd see in a laundry room. As far as these strip lights being on separate circuits, I just took a guess based on each being operated by a separate switch and located about 20' from each other. These could very well be on the same circuit too.

Jim,
I have five machines running on 220 pulling as much as 30A for the table saw and planer. The remainder of them are on 20A breakers. So, I'll have to run several different circuits based on amp draw. I'm primarily trying to figure out the cleanest way of running wire in a finished space without demoing walls and ceilings any more than necessary.

Thanks,
Brett