Electrical Extension Question

I bought a Lincoln ac-225-S arc welder from someone and he gave me a 30' 10/3 extension cord with it.  The specs on the welder panel call for 50 amps max input on 20% duty cycle.  Is the 10 ga. wire really sufficient for this welder?  I will also be installing a receptacle for the welder, will a 30 amp breaker on 10/3 do the job or do I need to move up to 8 ga. on 40amp or 6 ga. on 50 amp?  If I go up to a 40 or 50 amp breaker can I even use that extension cord?  I doubt I would ever weld anything thicker than 3/16" to 1/4" max.
      

Hello everyone,I have a question about a forklift battery charger i bought. Ok,its an exide forklift battery charger 36 volts. It weighs a ton so i am having to run a 25 foot extension cord to it. My question is,my 220 wall outlet has three holes so i went to lowes and made a 220 extension cord. Now i get to the ac cable coming out of the charger that hooks to the extension cord(plug was cut off),there are 4 wires coming out of the cable green,white,red, and black......the guy at lowes said i could buy a 3 prong plug for it to plug into the female end of the extension cord because one of the 4 wires is probably neutral and i wouldnt have to hook up but the green,white and either the red or black.....is he right? Inside the charger the red,white and black all go to big fuses and green to ground. Also above the fuses it says "factory set to 480 volts ac". I guess my question is,will this charger only work using a 4 prong wall outlet(mine only has 3) and with 4 prong plug hooked to cable coming out of the charger itself or is the guy at lowes right in saying that only the red OR black wire has to be used? Sorry if this is confusing but ive searched and searched online for 3 days and havent found anything. Thanks in advance for any help-Kevin
      

I participate in a Pop-up camper discussion group (Popup Portal) and the following was posted reguarding the use of 30 amp extension cords:





"I just returned from Mobile Mart, my go to store for anything for my TT.  Was looking for a 25ft extension for my 30 amp power cord. The salesman  filled me in on some tips about buying extension cords for service.



1.  Never buy a black cord unless you have to have it now or it's the only  thing they have. The black cord absorbs and holds heat. We all know what  to much heat or amperage draw will do to an extension cord. Cords come  in a variety of colors.....orange, blue, yellow, etc. I picked up a  yellow one for visibility.



2. When your plugged in and have left  over cord DO NOT coil it up on the ground. Spread it out so any and all  heat can disipate easier. I usually pull just enough out to reach the  box and leave the rest inside the camper. I don't believe he was talking  about what is in the camper that but whatever is outside the camper  needs to be spread out.



3. If you have to have a lot of line  spread out to be able to plug in he suggested some type of covering to  shade the cord. I'm pretty sure this would pertain to monthly campers  and others that stay in one spot for awhile. Even still a good idea for  those of us that are down south here with temps in the triple digits."



I suggested that most (or all) of this is BS.



What say you?
      

I spend alot of time outdoors and use my power tools or air compressor alot and use a 12 gauge contractors cord.  One problem I always have is that with my outdoor receptacle being above my deck sometimes the cord slips between the boards and hangs up and really causes a problem if the storm door is opened as it also catches the cord sometimes, and already damaged my other cord.



I am wondering if there are any issues with running the cord through pvc along the edge of the house and to the receptacle to protect it.



I am also wondering, since my old cord is damaged at one end, if rather than trying to repair it, if there is any code violation of running it into a weatherproof box and wiring it to a GFCI receptacle, reason I wonder this is that I have one on hand and have had no other use for it as I rent the house and cannot do any wiring to it, but it has no GFCI outlet which concerns me at times.
      

Installing a new cook top; the original plug was installed at the vent hood.  How do I move the plug to underneath the cabinet without tearing out the wall?
      

Hi.  This is not exactly home-improvement-related, but I'm hoping some of the electrical gurus out there can answer my question.  I am building an underwater fishing light.  It will basically be a sealed green acrylic tube with LED bulbs in it, powered by a 12V DC battery.  It will be submerged between 2-5 feet.  I imagine it will be used approximately between 2-6 hours at a time, so the cable will not be submerged in water or a wet area permanently. 



