This could be a post about our anxiety at whether we’re going to be able to get the house livable in just 14 weeks, but its not. Instead, this is a post about the electrical system! I know you’re excited now.

Last week we had the first drywall contractor walk through to give an estimate on the project now that they can size it up in three dimensions. I’ve often said drywall is more art than science, and that’s why we’re not drywalling the whole house ourselves. It takes a lot of practice and skill to create smooth drywall seams with any kind of speed or consistency. By contrast, the electrical system is more science than art. If you read and follow the electrical code its not unlike following a giant Lego set.

Our first house had all manner of minor electrical problems, with flickering lights and routine breaker trips. We eventually rewired every single fixture, outlet, switch, or appliance in the place, nearly doubling the number of circuits in use and bringing all the wiring up to code. Through that experience I got pretty adept at planning and wiring home circuits.

For this design we did a lot of planning on paper (well, digital paper, anyway) in advance. My home design program lets you place electrical features and connect them up right in the design, and then see the fixtures and switches in the 3D walkthrough. Then you can turn the layer on and off in plan view so it doesn’t clutter things up until you need it.

We tried to think through everywhere you would want an outlet to possibly plug something in. Modern electrical code requires a ton of outlets anyway, but we went above and beyond. Who knows if you might want an outlet in that closet? Everything seems to need a charger these days. And you know wherever the outlets are in a room you invariably seem to end up with a piece of furniture in front of them. We have 137 outlets in the house (nearly twice that if you consider most outlets have two sockets!) and are still adding a few more in the basement.

We similarly went through the house digitally and tried to think of the logical places for all switches to go. Within reach but not behind a door, of course. We both find two-way switches rather… disorderly, since “on” might be either up or down. But there are some places where convenience suggests two switches for the same light, and still other places where code demands it. You must have a switch at the top and bottom of the stairs, or at either end of a hallway for example.

We’ve planned in lots of minor details too. We put in small lights down along the stair treads for convenient safety lighting. We also put lights in almost every closet, most of them with automatic switches that turn the light on whenever the door opens. Like a refrigerator light for your linens! Amy also found small single outlets you can embed in a windowsill, which we are going to use in our fireplace mantel.

Now that the house is fully framed up, we’ve walked through with the printed plans and marked the real locations on the walls and ceilings. Sometimes a practical matter, such as the location of a wall stud or floor joist requires adjusting the planned location. Other times seeing it in real life you realize you want something slightly different.

We’re spending the time to measure and place things carefully to get lights perfectly centered or evenly-spaced. We’re also planning out circuits carefully so that each breaker turns on or off a logical contiguous set of outlets or lights. I like to keep outlets and lights on separate circuits so if the lights go out you can plug something in to see, for example. This is the kind of detail that exists in no contract-built home I know of.

• 

• 

This weekend we nearly completed the rough-in, which has meant setting up the main breaker panel, mounting all the boxes (over 200 in all) and running a literal mile of wire snaking all through the house. This is finally one of the jobs the kids have been able to help with, as you can see above.

And it all starts with a thick 4/0 (four-ought) aluminum cable that runs 62 feet from the far side of the garage through the breezeway to the Northwest corner of the house. That cable is as thick as my wrist, and costs several dollars a foot. You don’t want to buy too much as its so expensive and very hard to cut it off, but you don’t dare buy too little as you can’t return a custom cut 61′ cable that’s a foot too short! If the wiring is the nervous system of the house then this thing is the spinal cord. (You can see it in its final location at the top of the in-progress breaker panel below).

• 

• 

Once the last of the the wiring runs are in (just need the electric range and the A/C unit) we can call Electric Frank back for the rough inspection. Once he’s satisfied and signed off, we’ll be getting close to having the walls sealed up at last. That drywall guy I mentioned back at the top of this post is waiting in the wings and boy will I be glad to see him get to work. We’ll post some photos when the drywall finally goes in and you’ll really be able to see the rooms take shape.