Loading…
28
Didn't believe my supply house guy about 12 AWG for a 20A circuit, and I owe him a coffee now
Three years back I was wiring a small shop addition in Gary and grabbed a spool of 14 AWG for the 20A outlets because the price gap felt like a scam. My supply house guy, Ray, told me straight up that on a 60 foot run with a compressor and a welder on the same circuit, I'd be back for the right wire inside a month. I laughed it off until a weekend when the compressor kicked on, the lights dipped, and the breaker popped twice in one afternoon. Put a clamp meter on it and the startup draw on that run was way past what 14 could carry. Ripped out 40 feet of it and went to 12, and the voltage drop settled down to about 3 percent instead of the 7 I was seeing. Ray still brings it up every time I walk in. Anybody else get humbled by a counter guy who was just plain right?
1 comments
Log in to join the discussion
Log In1 Comment
joseph_green139h ago
Did you check the breaker trip curve before blaming the wire size?
6