I love my house. I really do. But I thoroughly despise one design issue - the master bedroom is directly above the garage. In many climates, that is not a problem, but in Arizona's awesome summers, this design faux-pas results in the master bedroom being the hottest room in the house. And that's a problem, for I prefer the temperature to hover as close to 72 degrees as possible at all times.
A few weeks ago, I decided to do something about it - I would air-condition my garage. No big deal, right? Just buy one of those window units, cut a hole in the wall, and fire it up, right?
If only it were that simple. Because my garage isn't well insulated, it is going to take an awfully powerful (17,500 BTU or so) air conditioner to properly and efficiently bring down the temperature. And of course, air conditioners that size require a dedicated electrical circuit, which of course I didn't have.
Well, I do now. Thanks to $225 and a hard day's work from my dad, my brother Ryan, and myself, I now have two new 20 amp circuits in my garage. We dug a 12-inch-deep, 80-foot-long trench from the electrical box to the garage (begrudgingly with shovels, due to the outrageous $250/day cost of a trencher), laid PVC electrical conduit in the trench, pulled six individual strands of 12-gauge wire through it, installed two breakers in the breaker box, drilled a big hole in the house to get the wire into the garage, then installed the electrical outlets in the garage.
It's no wonder I could hardly move Saturday night - that was a lot of work. And of course, I still need to get back out there to fill in the trench and lay the drip line for the backyard watering system. Which of course I need to do before we can pay someone (thank heaven) to do the landscaping in our backyard.
It's fun that our backyard finally shows signs of life, but frustrating to think that this is just the prep work. Good times!
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1 comment:
Great job, Dave!
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