Electric Underground

No, Its not the name of a '70s band. It's what was worked on this morning. The B&L team had certain tasks requiring wire to be run underground. Two of these were dealt with today.

A post mounted lamp stands atop the stairs to the beach. The underground cable feeding it was cut during the excavation and needed to be reconnected. But to reconnect it, it first had to be found.  The guys had a handy gadget that attached to the wire [by way of an outlet at the base of the post] which sent a signal through the wires that could be received by a special wand.  After 10 or 15 min of wanding and test digging they found the end of the buried line.

Once found they needed to make a secure waterproof splice to new wire, and run it to the house. Oh, and to run it there, they needed to dig a trench. Good thing we're in sand, because two electricians dug about a 30 foot long 18 inch deep trench by hand.

The actual splice consists of a heavy duty mechanical connection
encased in a silicone filled, shrink wrap tube.
Here, Andy is shrinking the waterproof tube over the splice.

Otis finished digging the trench and assembled the conduit  into the house.
They then laid the new wire in the trench and fed it into the basement.

After a layer of backfill in the trench a caution tape was buried to
warn any future diggers that wire is below.

The second underground task was to find and reconnect the power to the water well.  This line was found using the same tool that sent a signal to the receiver wand. At the same location the existing water line from the well to the house will also have to be reconnected. This connection will be made by the plumbers once I let them dig their trench from the northeast corner of the house across to the southeast corner, and then over to the garage. Andy and Otis dug about 3 to 4 feet down to find the wire and pipe and Andy made a splice to the new wire. They then determined the length of wire needed to be buried along with the water pipe and coiled it in the hole to be installed in the plumbers trench.

After finding the well wire Andy went through the same splicing process.

In the afternoon -- a nice, sunny warm afternoon -- I got my hands dirty and caulked the new basement windows along the south wall. It was nice working on the house while enjoying one of the first days that actually felt like Spring. Unfortunately, no one took pictures of me working...so you'll have to take my word for it.

While I was outside the B&L crew retreated to the basement to work on making order to the existing wiring.  No action pictures -- I was caulking -- but there was an obvious change when I saw the day's progress.

The "rats nest" of wires under the old service panel is gone.
They have all been organized and routed to the new circuit breaker box.

Much of the order was created by eliminating the existing service panel
and replacing it by a large junction box.
[Yes, the wires will be put totally in the box and the cover lifted to seal them in.]

Besides organizing existing wires the crew provided feeds for future needs.
This junction box will be able to feed the dishwasher and (future) disposal.