Need some advice on electricity for the new 10x12 room

Hey there. Just bought a house and will be closing around the beginning of September. Will have a 10x12 room in the basement. 4x8 of it will have 2 air cooled 600's, while the other areas will be used for mothers, vegging, and storing all my supplies. Other area's will have three 90 watt led's (veg) and 4 t5's (mother).

Before I have the room built in the basement (yeah, I wish I could do this one on my own but I really have 0 carpentry experience) I will need to pay for the electrical upgrades and new outlets etc..

I am wondering what kind of upgrades I will need electrically. I am not 100% sure about the size of the panel just yet, but the house was built in the mid 60's and the woman moving out is in her late 90's (I am assuming there is no 200 amp panel awaiting me). Assuming I have between a 20-40 amp panel, what would be the best advice here? Upgrade the existing panel to 200 amps? Upgrade the existing panel and have a new, separate panel installed for my room? I would like to leave myself some wiggle room, meaning I could potentially move up to two 1000's or even 3 as the time passes. Any advice would be great here, as it's kind of hard to tell the electrician what my actual plans are.

Current plan is to tell the electrician I am building a 'work-out' room that will be the home of two 3 horsepower treadmills (I have read they can pull upwards of 1500-2000 watts while running). Not sure if I really need a cover story but I am family friends with my electrician so I assume some small talk will arise while we're in the basement.

Thanks guys.

-Still Stoned

For the size of that room I would say upgrade the main panel in the house. You can then have a sub panel dropped into the basement from a 100amp breaker in the main box (100amps should be sufficient. You can bump it up if need be). Once you have that sub panel in, you have the ability to drop plugs throughout your basement wherever you like. Bit of conduit and some time, you can have the entire place wired up perfect. When you start looking for timers and whatnot, use water heater timers for your ballasts as they are 240vac and cheap.

Thanks a bunch dude. I don't really know a whole lot when it comes to the electrical stuff. Really helps that I can turn to RIU


+Rep for the advice

no problem man. feel free to drop me pm's with questions. been a electrician for some time now so always willing to help as best i can.

what state are you in? You can go to alot of hydro stores and someone there usually has an electrician that will hook up exactly what you need, before you get going.

rocky6106 said:

what state are you in? You can go to alot of hydro stores and someone there usually has an electrician that will hook up exactly what you need, before you get going.

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NY. The problem with the hydro stores around here is that everything is through the roof in terms of their pricing. I try to stay away from any of the local stores and usually head to PA when I need my supplies. I haven't really developed any favorable relationships with the local places, and the guys around here are really uptight when it comes to discussing the actual growing. Even mentioning that I would need electrical upgrades to run my systems would have them cautious about what advice they're giving. It's a rather uncomfortable situation where everyone sort of keeps to themselves.

SOMEBEECH said:

I would update to a 200amp main,if there is not one.Is the house all electric water heater,dryer,stove,HVAC,etc ,etc? I own a HVAC business so might could help.Welcome to RIU.You probly have a 100amp now unless its a large home,we dont have basements here in Texas atleast where i live anyway.

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Thanks man. It looks like I am gonna update the current panel to a 200amp, and have 100amps devoted to the basement (basement also houses the washer/dryer/ and a secondary kitchen area consisting of a stove and some shit like that)

Most of the house runs on electricity, but the stoves are gas powered (as well as the hot water tank, I believe). So, will the house itself use a lot of power? Not necessarily, it's only myself and my girlfriend moving in. But, it's safe to say we use our fair share, and will definitely need at least 100 amps devoted to the rest of the house. I think splitting the 200 amps half in half (half for the house, half for the grow) should provide me with enough electricity.

Oh ok, yea. Sounds shady. You need to head west man. But if you find a store you get friendly with or maybe the owner who isnt looking to steal from you knowing what you need the electrician for, maybe ask if they know a good electrician. Thats how I found mine and he has done tons of electrical work for setups, just have them in before you are having the set up. Or tell your regular electrician you are getting a man cave down there with a hot tub and big tv and all that shit that will need bigger amps

rocky6106 said:

Oh ok, yea. Sounds shady. You need to head west man. But if you find a store you get friendly with or maybe the owner who isnt looking to steal from you knowing what you need the electrician for, maybe ask if they know a good electrician. Thats how I found mine and he has done tons of electrical work for setups, just have them in before you are having the set up. Or tell your regular electrician you are getting a man cave down there with a hot tub and big tv and all that shit that will need bigger amps

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No licensed electrician in the world is going to believe you need a one hundred amp service just for your basement, unless you are talking about a 4000 square foot house. Find an electrician you can trust, because any decent electrician is going to take 3 seconds to do a rough load calculation in their head, and then suggest you run a much smaller service, or file in the back of his mind that you're clearly doing something else.

All above comments are 120% accurate. 100amps in your basement is alot. My grow consists of the same exact split I explained you need with a 60 amp breaker feeding the sub. Im also only running 2k watts in lighting ( just under 12 amps). 2 portable a/c's 2 light movers and a 900few cfm exhaust fan. The 60 amp handles that fine. If you need to hire an Electrician, tell him you want a 60what amp sub splitter for a Tig Welder. That will keep his brains at bay. Say your worried about the Welder amp draw and request 6 gauge wire be strung through. Then replace 60 amp breaker with 80-100 and call it good.

sounds like a lot of overkill to me.. my entire grow room with ac, 3 1000w, fans, t5's, pumps and all the other fixns only run 35amps per phaze @ max.. So unless you have a huge house or plans to expand you probably do not need to upgrade the house panel to 200a.. 125 is more than enough

also if you just run a 240v hot tub circuit down to the basement that is more than enough. #6 is good for 75amps max so use no larger than a 70a breaker "NOT 80-100 amp breaker".. that is 140amps of power at your service..

