180g peninsula tank build - First ever aquarium

[Sebae again]

Great ideas! Thanks for showing us all the steps of your tank build . Keep the pics coming!

[4lti7ude]

That cover your friends made for you is soooooo clean.

[mike31154]

Fine work, looking great.

One thing I noticed in your post #27 though, a long one, you show plumbing and electrical work. Says you used 16 gauge wiring routed to your GFCIs mounted int the stand, correct? Difficult to get a complete idea from the photos of exactly how you wired this up, but I'm assuming you're using an extension type cord (16 gauge) plugged into a normal wall outlet and routing that to two GFCIs in the stand? If so, I'd highly recommend bumping the wire guage up to at least 14. That's the standard size for a 15 amp circuit. By the sounds of it, you have two wall plugs available on different circuits. Why not take your two GFCIs in the stand and replace the standard wall outlets with them? Then all you need in the stand is normal outlets or even a good quality power bar or two with heavy gauge wire.

[Milad]

i believe its 3 16guage wires (thats what the rona guy said was standard for bathroom GFCI wiring.)

I wired the GFCI under the stand just beacause if I ever move the stand i dont want to move the GFCI outlets, just made more sense to me. Plus they were black and my stand is all black.

There is going to be about 4 power bars under the stand. Two Apex controllable power bars and two standard powerbars.

now that im searching around for standard gauage wire for the bathroom everything is saying 14!? WTH, im going to go bitch out the RONA people

[mike31154]

Some of the folks at RONA & Home Depot etc. know what they're talking about, retired tradespeople working for some extra cash. But as you can see, you need to be careful with any advice from large box stores. Any electrical contractor or specialty vendor would have provided you with more reliable info. If you want a good book on electrical code requirements for the homeowner, get the "Electrical Code Simplified, Residential" published by PS Knight. Soft cover book, red in colour for BC version, around $20 these days I think and available at.... RONA, Home Depot.... etc.

If you're going to go with larger gauge wire, might as well get 12 if you can. I can sort of see your point about having the GFCIs in the stand, but moving a 180? How often do you anticipate doing that? Receptacles are relatively easy to change, whether in the wall or in the stand. One other advantage of doing the wall, is you potentially save yourself one plug/recepacle interface. Each time you extend any circuit with an extension/plug and receptacle, you add resistance and potential power loss. Small perhaps, but it adds up, especially with undersize gauge wire and a controller and timer or two thrown in! The more continuous wire you have the better. If you do the wall receptacles, you could get by with heavy duty power bars alone, saving at least one plug/receptacle interface. With the GFCI or regular receptacles in the stand you'll have an extension cord from the wall powering the receptacles in the stand. Then you add another plug/receptacle interface for any power bars you use and finally you have yet another plug/receptacle interface from the power bar to the piece(s) of equipment you wish to power. You're going to end up with a lot of junctions there. By converting the wall receptacles and using power bars directly you could save yourself one of those.

Final thought, I don't recommend any plugs in the stand whatsoever. Try to keep anything with a plug and receptacle outside the stand. Less chance of humidity of the salty kind getting in there and causing you grief.

[Milad]

well whats ****ing me off is i asked the guy, what i need to wire GFCI in a bathroom type environment to code. He then grabbed the readily available card that was by the wires and said, 16 3. So i bought 16 3. if that card is wrong, someone is going to get a ass whoopin when I get to the store. Stuff like this ****es me off. I just asked few people where i work, what gauage should be used for wiring and they all quickly said 14. Seems as though its a standard thing to know!!!

Btw as far as the humidity, the plugs are kinda sectioned off away from the water. And you are right, not going to move the stand but the GFCI is for the stand so it just made sense.

[mike31154]

No biggie, the main thing is you now know what's required and it should be a relatively easy fix. You can always use the 16/3 as an extension cord for other gear around the house.