Installing 1000 feet of Underground Electric Around Our Farm 

I intended to post this sooner but the editing took longer than I expected because I've been so busy, but there is a lot of time lapse in here!

I actually learned about this type of machine when researching how to do a project like this, I dug some last year by hand and it would have been basically impossible to do this without the machine. I think that most of my videos are just for entertainment purposes because there aren't very many people who would do this project themselves, but I just like to film whatever I'm working on.

Thanks! I did this same work (only about 100 feet) last year by hand, and I knew I needed a better solution so this was definitely the best way to do it.

Thanks!

Thanks! Sorry for the long time between videos, I've just been pretty busy as usual so I only make about 1 video per month. I'd like to make more but most of the stuff I do isn't really interesting enough to make a video about, but I do have more planned.

Thanks for watching! I really like living here and don't miss California, its nice to be a bit farther away from everything going on these days.

I'm not familiar with the process of doing that but we're not planning to dig in this area after this. I can always use this video to find where the wire is burried

Thanks for watching, glad you liked it. On the WiFi, most of the network is actually completely wireless. Originally I tried using power-line ethernet adapters, and those work for between the house to garage, but some of our farm is on a separate electrical meter so wireless was the only option besides having the ISP install a 2nd line. I have several outdoor Wifi antennas and the first one is connected into our internet connection. Then the rest of them are linked to each other so I am able to extend the signal as far as needed, wherever I have power available. I can still get very good speeds even out in the farther pastures so this setup works really well. We don't have cell service here, so this is how I can stream music anywhere on the farm while I work, among other things.

@@joshuareynolds5219 Oh, so you're just expanding it on and on, I see. Nice to hear it works this way. Glad your animals can use their mobiles this way ;)

Hi, glad you liked the videos. For this installation I did two different runs of wire, each one was running off a 20 amp breaker. For our purposes, we just have lights, cameras, and water heaters running off of the circuit. In total we are probably pulling about 300 to 400 watts in the winter and haven't had any issues with voltage drop. The total distance of the longest circuit we have is about 1/4 mile of 12/2 wire and it works fine for most purposes. One time I tried to run a 12 amp circular saw at the end of the circuit and it was noticeably lacking power, compared to when it was plugged in at the garage, and that is due to the voltage drop. If you are installing electrical like this yourself, you could use larger wire to reduce the voltage drop some, but the cost would go up quite a bit to do that. From my experience, if you're not using more than around 500 watts, I wouldn't worry about voltage drop and it should be fine with 12/2 wire.

@@joshuareynolds5219 thanks for the fast and very accurate response I feel more confident now with my project is only about 300 ft of run for some brick towers entry lights and I’m planning to use 12-2 uf cable also on a dedicated circuit for these lights, once again thank you so much for your response, I’m not a person that subscribe to channels but you definitely deserve my subscription, thanks and I wish you success on all your goals 👍🏽😎

I did have GFCI on there originally but ended up removing it and don't have on now. It's technically safer with one but it mostly just helps protect from shocks, but a regular breaker is in place for short circuit protection. For some reason I would have to replace the outdoor GFCI plugs every couple months because they kept going bad and always had the flashing light of death, so eventually I just put a regular outlet in. I couldn't keep risking the line going down so often because when it did the water would freeze in the winter and our cameras would be down. Its been almost 2 years and everything has been working fine

We have Wifi extenders around the farm so we can have internet access wherever we are on our phones, we don't have cell phone reception in our area.

I definitely prefer living on the farm, I would never live in a city again. I still go to the nearest city often but especially with all the chaos going on recently it is nice to be able to be far away from all that the rest of the time.

@@joshuareynolds5219 Good for you! Being happy about the life you have is SO cool!

I was learning how to pack down the dirt with the tractor at the time and its not like there was anything else to do while I was working. That sounds like a scary time to grow up with the wolves you mentioned, they didn't have any guns? Obviously no ATVs either at the time, life has gotten so much easier these days

It was standard 12/2 direct burial. I know there is a voltage drop over the distances I went, but it's never been an issue with the loads normally being used of less than 500 watts

I actually did about 100 feet of trenching last year by hand, and this year when we needed to dig 10x longer I couldn't even imagine doing it by hand so we rented the machine.

I haven't measured it but most of the time we never use more than 500 watts total on the circuit and haven't had any noticeable issues. One time I tried to run a 12amp saw at the end of the circuit and it was very slow, so the voltage drop is there but usually isn't a problem. I could've run thicker wire to have less drop, but that would be much more expensive for the rare occasion we need more power.

Just for the heck of it why don't you measure the voltage at the end of the line?

Yes there is a noticeable voltage drop but it hasn't been an issue for anything we've used the electrical for, which is usually less than a few hundred watts

What’s the perfect wire gauge for that distance? Let’s say few lights and heat lamp for the chicken ?

I used 12 gauge wire and haven't had any issues. The wire is rated for 20 amps but at such a long distance it isn't possible to achieve that current anyway. We use about a maximum of 5 amps and it works fine. It's ideal to use 12 gauge wire to minimize the voltage drop over the distance, but to save money you could get away with 14 gauge if you'll only be pulling a couple amps. 1 heat lamp and some lights should be no problem, but 2 heat lamps might cause the voltage to drop more

I'm 20

I actually haven't measured it but it is definitely noticeable. When running LED lights or small water heaters it hasn't been an issue, but this summer I was running an 8 Amp circular saw and the cutting power was very low, I think the voltage drop is only an noticeable with high amp loads

@@joshuareynolds5219 if u would of used 10/2 instead of 12/2, probably have better results, i wish i knew how much better. But lights are different then anything with a motor.

Yes it was 12/2 wire. We rarely load the line with more than 300 watts anyway so for most cases it is no problem.