Shop wiring help (I think again =)), 3 phase question as well.

[Chris Pasko]

Ok guys, I am not sure if I touched this in my past posts or not but I am finally getting ready to do some wiring in the shop and need to make sure I have everything I need as I don't want to open the walls up later on and add circuits. I am of course not looking for any type of specific answer, but rather a general formula I may be able to use.

My shop is 36x40' with 9' ceilings at the side and 12' at the center. I am using OSB on the walls with a 1x10 between shops to span the gap (As seen by a fellow creeker on here and looked great) so I will be putting receptacles there. I was thinking every 48" I could put a double gang box with every other on on the same circuit. I also need some 220v receptacles through out as well as 3 phase. Where should these guys go? I was thinking at about 18" off the floor but where, I cant put them in the same box (well at least doest seem like a great idea). I think I will get 1 or 2 of the in wall mounted retractable extension cords on the two 40' walls (used to be on lee valley cant find them now). I also want some 3 phase and 220v drops from the ceiling. All of this and I have NO idea where I will be placing my tools yet hehe.

So my main objective is to figure this out by this evening so I can hang boxes tomorrow and have my electrician down by this weekend.

Lastly I will be putting a 3 phase panel in directly next to the regular panel. I will be putting an addition on the back of the shop eventually for the rotary phase converter, dust collection, air compressor, and furnace. So I need to run a main wire from the 3 phase panel to the back of the shop so when I put the addition on I can hook the converter up with out opening the walls to re wire for it. Do you guys know what wire I should run for this?

There was a thread on here where someone had the same setup as I am wanting to do, but after about 30 minutes of searching I cant for the life of me find the thread. It was just from a few months ago.

Thanks guys!

[John Harden]

Without knowing where you'll place your tools, it'll be tough. However, don't forget that where you place them at first will not likely be where they are 5 years later on. I move stuff more often than I thought.

I have a 3 1/2 car garage that makes up my shop and had the same situation as you (without 3 phase needs). I covered the walls in firring strips and covered everything with phillipine mahogany plywood. The electrical wires were run between the firring strips and gang boxes are surface mounted on the plywood about 18" off the floor all the way around the shop.

One decision I had to make was how many to put on each circuit and how many to run. Because I didn't know where the tools would go, I elected to put 120V boxes about every 4-6 feet or so, depending on location and convenience along the wall. I also made each one a dedicated circuit, allowing a full 20 amps of availability at each site. This has turned out to be a good decision. Maybe a little overkill, but I've never overloaded a circuit yet and I have a lot of flexibility.

I did know where I was likely to place the tablesaw, planer and dust collector, so I ran 240V circuits there. You can always do the same and run extra. Another option would be to run 2-3 dedicated runs up to J boxes in the ceiling area. You can then tap into them and run the drop down lines to your tools when you finally decide where to put them.

Also, don't forget that by running each of your 120V circuits as dedicated runs straight back to the panel, you can easily convert any of them to 240V in the future. Just change out the breaker and plug making sure to not exceed the capacity of the wiring or of the subpanel. I ran mainly 12 gauge wire with about 4 or so 10 gauge runs for heavy tools. All in all, I think I wound up with 15 or 16 dedicated outlets all over the garage. Some will rarely, if ever get used, but they're there if I need them.

The cost of wiring, J boxes and outlets is not that much, so overkill is not a bad thing. I've never heard anyone say, "I've just go too many outlets out here".

Works well for me.

Regards,

John

[Paul B. Cresti]

Chris,
I see your fleet is ready to dock! I hope all goes well with their landing.

Like already said without knowing where you will place your machines you will be just plain guessing. When I first moved into the shop I have now I had not one single 3 phase machine so wiring was not too bad even though I had a ton. Running 220v lines off of a 30amp breaker (sized for the intended load) required 8ga wire at places and in some places I used 10ga wire for 20 amp 220v circuits. All other "normal" 110 lines are 12ga. Some of this wire was very hard to work with so... give you electrician a break and give him oversized single boxes to work with! All of my 3phase stuff is currently coming off of the RPC to a power distribution block and from there hard wired to all my 3phase machine via 8 or 10 ga SOW cable. I did this because A) my 3 phase machines came much later B) I know I will be some day changing my layout so I did not want to rip up the walls to install 3 phase wiring.

So... I strongly recommend to slow down and plan out your shop first. Think of how you will be using your machines, lay them out in the space and then decide where you will need outlets.....

[Rob Will]

Chris,
I'm currently working on a new shop as well. My plans are to install all 110V outlets flush with the OSB wall on about 4-6 dedicated,color coded circuits. These will be 48" off the floor.

All 220V and 3 phase circuits will come from a wall mounted conduit with a large junction box about every 8'. This will be mounted near the ceiling You can drop out of any one of these junction boxes anywhere / anytime and even add wires if need be. I will most likely use 8 x 8 x 4 plastic boxes. Some people prefer steel. The main feeder conduit to these junction boxes will be 2" pvc coming right off the panel. For this reason there may be some advantage to surface mounting the main panel or at the very least, attach the OSB wall panel with screws for later access.

If you think about it, the tools most likley to require special wiring are the heavy items, some of which you may not own yet. The 110V stuff is no big deal.

Rob

[tod evans]

chris, i wired my shop for both single and 3 phase. what i did was run a raceway down the center of the building to allow for future flexability. the smallest wire i used was 10 gauge, all 110 circuits are wired with 10 just for overkill. all 220 single phase are 6 gauge. the three phase varies according to load but i oversized the wire on all circuits. each three phase run from the raceway terminates at a fused dissconnect within 6 feet of the machine. to feed your panel i would go no smaller than double ought for a short run.......this may be overkill but you never know what the future will bring and a few extra bucks now just might save you headaches later.....02 tod

[lou sansone]

for the 3 phase circuits plan on running some 20, 30 and possibly 40 amp circuits. 40 amps is pretty large though, and unless you get into the bigger wide belts you wont need it. I run conduit that is oversized and simply pull in the needed guage of wire as the machine showes up. You can pull out smaller stuff if you do need a larger circuit later on and the cost is pretty small.

lou

[Chris Pasko]

Thanks guys, again you have given me many useful suggestions. I will go over everything with my electrician and get things moving. I have decided to run the 110's @ 4' intervals @ 52" off the floor. I like the idea of running the 220 and 3 phase at the ceiling height and dropping to the machines, voltage drop wouldn't be an issue would it? Still in the air but that is an idea I like.

So you guys know what I am working with I have the format kappa 40, format dual 51, format profil 45, and the rl160. All of these are three phase and thus I need a few 3 phase outlets =). I also have a oneway 1018 and a large drum sander which is 220, need to pickup a few sanding machines I think will be 220. I just need to make sure that this is all wired for to make it easier in the future as you guys know how it is. The only upgrade to the fleet may be a nice wide belt sander which would be three phase.

I am a one man hobbyist shop so only one machine and the dust collector will run at one time.

All the osb will be screwed on because sure as hell I will need to add something later on it just happens heh.

Thanks for all the input guys, a great source!