Total.Hydroponic.Control said:

No licensed electrician in the world is going to believe you need a one hundred amp service just for your basement, unless you are talking about a 4000 square foot house. Find an electrician you can trust, because any decent electrician is going to take 3 seconds to do a rough load calculation in their head, and then suggest you run a much smaller service, or file in the back of his mind that you're clearly doing something else.

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Fortunately my electrician is a family friend. He will probably suggest a much lower wattage in the basement, which is why I will have to be a stubborn ass and insist that I need the amps. In the end, I pay the bill, in cash. I think he will just assume I am a smartass who thinks he knows it all about electricity. Thanks for the advice though, I will definitely be ready for him to try and tell me I am going way overboard.

linked2002 said:

All above comments are 120% accurate. 100amps in your basement is alot. My grow consists of the same exact split I explained you need with a 60 amp breaker feeding the sub. Im also only running 2k watts in lighting ( just under 12 amps). 2 portable a/c's 2 light movers and a 900few cfm exhaust fan. The 60 amp handles that fine. If you need to hire an Electrician, tell him you want a 60what amp sub splitter for a Tig Welder. That will keep his brains at bay. Say your worried about the Welder amp draw and request 6 gauge wire be strung through. Then replace 60 amp breaker with 80-100 and call it good.

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Thanks a bunch dude. Your advice is really coming in handy

rocky6106 said:

Oh ok, yea. Sounds shady. You need to head west man. But if you find a store you get friendly with or maybe the owner who isnt looking to steal from you knowing what you need the electrician for, maybe ask if they know a good electrician. Thats how I found mine and he has done tons of electrical work for setups, just have them in before you are having the set up. Or tell your regular electrician you are getting a man cave down there with a hot tub and big tv and all that shit that will need bigger amps

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I actually lived in Long Beach for about a year. Loved the medicine, and the ability of running a legal grow. But, law school is costing me 1/3 of what I would have payed at any of the UC schools. Hopefully I'll be back after I finish up this degree.

I will definitely keep the advice in mind though, hopefully I find a good local place in the next few months.

Well honestly if you are only running 2 600 watt lights you wont need to do much upgrading. Don't go through the trouble of putting a sub panel down there for such a small amount of usage. 1 20amp 120v will handle those two lights and what ever fan you run...and then whatever existing electricity is down there will handle everything else as far as any other fans, t5's for veg and so on and so forth.

My 12 month average is 2831 kWh/month in a 1800 sq ft ranch with unfinished basement in a 5 year old home. 2 1000's, portable A/C, 600w Mother, 1300CFM of air movement, 100+ gallon salt reef tank and my GF and I. Thats an average of 33 AMPS/hour for the last 12 months. Lets say peak load is 300% of that. 100 AMPS minimum.

What is the square footage of the home? What is the age of the appliances? Its good that the stoves are gas that helps. Ovens too? natural gas/propane dryer? Water heater?

Archie22 said:

My 12 month average is 2831 kWh/month in a 1800 sq ft ranch with unfinished basement in a 5 year old home. 2 1000's, portable A/C, 600w Mother, 1300CFM of air movement, 100+ gallon salt reef tank and my GF and I. Thats an average of 33 AMPS/hour for the last 12 months. Lets say peak load is 300% of that. 100 AMPS minimum.

What is the square footage of the home? What is the age of the appliances? Its good that the stoves are gas that helps. Ovens too? natural gas/propane dryer? Water heater?

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960 sq ft.
Brand new fridge, microwave. No dishwasher. All other appliances in the house like tv's and whatnot are new within 2 years.
Oven is also natural gas.
Water heater has been confirmed as natural gas.


Thanks for the reply. Really like that salt reef tank, she must be pretty bad ass. In terms of power, I am starting to think I might want to run 4 air cooled 600's. My veg tent is LED and around 350 watts with the fans factored in. Mother tent has 4 t5's and small 4"inline fan and an oscillating fan, might run around 300-350 watts.

So, looking at it all in a big picture (if I end up going with the 4 600's vs 2)

2400 watts hps
650-700 watts mother/veg tents
2 8" inline fans for the hoods about 400 watts (guestimation here)
4 oscillating fans 150 watts

total of about 3600ish watts at any given 'peak'. If I were to end up going with two 600's it would be 2200ish watts. Nothing crazy here, but I want to make sure my electrical situation is 100% ready for this setup before I get it all going and then have issues start to arise.

-Still Stoned

Well aside from smoking Bud this happens to be my area of expertise, as I am a Master Electrican. You do not need a sub put in if you are going to upgrade to a 200A service. It will just cost you money that you dont need to spend. What you do want is (2) dedictated 20A ckts and (2) dedicated 30A ckt installed (possibly (1) 50A ckt if your using a stand alone heating or cooling system). Those four should give you enough power. Run your lights off the 30A ckts and everything else on the 20A ckts. Alternate the lights between the 2 ckts aswell as the smaller things for the 20A ckts. This will help distribute the load evenly, thust causing less breaker tripps. Make sure when he wires the room that he alternates ckts along the wall and in the ceiling. Once again distributing load properly makes hugh difference. That is all you should need. Whatever cover story you give is on you, but speaking as Electrican the gym idea does sound around the lines of what a gym would draw, power wise. Good Luck and Happy Smoking.