I have had several mini anxiety attacks about the wiring. I got up in the attic and it appeared the entire house was wired with 14 gauge wire. However, the panel is all 20 amp breakers. This is apparently a no-no. I messaged marknfw about the possibility of mixing 12 and 14 gauge wire and let him know what I had there already and he confirmed that you should not use 14 on a 20 amp circuit. This really sent my anxiety up a notch.

However.........................................

I just ASSUMED it was 14 because it was all white romex. So, just for shits and giggles I got up there to inspect it more closely. It is 12! Woot!. I did not know that 12 came in white. I should analyze things more carefully. Anyways, I'm good to go.

sweet! I was thinking maybe they had the panel replaced by some yahoo that just said F it and put all 20s in. Nice to know the house is done in 12.

Yeah, quite a relief.

I'm still trying to figure out a game plan.

The back wall has one receptacle and a light switch. It also has an empty box where it looks like a receptacle went. There is capped wire in it. I was able to confirm today that that wire is indeed a separate circuit. I believe it is the only thing on that circuit. I have no idea why they took this offline. My plan on this wall is to install a double gang where the single gang is now. Then remove the wire to the empty gang and connect that to the existing circuit. So, the end result on the back wall will be a light switch, a single gang receptacle (for the washing machine) and a double gang for mostly battery chargers.

One of the side walls of the garage is standard stud/sheetrock. There is a single gang plug close to the door that only has the sprinkler system on it. I'm going to leave that alone. Then, there is only one single gang receptacle for the rest of the garage on that wall. It is somehow connected to the same circuit as the back wall. It is not the end of the line, though. There are two sets of wires coming into the box. However, when I get up in the attic I only see one wire going down the wall. There is actually another very small black wire with it. I have no clue what that could be. My suspicion is it might go to the water heater which is close to the receptacle. But, back to the receptacle. I thought I could just pull that wire up and disconnect that receptacle from the circuit but apparently the line goes somewhere through the wall.

My plan was to start a new circuit where that plug on the side wall is, then add two more receptacles along that wall. Then run wire through the attic and down the opposite wall, which is cinder block. Then put three more receptacles on that wall.

I had this sort of wishful thinking strategy to not tear up the sheetrock wall but I don't see any way around it if I do what I want to do. Probably will make life easier in the long run if I do take it out. I thought I might just put pegboard up (I love pegboard) where the sheetrock was but the other side of the wall is our hallway. I guess it would still be fine if I shoved insulation back behind the pegboard.

I'm going to take a bit to think about all of this.

in any area of my work space i use 4 gang boxes. makes it easy to plug in more things and the two ones dont allow two bigger plugins to be used.
plus i find things i like to leave plugged in when not using. especially in my work shops. where i also run a switched plug in with extra outlets on it. i dont use more than the ratings anyway which are less than the breaker strength.
plus all freezers need an alarm or at least a night light or something on the circuit in case it gets tripped. as you do not want to find out your freezer is out from the smell.

so on a 20 amp circuit you can only or should load it 80% so that 16 amps or about 1900 watts. so load each one accordingly. check what your washer and freezer use to see if you can run both together if on the same line.

oh and you have to use the start up load on things with motors.

I think I'm good.

The current circuit will have washer, garage door opener, sprinkler system (maybe? ) and garage lights. These were already on it anyway so i should be fine.

The new circuit will just have receptacles for freezer, power tools, additional lights.

I got the sheetrock off. My father-in-law had a nifty electric sheetrock cutting tool that saved me a ton of time and effort.

I'm glad I bit the bullet and took that off. There was some unexpected wiring that it exposed. It will make life much easier.

Are the dark places in the insulation a concern?

I hope not...

The receptacle on the left in the top picture is the wiring to the unused circuit. In the attic the roof comes down to that wall. There is no decking around that area any misstep would result in gouin through the garage ceiling. Not only is it a super tight space there, there is duct work there as well. It took me about 20 minutes to squeeze my 65 year old 6' 4" body in there to get enough leverage to pull it. Fortunately, once I got it going it wasn't too hard.

Then I ran that wire down the wall where the receptacle on the left in the other picture is. I hit a horizontal support brace that I didn't expect so I had to remove some extra sheetrock.

Then I ran some new romex down the right side. That was a pain because the hole in the top plate wasn't big enough. I had to drill and chip away wood to get it through.

I'll end up tying these two via receptacles. Then I'll run the new romex across the garage to the opposite wall.

Lots of hot work in tight spaces but I'm making progress.

the dark stuff is mold. you might want to remove it while its open. not a giant concern but it must have been damp there.
so is that white stuff.

spray it with some boraxo mixed with water and let it dry around there harmless to you. thats what kills mold.

you should pull off a lower panel for a look

The Romex 12 I see now is a yellow color, but at one time it was all white. The wire was probably made before they switched over.

Google says the switch to color coding took place in 2001.

https://diy.stackexchange.com/questi...dard-in-the-us

Side note: I have fun betting the over/under on how long it takes me to realize that I can just google or youtube for information.

