Look what I did

[Marion Smith]

It's 150' to the other one of these. Rented a Toro trencher, but there was still more hand digging at each end than my back was prepared to tolerate. I'm tired, sore, out of days off, and there is a 150ft long dirt snake in my backyard that I hope settles in soon. Wire is in the conduit, but still need to purchase and install the sub-panel and branch circuits. What a job...ugh.

[John Ziebron]

Hi Marion, looks like you did a nice job on the end. I know it's a lot of work. My current home, that I purchased a year and a half ago, has a larger pole barn that I turned into my WW shop but there was no electric run to it. It was a 65 foot run. I already had a small compact tractor so that gave me an excuse to buy a backhoe attachment for digging my trench (plus I ended up digging out 37 stumps on the property). As you mention, still a bit of hand digging to do too.

It looks like you used 2 inch conduit for your service lines like I did. But when you say "dirt snake" I'm thinking you mean your trench is not filled back in yet. If so, you might consider adding another smaller conduit line. I added a 3/4 inch conduit line and put in a coax cable, an ethernet cable and a pair of wires for anything else like a switch or signal device. Communication wires like this must be in a separate conduit.

[John K Jordan]

It's 150' to the other one of these. Rented a Toro trencher, but there was still more hand digging at each end than my back was prepared to tolerate. I'm tired, sore, out of days off, and there is a 150ft long dirt snake in my backyard that I hope settles in soon. Wire is in the conduit, but still need to purchase and install the sub-panel and branch circuits. What a job...ugh.

Good for you! Just imagine the feeling of accomplishment when you flip on the breakers for the first time!! And I'm sure you saved a ton of money.

I hate those trenchers - dug about 1200' with a diesel-powered one to run water and power to the new barn site. That thing liked to beat me to death. Before I got everything in the ground dirt started falling in so I had plenty of quality time with a trenching shovel. Ack.

Far easier but with a much bigger mess: For my shop I dug a 250' trench with the 16" bucket on my backhoe. The nice thing was the trench was big enough I could work inside it. The mess was filling it back in, tamping with the tractor, and smoothing out the ground. I did run an extra conduit, empty except for a length of rope in case of future need. I also put in a smaller conduit with an cat-5 ethernet cable for wifi in the shop.

No way I could have afforded to pay someone to do all the wiring (and the excavation, construction, everything.) I did wait until I was retired to even start. I can't even imagine doing it all while working a day job. Yikes.

JKJ

[Mike Heidrick]

Congrats bro!! I am in the DIY club too with a day job. I feel ya!!

[Marion Smith]

Thanks guys, I feel a lil better knowing I'm not alone with the aches and pains of the diy-er. The trench is all filled back in, just the mound of dirt over the trench left to settle. I may get brave and run my Cub Loboy over all the places I can get to and not fold over plants and such. Shoving the wire in the conduit wasn't as bad as I thought. I think it helped that I glued the LB on last after I put the wire in. I was able to shove the wire straight in. Also a help was choosing the long sweeping 90's instead of the short ones. I only have one 45 in the run also. It's a work in progress while tending to my usual daily chores and saving to pay cash. It will be really sweet to throw that breaker for sure. No extra conduit run. I already have my antenna wire buried 3" deep right in the dirt for my radio. I don't have any plans for TV or computer out there.

[John K Jordan]

I think it helped that I glued the LB on last after I put the wire in. I was able to shove the wire straight in. Also a help was choosing the long sweeping 90's instead of the short ones.

My wire was a 250 foot bundle of two copper #1s, a #2, and a ground with several curves around trees and I really worried about getting it through the conduit so I cheated. I laid the wire out on the ground, slid each piece of conduit over the bundle and glued it in to the last one, then slid the whole thing into the trench. Even then it was tricky making the bends at both ends. A major pain was digging deep by hand under a couple of 1' diameter roots from a massive oak tree. The option of completely skirting that tree would have added 100' to the line, increased the wire size and cost a lot more, and required working around and through other utilities buried here on the farm including a 7200 volt underground power line to my transformer. (no way, no how, not me)

The whole thing wears me out now just thinking about it. I must have had a lot more energy back when I was 64.

One thing I'm sure you thought of but bears repeating: put in a breaker box with more spaces than you can imagine you will ever use! I put in a 20 space box (100 amp) and filled it up with just a couple of additions I didn't plan for, like adding a milling machine and metal lathe.

Be sure to post pictures of the progress!

JKJ

[Jim Becker]

I second John's advice on the "generous" panel suggestion...blank spaces are great, but not having spaces for future needs is an expensive bummer. There's not that much difference in cost for a physically larger panel when you amortize it over time.

[John K Jordan]

There's not that much difference in cost for a physically larger panel when you amortize it over time.

