Liam Powers called first thing this morning to consult about the severe voltage drop being observed in the walkway lighting system. Seems both the “master electrician” I conferred with at Lowes and the transformer instructions wattage / distance / wire size table were seriously wrong in saying that 12 gauge wire would properly power forty 7-watt lights stretched out over a 450 foot distance. Liam gave me the voltage drop formula so I could see for myself that 10 gauge wire would be the minimum required… and even with that size wire, a 2.6% voltage drop would still occur (3% being the generally accepted maximum allowable voltage drop in a given circuit). Fortunately, Liam concurred with the solution I had already envisioned, i.e., adding a second transformer to feed the lower half of the walkway lights, and offered other advice about how to wire everything together. Soon after hanging up with Liam, the Goodro Lumber truck arrived with another $700 worth of our children’s inheritance. Hopefully this load will give me enough deck boards and 4 x 4’s to finish the walkway. Of course I said that same thing with the last load… Got the last 8 feet of this walkway section built (minus the usual safety feature, i.e., railings). So that means (hold on to your horses there, Nellie!) that we’re sort of done down to landing #7 (and final).
