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Walkway lighting, shop to house

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hetkind

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Johnson City, Tennessee
The wife has to work all weekend...and I have a little project to work on.

It is a good three hundred feet, up a hill and through the woods from the house to the shop. Last month, while we were pulling communication wiring, we installed an extra conduit between the house and shop, and this one runs down the access road. And we put in T's, marked for posts, got lights and selctected four nice silver birch posts from the stockpile.

This weekend's tasks is to drill and notch the posts for light mounting, then plant them at the assigned spots. They have already been coated with copious amounts of linseed oil for preservation. They have also been air seasoning for about six months now also.

Once posts are mounted, then some conduit to the T's and finally three way switches so they can be controlled at either end, convenience outlets on GFCI at each post and wired up to it's own 20 amp circuit, and run with 12 ga wire. The wire pulls will get a bit complicated with extra wires in the conduit for the three ways switch and to run all the bulbs and switches in true parrell fashion.

With CFL bulbs, at 23 watts each, normal load with all four bulbs on will be 92 watts, leaving 19 amps available on the circuit, if and when needed.

Howard
 
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H

hetkind

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Johnson City, Tennessee
All we need is enough light to get from the shop lights to the house lights, and avoid walking off the road, down a steep grade, into the stream crossing:)
 
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aandpdan

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Umm, voltage drop is going to get you. The distance is too long. 3 ways are going to hurt as well as you've effectively doubled the distance of the run.

For 300 feet with #12 3 amps is the about the max you can draw on that circuit for a 3% voltage drop so your lighting is fine.

On your convenience outlets, once you start drawing about 10 amps you have a 10% voltage drop and that will noticeably effect any power tools. If you try to draw 20 amps you'll have a 19% voltage drop.

These are rough calculations. Depending upon the distance to each post and how you've wired it these will change.

FYI, NEC 210.19 FPN No. 4.says "voltage drop to the furthest outlet does not exceed 5 percent. That would be #6 for just under a 5% drop at 20 amps.
 
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Kevin54

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It is a good three hundred feet, up a hill and through the woods from the house to the shop.
Click to expand...

All we need is enough light to get from the shop lights to the house lights, and avoid walking off the road, down a steep grade, into the stream crossing
Click to expand...

The first thing that came to my mind when I read the first posting was "over the river and through the woods" :lol_hitti

Sorry. Couldn't help but chuckle to myself. Back to the regular scheduled programming:)
 
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hetkind

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good point, the expected use for the convenience outlets are for a radio, the extremely rare use of a power tool but most probably for a battery tender for a vehicle kept in ready status on a pull out.

aandpdan said:
Umm, voltage drop is going to get you. The distance is too long. 3 ways are going to hurt as well as you've effectively doubled the distance of the run.

For 300 feet with #12 3 amps is the about the max you can draw on that circuit for a 3% voltage drop so your lighting is fine.

On your convenience outlets, once you start drawing about 10 amps you have a 10% voltage drop and that will noticeably effect any power tools. If you try to draw 20 amps you'll have a 19% voltage drop.

These are rough calculations. Depending upon the distance to each post and how you've wired it these will change.

FYI, NEC 210.19 FPN No. 4.says "voltage drop to the furthest outlet does not exceed 5 percent. That would be #6 for just under a 5% drop at 20 amps.
Click to expand...
 
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Aceman

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hetkind said:
we installed an extra conduit between the house and shop, and this one runs down the access road. And we put in T's, marked for posts, got lights and selctected four nice silver birch posts from the stockpile.
Click to expand...

Are you planning on burying the T's? Common practice is 2 conduits coming out of the ground at posts. One in, one out. How is it that you're using T's and keeping them accessible?

For your receptacle circuit, I would run 10's minimum.
 
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mrb

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do you have 3 ways at each end of this 300ft switching the lights? If so, I would use them to switch a relay / contactor at the supply side of the line which then switches the power to the lights. Otherwise your last lamp has 900 feet of wire infront of it due to the 3 ways. I have some 120vac coil 40a contact relays if you need one....
 
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hetkind

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Johnson City, Tennessee
mrb said:
do you have 3 ways at each end of this 300ft switching the lights? If so, I would use them to switch a relay / contactor at the supply side of the line which then switches the power to the lights. Otherwise your last lamp has 900 feet of wire infront of it due to the 3 ways. I have some 120vac coil 40a contact relays if you need one....
Click to expand...

Those are my plans...but for a normal load of 92 watts or under a one amp on 12 gage wire, I should be OK for the actual number of hours these lights will actually be on...

Howard
 
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JTG

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New Jersey
hetkind said:
Walking is good exercise also...and since the garage is up the hill from the house anyhow, where would I park the golf cart at the house?

Howard
Click to expand...

Golf cart garage of course!!!

I can see the build thread now.
 
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ddawg16

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I'm assuming you ran 1/2" conduit....
Why not put in a second set of wires for the 'convience' outlets? That way the lights should be uneffected.

As for distance...I think you will be fine with the lighting....if we assume one post at each end and the remaining two evenly spaced in between....that is about 100' between lights....or 50' to the point of the least amount of light....I have a 23W CFL on the side of my garage providing light for the whole yard.....plenty bright at even 40'.

BTW....you owe us pictures....
 
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hetkind

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Johnson City, Tennessee
Actually, I am running 3/4 nmc...I could run a whole seperate set of wires of for the convenience outlets in the same conduit...I have the wire on hand. I am not about to redig the trench, snow is coming...

Howard
 
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