New Electrical Work

I can think of 3 possible problems.

1. The most likely problem is you have a bad light. Try replacing it with another light, even one that is not a grow light, to see if the breaker still trips. My guess is it won't which means you need a new grow light.

2. If the circuit still trips, you likely have a problem with the circuit wiring itself. You may need to hire a competent electrician to fix this problem by rewiring the circuit.

3. The least likely problem, but it is easier to check than #2, is a bad breaker. There is no magical way to check this. Buy a new one, replace the old one, and see if that works.

There isn't anything else that can be wrong. After checking all three things, you've checked everything on the circuit. If you still have problems a competent electrician will need to check the circuit more closely.

It depends on the extension cord but I will give you 2 ways and they are each very simple.

On a residential type (what I call a house burner) extension cord with just 2 conductors, you will find that the jacket of one wire is smooth and the other one has ridges. The one with ridges is your neutral or white conductor.

On a more commercial type extension cord with conductors covered by a protective jacket, your conductors in the cord will be color-coded, with black being hot, white being neutral and green or bare being ground.

Try it see what happens... >:l

Can you splice them? Yes. Should you splice them? No.

It really all depends on what your over current protection is. If your #12 wire is on a 20 amp breaker, your #18 wire can melt and cause a fire without tripping the breaker. I do not know what is the amp rating of 18 gauge wire. -- Sparkfighter

Black is the hot side of the line, white the neutral side, green (or rarely bare) wire is the ground.

Assuming your under counter lighting is 120v and is fed from a box installed in the cabinet, you need a competent electrician to run a switch loop to a switch in the wall. He/she may need to make holes in your wall you may not want. There is no magic to getting wires in the wall.

The wires can be run exposed if the proper materials are used. This would prevent any undesired holes in your wall.

No, using the AWG system of measuring wire sizes the smaller the wire numbers go the larger the wire size becomes. Hence the number 14 is smaller that the number 16 so it is largest in size of the two wires.

Depends more on the application and what else you might have on a current circuit you would use if you didn't install a separate circuit.

At 120 volts you are only talking about drawing 8 amps. On a 15 Amp circuit this is fine. However, if there is a motor involved there may be excess start-up currents.

There are certain appliances like stoves, refrigerators, dryers, dishwashers and so forth that require separate circuits. If you have a small heater you move from room to room then you can use an existing circuit that would not trip when you added the appliance. Use the cord that comes with the device directly into an outlet rather than using an extension cord.

If the appliance needs to be hardwired into a box then use a dedicated circuit.

Steel conduit weighs more, provides more protection, and costs more than plastic conduit.

Plastic conduit weighs less, is easier to work with, and costs less than steel conduit.

Yes you can. Lots of blow dryers have GFCI protection built in.

There is a concept that one must understand when working with electricity; "electrical current will always take the path of least resistance."

Many people don't understand the difference between a "short" circuit and an "open" circuit.

An open circuit is when there is effectively no return path from the electrical source back. It's like when a light switch is turned off and the light isn't on.

A SHORT circuit would be when the light switch is turned on but another wire is across the same wire pair, resulting in an effectively shorter path between the conductors of the power source. The electrical current then takes the path of least resistance, leaving no electrical current for the bulb.

Naturally, there is that gray area between a short circuit and an open circuit, that's where things run properly... in general.

I'm assuming the electrical system is single phase, such as a home. If not, you need to hire someone to do the work for you.

First, 6000 watts at 120v is 50 amps, so if your load is truly 6000 watts, 30 amps isn't enough.

If your 6000 watts is 240v, which would draw 25 amps, then 30 amps is plenty.

Ten gauge wire may not be placed an a breaker or fuse larger than 30 amps.

Yes. Also on GFCI you can run output to second bathroom outlet and will be protected.

Great thanks. That make more since, because there's only four outlets for both plus the lights on a 20a run

Is it considered better to run the circuit through one GFCI outlet or is that to cut cost. I don't mind buying four GFCI outlets and adding the extra pig tail wires, specially if it might work better

Use a 20 amp fuse or breaker.

This will pull 20 Amps continuous so you will need a 30 A breaker and 10 AWG wire. You would have Black, Red, White and Ground. The 240 V would be on the black and red connected to the output from a two pole 240 A breaker. White would be neutral and green or bare wire would be ground.

You run a greater potential for being shocked if you connect the black and white wrong.

Use what is called bell wire or thermostat wire.

It depends on your local laws. In other businesses you usually just have to catch up on any permit payments.

Yes, the total amperage load of a 2000 watt heater at 240 volts is 8.3 amps. Keep in mind that the wire feeding the heater must be a #10 because the breaker is rated at 25 amps. A wire's ampacity rating can be larger that the breaker amperage rating but never smaller. Example, a #14 rated at 15 amps or a #12 rated at 20 amps can not be connected to a 25 amp breaker. The 25 amp breaker does not trip until it reaches 25 amps well over the allowable amperage of the #14 amd #12 wire. This is why a #10 wire must be used as its rating is 30 amps.

2400 watts.

The answer is no, not generally. All that means is I wouldn't do it that way.

It all depends on how much you want to go out if that circuit trips. Having outlets on different circuits isn't as important as having lighting on different circuits. If a lighting circuit trips, and in a home the lighting and outlets share circuits, you don't want every room on that floor to be dark.

So you might consider wiring a room on one floor on the same circuit as the room above or below. That's fine. But if there are 4 rooms in close proximity on the same floor, I wouldn't put all the lighting on one circuit, even though that is an acceptable installation.

NEC code requires #6 bare copper.

That's 277 volts of alternating current.

This is typically one phase of a 480v 3 phase system. Don't worry that 3 x 277 adds up to more than 480v.

A 277v line is typically one phase of a 480v 3 phase system.