And the additional cost is so small that it is effectively free compared to the cost of the trenching, conduit, wire, fixtures, switches, foundation, walls, roof, etc. !!!

I used that logic to justify a larger air compressor, big cyclone, plasma cutter, new lathe, milling machine... Oops, I hope my wife doesn't read this.

JKJ

[Don Jarvie]

You can use a full panel, much bigger, in place of a sub.

[Garth Almgren]

I'm looking at doing the same in the next month or two so I can run a couple power and data conduits out to my office shed once I get it built. I've only got about 60 feet to trench, but I'm still not looking forward to it because my yard is crisscrossed with multiple zones of undocumented irrigation lines.

[John K Jordan]

I'm looking at doing the same in the next month or two so I can run a couple power and data conduits out to my office shed once I get it built. I've only got about 60 feet to trench, but I'm still not looking forward to it because my yard is crisscrossed with multiple zones of undocumented irrigation lines.

Yikes, hire a locator service?

I ran two ethernet cables in one conduit in case one quit. I know that sounds paranoid. I might use one to connect to the video surveillance system. BTW, if you didn't know it you can connect a second WiFi router by ethernet cable and configure it as a seamless extension of the first router - I get continuous, uninterrupted WiFi walking from the house to the shop. I like this better than using an repeater.

Also, my shop has a metal roof and nothing I did gave me a good signal, including trying several amplifiers. I ended up putting a femto cell (Verizon) in the shop. This connects to ethernet and works like a public cell tower but with limited range. Full bars now.

I may have mentioned, but since the trench was there I ran an extra 2" conduit containing nothing but a rope. Just in case.

JKJ

[Malcolm McLeod]

I'm looking at doing the same in the next month or two so I can run a couple power and data conduits out to my office shed once I get it built. I've only got about 60 feet to trench, but I'm still not looking forward to it because my yard is crisscrossed with multiple zones of undocumented irrigation lines.

Maybe this will help? I am told by people that do such for a living, that it is easier to just cut the existing irrigation lines when trenching for new services, and then repair/splice them back together. It rubs me the wrong way, but then again I'm not trying to earn a living with a shovel...

[Ken Fitzgerald]

Nice work Marion! The first time I rented a Ditchwitch, I accidentally kicked in the clutch before I engaged the drive. I watched the rotating chain pull the machine forward and climb a 48" chain link fence before I could stop it. It cut the fence as it climbed.

I'm looking at doing the same in the next month or two so I can run a couple power and data conduits out to my office shed once I get it built. I've only got about 60 feet to trench, but I'm still not looking forward to it because my yard is crisscrossed with multiple zones of undocumented irrigation lines.

Garth, periodically I have had to add things and as stated by another member, it's easier to repair the irrigation lines than try to accurately locate them. I installed my own sprinkler systems using PVC. Later I added some more circuits using funny pipe. I had to repair both last year after our kitchen addition build. It's really quite easy.

[Garth Almgren]

Maybe this will help? I am told by people that do such for a living, that it is easier to just cut the existing irrigation lines when trenching for new services, and then repair/splice them back together. It rubs me the wrong way, but then again I'm not trying to earn a living with a shovel...

Yeah, that's probably what will end up happening if I do hit one, though I really hope that I won't - my pipes seem to be at about 24" and I was only going to trench to 18" since I'll be using PVC conduit.

I was putting in a fence and hit a pipe while digging for one of the posts, and it was a bit of a pain to dig out around the break because there were 3 pipes bundled together at that point, so I had to dig around the break far enough to bend the broken pipe up enough to splice in a repair joint. I did learn a cool trick about sawing through PVC pipe with a synthetic string - it was such tight quarters that my tubing cutter wouldn't work.

[Garth Almgren]

Yikes, hire a locator service?

I ran two ethernet cables in one conduit in case one quit. I know that sounds paranoid. I might use one to connect to the video surveillance system. BTW, if you didn't know it you can connect a second WiFi router by ethernet cable and configure it as a seamless extension of the first router - I get continuous, uninterrupted WiFi walking from the house to the shop. I like this better than using an repeater.

Also, my shop has a metal roof and nothing I did gave me a good signal, including trying several amplifiers. I ended up putting a femto cell (Verizon) in the shop. This connects to ethernet and works like a public cell tower but with limited range. Full bars now.

I may have mentioned, but since the trench was there I ran an extra 2" conduit containing nothing but a rope. Just in case.

JKJ

I'm going to be calling 811 but I don't think they do irrigation pipes. I'll go with what Malcolm and Ken suggested and just let 'er rip and fix any damage after the fact.
Good tip on the spare conduit - I was going to run two oversize conduits while its dug up for the high and low voltage with a pull string. I'm planning on having a gigabit switch at the very least out in the office shed and probably an access point as well since I have multiple computers to deal with.