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furniture wiring

4735 Views 14 Replies 6 Participants Last post by  leatherneck61
Got some herman miller furniture that has outlets along bottom for convienent wiring. I have a simple single phase drop I want to wire in to the furniture whip provided that supplies plugs. the furniture whip is three phase capable. i.e. 2 grn, 2 white, 1 blk, 1 red, 1 blue and 1 pink wire. I am asuming I wire whites and green to ground in drop, pink and blue to a return/white in drop and blk and red to blk/hot in drop? hope it makes since. Thanks.
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Go back and add your location to your profile, Differant rules for differant locations.
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Black, red, blue, and pink are hot. They get wired to black/hot. The two whites are neutral, so they go to white/neutral. The two grounds are green.
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Sounds like a modular furniture we have in the office. The furniture is designed to be wired with different circuits so you don't over load one branch circuit. There will be receptacles with different numbers on them. Each number will correspond to a different circuit. The black, red, blue and pink wires are the hot wires for the different circuits.
The reason for the two grounds and two whites is one circuit is designed to be wired a isolated ground and used for computer equipment in an industrial setting. That leaves the other circuits for the calculators, heaters, printers, etc.
You can simply tie all the hots together and everything will be one circuit.
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Here is a copy of the wiring label direct from Herman Miller:

http://www.newparadigmint.com/4CircuitLabel.pdf

I sell Herman Miller furniture, so let me know if you need any other information.
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Thanks for the great help...I thought I would update now that I understand more. I have outlet's that are labeled i.e. a,b,c and d as mentioned by joed. The furniture whip has various colors for hot that I mentioned; red, black, pink, blue and then a white1, white2, green1 and green2, green2 is yellow striped. My junction box under the floor that I want to hook this up to has various drops from the panel with a earth ground, grn/yellow stripe, solid green or common ground I believe, black and a white wire. The schematic that cube supplied is helpful as I am looking at bottom right of it and the single phase diagram. I tried to hook up just one circuit (a) to see if I had it right and I got 86 not 120v. My theory being I would use one drop from the panel for each circuit, i.e. a,b,c and d. I used blk for hot, white1 for neutral and green one to the earth ground did not mess with common ground.
If you bring in a circuit for each a, b, c, d receptacle on the furniture, yoou must have a way to disconnect all legs at once.

Do you have 3 phase power?
jbfan, My setup here is a typical breaker box with commercial power supplied. I suspect it comes in three phase but goes out on individual brakers as single phase...not a real guru on that but I don't quite understand why I need three phase when the schematic shows a single phase hook-up. I planned on running a breaker (drop) I'm calling it for each circuit...a,b,c & d. The 86 volts is confusing me though. The breakers run a line to a junction box with terminal boards that then go out on romex whips under the floor to various areas. When I shut an individual run/breaker off I get some residual voltage still and so I'm wondering if this is because of the two grounds, induction from other wiring, etc.. what? When I hooked up a single run/drop for a circuit to test my theory I got 86.4 not 120??? Thanks
Circuit a,b c share a neutral, while d is an isolated circuit.
You have to run a multi wire circuit and share a neutral to power a b and c.

The voltage problem could mean that a connector is not fully seated in the furniture.
If the load is not large there is no need for a multi wire circuit. All the hots can be tied together or not used. If some are not used then realize that some of the receptacle with certain letters will also not work.
I think I understand but probably not. Looking at the schematic for a "grounded single-phase system" can I just run my four seperate hots L1-L4...to pink, blue, red & black (a,b,c,d) then tie their grounds and neutrals to a common connection. It will still be on four seperate breakers though?? Since it's one return though?? Not sure may be over my head!
You can not connect the neutral for the pink circuit to the other neutrals.
joed,
Yea I think I am getting to complicated for my level of understanding. This section of office furniture has about 24x2 outlets in it labeled a-d, so I would like to run the four seperate hots/circuits, one for each lettered outlet. Looking at the schematic I am not sure what they want me to do with the neutrals and grounds? I have what I think are earth and common grounds (two grounds anyway) on each breaker/circuit I want to use...So can I tie the earth grounds (green with yellow stripe) to the green/yellow for the furniture whip, the solid green to solid green for the furniture whip, then white/neutral from breaker/circuit to each respective white (1 or 2) by circuit (a,b,c,d) according to the schematic. Not really tracking on the d isolation thing...sry If Im confusing but to simplify I was hoping I could just run one breaker to a, another for b, etc... I did not want to get into phases and isolation unless someone really wants to educate me and I don't want to make anyone start shaking there heads or cringing at me! No offense intended
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As I read that diagram white #1 is shared between circuit A,B, and C and white #2 is for circuit D. In order to prevent overload on the white circuit you can only have three circuits when used in your home. Circuit A, B, and C(black, red, blue) can be used with a multi wire circuit(2 circuits). Two of the lines will have to combine into one so for example your plugs labeled C will really be A plugs. Then you can use the D(pink wire) as another circuit with the second white wire.
Ok...so I found one problem. I have been looking at the bottom right depiction of the schematic "connection to a grounded single-phase system" I think everyone else is looking at the first depiction of "connection to a grounded three-phase system" or the first depiction of a "multiple grounded three-phase sytem. ooops. Maybe that's where I need to go to school. Making more sense now!!
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