Electrician Question
 

I kind of sliced through one of the elecrtical wires running to my garage so now it has no lights. Apparently 8 inches underground and 3 inches from a post was good enough for the last owners. Anyways, it isn't in conduit or anything that I can pull it to get enough to surface and use a junction box (no slack what so ever). Is there anything I can do other than put in 2 junction boxes about 3 feet apart and run a new wire between? It isn't a perminate solution as I'm replacing the wiring when I rebuild and enlarge the garage. Probably another year.

benebob,

I'll admit this idea isn't an optimum solution, and maybe not even acceptable; but, with a slight modification to your post.....I was thinking one plastic junction box. A short length of wire. insert the cut ends into the box. join the two cut ends with the short wire using wire nuts. Seal the box up with silicon. bury again.

I would do what Lee suggested as long as it will not be permanent

i'd say fix it the right way and be done with it knowing you did it correctly.

my house was in great shape when i bought it, but wasn't updated much from the 60's - no doorbell, no outside outlets, only 3 phone jacks with the old prong connectors, etc. at least i know nothing was done half-assed by the previous owner(s).

Well, I'm looking at this with two options.

Do a temporary repair on the existing with a splice and two boxes, risk failure before the garage is finished.

Install the new feed in conduit, burried at the right depth to the garage, but leave extra at the garage end for final connection when the garage is redone. Extra work now, but less work later.

Only you can make the decision. However, if it was me, I'd do the new feed now. Hell, I'd even upgrade it to 100A.

Doug

So ya think I can box it underground huh? Never thought of that. I guess it would be just as weather proof then.

I'll do it right. We paid to have the whole house done when we moved in. Went from a 60amp box with knob and tube wiring to a 200amp box before doing anything else. Problem was it was winter so they couldn't dig a trench for new wire and conduit to the garage. If I'd run conduit now. I'd have to go under our back slate deck (which I'm gonna redo when I do the garage). I'd also have to end up cutting it out as I'm enlarging the garage slightly when I do that. The garage is about 60 feet from the house so it would be a rather long trench to dig and would tear up the yard an extra time. Was gonna do the garage this summer but just spent all that money on our basement tiles. Bar comes first I guess:D. I'm just looking for a year or 2. It has its own fuse so that isn't a big deal. 100amps??? What are you running in your garage that you need 100amps???:D

Use some sort of sealant and bury the box.

What size is the breaker feeding the garage now? Probably wouldn't hurt to throw in a GFCI breaker in its place.
IIRC about $30 for a 20 amp??????

They are all 20amps or higher in the house except for the 2 15amps I'm gonna use for the basement (Angie wants to get video games and pin ball machines for down there eventually so I put 2 seperate breakers in for the one room. Maybe I'll have it done by Reading. Would like to do some final detailing as the SVX hasn't had a good bath or cleaning since October.