A month ago I had to help someone change the axle on a Model T, and I fretted for a couple of days about whether I could remember how. Then I remembered: Youtube!

or just pull the cover off a box and look to see the size. or look at the wire's thickness. and if you cant tell you likely not doing anything that matters.

There is no lower panel. That is cinder block.

I'm wondering if that is from condensation. I lived in a cinder block house that would "sweat". The really bad spot in the first pic is right behind the dryer. I dunno.

Its stamped on the wire.

Boat update. I contacted 2 people to take a look at our lift.

The first guy came out right away. He proposed using a use lift he had stored somewhere and cobble together everything to make things work. He was pretty scatterbrained and ended up giving me a "bid" handwritten on a piece of paper. He wanted 1/2 down before starting. I didn't get a warm fuzzy but I'm in a bind.

The second guy was recommended by a friend. However, the day he was scheduled to look at it he came down with covid. I felt I was sort of in a bind and contemplated going with the first guy but I decided to wait because of my uneasiness. He finally came and told me that there was no way our current lift was suitable, which I suspected. He said the entire thing needed to be replaced. Initially he said he didn't think he could get it done by the end of the month. He gave me a professional bid but it was significantly higher. But, he wanted 1/2 of material cost down only the day it gets delivered. I got a really good feeling from him, plus a good recommendation, so I went with him. When I told him to get started, he said that after talking to the manufacturer, he thought he might get it done on time.

One note, though. I hadn't really measured our dock vs. the boat. Everything looked ok but when I talked to the second guy he immediately picked up on how the boat was going to fit. We have mangroves sticking out about 6' from the seawall. Those are going to have to be trimmed down all the way to the seawall to get the boat in. He offered to move the posts out but said that was another big chunk of change PLUS a 6 month wait for permits. I'll go with the mangrove trim. I've done some research on that since mangroves are protected here. Homeowners can trim mangroves less than 16' tall all they want as long as you don't mess with the roots.

First world problems, eh?

On a related note. There is a lot on the end of our circle that has some boat trailers parked on it. Turns out my next door neighbor owns it and will rent me a spot for what I'm paying to park it across town. Woot!

We had an Amazon delivery scheduled this morning. I had to be available to let them in so my plan was to get up in the attic after it got here.

It never got here.

So I decided to at least be somewhat productive. Got three receptacles wired and tested.

The lower single receptacle is the existing circuit. Im undecided on whether to leave it or take it out.

Nice work. You're supposed to sheetrock before you put the plugs in though!

Yeah, I know. I'm so paranoid i might have done something wrong that I wanted to make sure everything works.

My sheetrock skills are almost nonexistent anyway so I'm sure I'll be patching spots no matter what. They have little receptacle patches that look fairly easy.

Also, there has to be some trick you guys have for cramming all those wires into the box. It was the hardest part.

This attic is going to be the death of me. I have to crawl to get where I need to be and most of it isn't decked. Slow going but I'm getting there.

Things have changed since the Austin boodoggle. I didn't need reading glasses then. Well, maybe for very fine print. I need them for everything now. I can't even strip wire without them. It's really made it a lot harder to do anything. They keep falling off or I set them down and can't find them. Not to mention I'm just moving slower these days.

Yesterday was not productive. Spectrum guy showed up and was here for over 3 hours trying to figure out how to get a feed to one of the bedrooms. I was able to run wire across the attic to the other set of receptacles. I'm somewhat close to finishing the new circuit.

I thought it would be easy to hang lights but I'm sort of struggling now. I just assumed I could screw hooks into the roof trusses but the roof(s) go all different directions and I'm having trouble finding wood to anchor the chains. The lights are really light and I guess I could just put anchors in the sheetrock and be done with it, but I really don't want to do that. This will be today's challenge.

Would it be worthwhile to cut down a piece of plywood into strips, and make a little sidewalk up in the attic to make getting around somewhat easier (and less likely to end in ceiling patching?)

About finding the trusses, maybe go up in the attic with a cordless drill and very small bit. Move the insulation away right next to the truss you're targeting, and poke a small hole through to mark its position for light hanging?

And biggerboat said let there be light, and there was light. And biggerboat saw the light, and it was good.

Anyways, it took a couple days, but success.....

Yesterday I finally finished wiring everything. I have a couple of little things to do but it all works.

We got sheetrock that we hope to hang today. My wife has offered to do the taping and floating. I've tried this before and failed miserably. I told her i would paint it if she did that.

While I've been busy with this, my wife hass been full speed ahead on the yard. Our goal is to eliminate grass in the back and just have plants. We brought some large potted plants with us that we will be putting in the ground.

A couple of shovel loads in and I see a white wire. Turns out it goes to our dock. Same romex thats in the house. No conduit. SMH.

On the good side, its incredibly easy to dig here. Unlike Austin where its full of rocks and takes forever to dig a small hole.