I want to add new outlets to my basement workshop. I'm planning two new 20 amp circuits of 6 receptacles each. The breaker box is at one end of the basement, the farthest wall is 50 feet away.
The joists in the ceiling are open. I don't want to run conduit horizontally along the walls to connect the outlets, because of all the obstructions along the way. I have holes already bored in the joists from prior wiring I can use to run the cable.
It seems the usual way to wire them is to daisy chain one outlet to the next using pigtails. This avoids the need for junction boxes, but it seems to me the total number of splices are the same. They are just moved from the j-box to the receptacle box.
My concern about daisy chaining is the possibility of voltage drop. A table from cerro wire suggests that, for 12g wire, 50' is the max distance of cable at 1500 watt loads. Since that is the distance of the farthest wall, does that mean that I should not daisy chain (which would add around 8-9 feet of cable per outlet branch, dropping from the joists and back up), but use only j-boxes?
The only issue then is that each receptacle would need to be gfci, since I couldn't use the first one in each circuit to protect the other outlets. Or then should use a gfci breaker.
Do I have this right?
The joists in the ceiling are open. I don't want to run conduit horizontally along the walls to connect the outlets, because of all the obstructions along the way. I have holes already bored in the joists from prior wiring I can use to run the cable.
It seems the usual way to wire them is to daisy chain one outlet to the next using pigtails. This avoids the need for junction boxes, but it seems to me the total number of splices are the same. They are just moved from the j-box to the receptacle box.
My concern about daisy chaining is the possibility of voltage drop. A table from cerro wire suggests that, for 12g wire, 50' is the max distance of cable at 1500 watt loads. Since that is the distance of the farthest wall, does that mean that I should not daisy chain (which would add around 8-9 feet of cable per outlet branch, dropping from the joists and back up), but use only j-boxes?
The only issue then is that each receptacle would need to be gfci, since I couldn't use the first one in each circuit to protect the other outlets. Or then should use a gfci breaker.
Do I have this right?