Tag Archives: primary elections

2014/08/05 (T) Primary Elections

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The rain started early today with a pre-dawn thunderstorm and continued off and on the rest of the day and evening.  The area beyond the basement walkout deck is a muddy mess, but Village Landscape Development has not finished grading it.  They need it to be dry, so it may be awhile before they can finish it.

Our first construction task today was to pull electrical cable up into the garage attic for three more circuits.  I wanted to get this done early in the day while it was cool and Linda’s knee was feeling better.  I had been mulling this work over last night and realized that I had probably made an incorrect assumption about the location of the 240V/20A service for the new library air-conditioner, so I put a call in to Darryll right after breakfast.  We got a call from Karen at Bratcher Electric around 9 AM to  see if it would be OK for Mike to stop by around 11 AM to look at some electrical work we need done.  He wanted to see the job in person in order to prepare a quote.

The new cable for the outlets on the west and northwest wall was already in the garage attic but I had to crawl into the low northeast corner to reach it and get it routed in the right direction.  I then had to crawl into the same corner from a different direction to pull it to the junction box I installed last week.  I secured it with cable staples and connected it to the old cable.

Next we pulled a 14-2+g NM cable from the sub-panel to the approximate location where the garage furnace will hang from the ceiling to provide a dedicated 120/15A circuit but did not install an outlet box pending a final location from Darryll.  We then pulled another 14-2+g NM cable from the sub-panel to the north end of the new west utility closet wall.  This cable will provide a dedicated 120V/15A circuit for the new library furnace.  Again, I did not install an outlet box pending a final location from Darryll.

Darryll called back and confirmed that the new 240V/20A dedicated circuit for the new library air-conditioner had to be routed to the location of the condenser/compressor on the outside of the west wall of the garage and there had to be a weatherproof disconnect within three feet of the unit.  That meant another trip to Lowe’s, but not until much later in the day.

Mike Bratcher showed up on time and I walked him through the project.  I want to re-wire the garage sub-panel as a 100A main panel by running service entrance cable from the transfer switch in the southwest corner of the garage to the sub-panel in the northeast corner of the garage.  We may also want to run power to the bus barn if/when it gets built.  Mike suggested that they go ahead and “stub out” the barn service at the same time with an appropriate disconnect.  The plan is to have them do this work at the same time they convert the Kohler whole house generator to natural gas and do the annual maintenance.  Mike also confirmed that they can take care of the natural gas connection to the generator as long as the pipe is located near the back of the unit, has a shutoff valve, and is capped.

By the time Mike left it was after noon so we had lunch.  While we ate we ordered a dual outlet phone/ADSL filter wall plate and a few other things on our Amazon Prime account and researched candidates and proposals for the primary election.  We then went to our polling station, located about two miles from our house, and voted.

This was the first election we participated in since moving to Livingston County.  As Democrats (and liberal ones at that) in this part of Livingston County voting in the primary is an exercise.  The real contest is on the Republican ticket; whoever wins the Republican primary for any given seat will almost surely win the general election in the fall.  Still, we always exercise our right to vote and there were statewide candidates and issues.

The last cable we installed today was another 14-2+g NM to provide 120V to a junction box on the utility closet ceiling.  I mounted a round white plastic junction box approximately 8″ from the east utility closet wall in line with, and slightly in front of, the sub-panel.  I installed a plastic bare-bulb light fixture with a pull chain and 3-prong outlet to the junction box.

I did not tie any of the new circuits into the sub-panel today as we have one more circuit to pull and I want all of the cables at the panel before I cut the power and remove the cover.  We were done with electrical work for today so I turned my attention to drywall surface preparation while Linda retreated to her desk to work on tax returns.  I sanded the drywall compound as smooth as I could and wiped everything down to get rid of the dust.  I then primed all of the new and old drywall on the northeast garage wall along with the plywood platform and exposed 2×12 on the front of the base.

By the time I was done and cleaned up it was approaching 5 PM, we were both tired, and we needed to go to Lowe’s, so we decided to dine out.  We went to Lowe’s first and bought a weatherproof plastic disconnect box, a couple of watertight fittings, a 10′ length of 3/4″ plastic conduit, and a 50′ role of 12-2+g NM cable.  All of this will be used to run the new dedicated circuit for the new library air-conditioner.  We then drove to the Panera in Brighton and used one of our gift cards to have a light dinner.

We were back home a little after 7 PM.  The primer was dry so I decided to paint all of the surfaces I had primed before dinner.  While I painted Linda made a batch of her incredibly yummy granola.  We had a small glass of wine and played a few games on our iPads while the granola cooled and then turned in for the night.

 

2014/07/23 (R) My Platform

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The primary elections are just around the corner but my platform has nothing to do with politics.  My platform is a 46″ x 40″ surface 12″ above the floor in the northeast corner of the garage, or will be once I build it.  This platform will be the base for the new HVAC unit for the library and I need to have it built before the equipment gets here and Darryll shows up to install it.  Once the unit is installed I need to enclose it to isolate it from the garage to prevent explosive vapors or noxious fumes from entering the combustion chamber or fresh air circulation.  That will require the construction of two walls one of which will have an exterior grade door.

John’s chop saw, which I borrowed the other night, allows me to make more accurate cuts (clean and square) than I can with my circular saw.  In the meantime I have some work to do removing/installing a few studs in the north wall of the garage and running some new electrical wire.  I need to run 120V 15A circuits for the furnace portion of the library unit and for the ceiling mounted garage furnace and a 240V 20A circuit for the library air-conditioner.  Eventually I will have a 240V 30A outlet for our radial arm saw, which would be great for the woodworking aspects of this project, but that’s a project for another day.

Three landscapers showed up a little before 8 AM (Tommy, Matt, and Spencer).  Tommy was on the phone with Steve getting their instructions for the day and then they got to work building an additional section of the west retaining wall with medium size boulders and preparing the area under the east end of the deck for a layer of egg rock.  They took off around 9:45 AM for some unknown reason, but the sound of their truck reminded us to put the trash out at the street for pickup.  They were back in a little while, worked until noon, and took their lunch break.  By 3:30 PM they had the boulder wall built, the egg rock placed, a strip of edging set into a small trench, and small boulders placed on the eastern slope below the large boulders.  That certainly looked like progress.

Linda worked at her desk until mid-afternoon and then started working on dinner.  Although simple in presentation at the table, she put a lot of time into our meal.  She made a potato and lentil curry that was very good with deep, complex flavors, and garlic naan bread.  Both were as good as anything I have ever had at an Indian restaurant and the naan was vegan, made with unsweetened soy milk in place of dairy milk and olive oil in place of dairy butter.

I spent most of the day taking the measurements I needed to turn my mental concept for the utility closet into a set of design drawings from which I could produce a material list.  By supper time I had a good set of drawings to guide the carpentry work but was still puzzling over some electrical issues.  By the time Linda had dinner ready I was ready to set thus project aside for the night.

It was after 7 PM by the time we finished eating and cleaned up, but that left us plenty of time to sit on the deck and enjoy a cool northwest breeze and the muted light of scattered clouds.  It eventually got too cool to stay outside so I worked at my computer until bedtime.