Machine Builders Network+ Forums Machine Builders Network General Discussion What odd jobs did you do today?

The power from my shop is fed from a separate meter. I am charged $32 dollars a month for that meter and a higher rate for the actual power. My house is fed with a 400 amp feeder. I am going to install a new feeder to the shop from the house panel to save that charge. Should take about a year and a half to pay back the cost.

Wednesday I rented a walk behind trencher. I trenched 260' to my shop. Since I had time left I trenched 320' to my kids play house in the woods, and about 175' from my water access box in the yard over to the same play house. Got all that done in 4 hours and back to the rental place, not bad for $112 rental.

I had to cross my feed from the house to the detached open garage (20 amp circuit). The power line should have been 12" deep but I thought I might hit it and since I didn't know where it crossed I turned off the breaker and went to trenching. I didn't notice hitting it, but after all the trenching I tried the breaker and it was dead. I found where I cut the wire and it was only about 5" deep. Anyway I have two freezers running off extension cords for now.

That night I layed the 4/0 wire in the trench and covered it back up with the tractor. I didn't have time to compact it much as it started raining. It ended up raining 2" over 2 days. My trench sunk in about 3" all the way to my shop....anyway I decided to let it dry out before I try to drag the dirt back in the hole. also where I cut the power line, the trench was full of water so I have to wait on that to dry before I can splice it back together.

Since I couldn't work on that I laid a power line out to the shop and installed a GFCI, this is a long run for a circuit but it will only be used for a chicken heat lamp and maybe an occasional power tool. I got that wired up but didn't get the trench filled in.

After that I got the water pipe and a freeze proof spigot. In my yard I had a box that housed two valves coming from the county water feed. One valve goes to the house and the other to the shop. Both at 1" pipes. The box had sunk into the ground by about 6" to the top. I used the back hoe attachment on the loader to dig out the box, and to finish the trench out. I had to cross a underground dog fence wire in 3 places with the trencher and I managed to not hit in any of the 3 places. I spliced into the line feeding my shop adding a Tee and a valve. I then in a new taller yard box. I still had to put bricks in the bottom of the hole to keep the box above grade. I also put gravel under the valves and sealed the edges to hopefully keep the dirt from building up on the valves, they both were buried under about 2" of dirt, making them not usable. The box was also full with about 12" of water from the rain. I used a wet dry vac to suck the water out. After installing the new valve I was able to turn the box 90 degrees to get all 3 valves in the same box. I ran the 3/4 pvc 175' to the play house and installed the freeze proof hydrant. I put gravel under and around it so that it will drain properly. Put plastic on top of the gravel then buried it with dirt. Backfilled that pipe so I don't have to worry about it freezing.

Lots of work over a few days, but now I don't have 200+ ft. of extension cords across the driveway and won't have to haul water nearly as far for the chickens and whatever else needs water out there on the other side of the driveway. I wasn't planning on the power outlet or the water but I had the trencher and one thing let to another.

Still have to back fill the power feed and power outlet trenches. I also have to fix the power line to the garage to get rid of the extension cord after it dries out some.

Here is the yard aftermath after the rain.



Power outlet trench, had to hand dig some of this one.



Sad thing is I have everything I need to make a trencher attachment for my loader. I have the whole front end off of a case trencher, but it was taken apart 7 years ago and I never have gotten around to making it into a attachment.