Obviously I am doing this to save $$ (they are expensive otherwise), and I find myself wondering why I can't buy an inexpensive extension cord (lamp-cord-style) and use it for the power from battery to light.  I started looking at garden lighting wire, but that stuff is very expensive.



Would auto electrical wire (with shrink tubing) be sufficient (though I'm not sure I can find shrink tubing with enough length)?  Speaker wire?  LOL. 



Any suggestions would be appreciated!



Edit: One thing I forgot to mention is that I don't want the power cord to be heavy at all.  Nice and light is the key!
      

Help!  We decided to raise the ceiling in our kitchen for some new taller cabinets. We have 30" cabinets with a 7' drop ceiling. By taking out the drop ceiling we can go to an 8' ceiling with 36" cabinets.  We just had the ceiling taken out and now I see I got a problem!



This is a 2 story home, the wall in question is a load bearing wall (runs through the center of the house) The main breaker panel is in this wall (the panel opening is in the adjacent family room)



As you can see in the photos I cannot extend the wall up because all of the home wiring is in the way!  I expected I might have to run longer wires but not this. 



Some ideas we've thought about...

notch the double 2x4s (not sure how much I need to notch or allowed to)



build a cove (box) and leave the wires like they are (might be an eyesore in our new kitchen)



put up a large crown moulding along the entire wall (would be the only crown moulding in the house)



extend the ceiling up 6-7" instead of 12" (should leave enough room for wire to stay)



I'm leaning to the notching option if I can find a way to reinforce that section.



Any ideas?



thanks!
      

I completed my whole house rewire last Fall (took 2 years and severely tested my wife's patience). I read 5 wiring books in the early stages but read Rex Cauldwell's Wiring a House with his above code suggestions near the end of the project and now im obsessing about some of the stuff I didnt do. What do you guys think of some of the suggestions, specifically,



1. Driving 8 ground rods and the wire must be continuous (I drove 4 but the #6 copper wire from the panel to rod 1 is 1 wire and the #6 wire from rod 1 through rod 4 is another wire but both are properly clampled to rod 1 with an acord clamp). Funny, even with 4 rods there is almost no current through the rods versus 2-3 amps through the traditional cold water pipe ground



2. 1 circuit for each duplex receptacle in bathrooms. Since I have a quad in each of the batchrooms, that would be 4 circuits instead of 1 (code allows an unlimited number of bathroom receptacles on one circuit which does seem odd)



3. Nothing shared with kitchen counter receptacles (ie kitchen wall and dining room on their own)



4. Dedicated circuits for everything - I added dedicted circuit for fridge, microwave and dishwasher/disposer, but did not separate the dishwasher disposer onto 2 circuits. There used to be what I called "Circuit X" which did kitchen counter, microwave, dishwasher, disposer, fridge, 2 kitchen counter outlets, dining room and 1 outside outlet. Wife frequently blew that one. Circuit X was divided into at least 5 circuits during the rewire



5. No switch loops - did 5 of these to save on carpentry/avoid certain box fill problems. Now 2011 code says no switch loops without a neutral. Oops?



Just wondering what you guys think.
      

Hi all

I'm renovating a rental home I bought. It has the original 90 year old fuse panel  and I'd like to replace it with a modern panelboard. Here's a picture of the current setup:







I'd like to demo the inset fuse box cabinet and then mount a new panel on the wall to the left.

The service conduit goes inside the stucco into the building. I'd like to cut it, put in junction box, and a sweep and extend the service to the left to the new panel



I called our electric co. to get the power disconnected and strangely the rep told me "Oh, people usually just work on it hot". Is this true/feasible??



Your advice is appreciated
      

Hello All,

Hopefully I am posting this in the correct forum!

I am new to the forum and I have a question I would like to pose.

I am trying to make an extension cable for my telescope hand control.

I have had good results with the 25' length  but it is to short . So I made another one 50' in length but it give me connection error codes. The cable is correct as it worked for a while .I am using an rj12 6pin connector with cat5 cable(24awg). The power supply is 12V DC with 2.5 amps running on house AC.

The question is: If I put a different power supply on that is 12v DC using 5.0 amps will the increase in amperage effect the DC current flow?



Thanks,

Don