Kitchen and Electricity

We take our kitchens very seriously. In years past, a kitchen was hidden away and was seen as a more utilitarian room used simply for the storage and preparation of food. These days, we dine, mingle, read the paper, and socialize in this room, which often has a family room directly connected to it. It’s one of our home’s biggest overall energy consumers, and it demands a lot of wiring, devices, and appliances. Given the multitude of tasks and uses of a kitchen as well as the code requirements, you need to pay special attention to its circuits and the placement of light fixtures and receptacles. As previously discussed, you’ll want plenty of task and ambient lighting. You’ll also need a number of dedicated circuits for individual appliances. On top of that, some receptacles require GFCI protection and some do not. A well-designed kitchen is a joy to be in and inevitably will become the hub of your house. Virginia Woolf said, “One cannot think well, love well, sleep well, if one has not dined well.” I certainly won’t claim that meeting the National Electrical Code in your kitchen will improve all these areas of your life, especially if you live mainly on microwaved hamburgers, but at least you’ll get a better look at what you’re eating.

Keeping the Inspections in Mind

An inspector will scrutinize your work more closely than an electrician’s work. Make sure your cable is pulled tightly through wall and floor spaces and is stapled according to code requirements, which specify insulated staples or straps …

➤ Not more than 12 inches from a box or fitting.
➤ Not more than 41⁄2 feet from each other when a cable is running along a stud or joist.
➤ Installed without damaging or denting the cable in any way.

You must have at least six inches of cable or conductors in each box from the point of entry into the box. Once attached to a device, the conductors should be neatly tucked inside with the hot and neutral conductors separated from each other. Overall neatness and professionalism go a long way toward satisfying an electrical inspector.

Plenty of Dedicated Circuits

You might have already updated your kitchen and bathroom wiring with 20-amp, GFCI-protected circuits (or opted for GFCI receptacles). Now you can
expand and add other necessary dedicated circuits including …
➤ An outdoor GFCI or two.
➤ A workroom circuit.
➤ A garage circuit.

15 Amps or 20?

Most branch circuits for lighting will be 15 amps. Twenty-amp circuits normally are reserved for dedicated purposes. It’s perfectly acceptable to use a 20-amp circuit for lighting, but use it judiciously because it can handle, for example, four more 100-watt fixtures than a 15-amp circuit. Great, you say, that means less wiring to do—at least until the lights go out. Then it might not be so great. You’ll have that much less light to see by if an entire section of your house goes dark. Twenty-amp lighting circuits work well when you have a large cluster of lights such as in a kitchen/ hallway combination where you might have as many as 10 150-watt recessed fixtures. You also should consider a 20-amp circuit for your home office computer and peripherals. Check the rating of your copier, which could need its own circuit.

Power Everywhere

The whole point of a modern electrical system, aside from safety, is to have power, fixtures, and devices where you want them. You’re only reading this chapter if you have an outdated system or if you’re building your own home or addition. Newer houses rarely need circuits added unless they are being physically expanded or you’re adding more power to an area such as an unfinished basement, a garage, or outdoors. Don’t underestimate your needs. If you’ve got the time, install all the receptacles a circuit can handle. You’re already tearing up the walls, why find out later that the one wall on which you didn’t install a device was where you could really use one? Use the current code as a guide whenever practical for lighting and receptacle requirements. The only time you must follow it is during a major remodel when all the walls are open in an existing room and you’re running new wiring or when you’re adding on.

Write Up a Plan

It’s always a great temptation, at least if you’re a guy, to dive into a project and improvise as you go. That’s okay for standup comedy (at least when it works), but why add to your electrical labors when you don’t need to? A pad of paper and a pen or pencil are still useful tools (even in the computer age) for visualizing your wiring. They can make the job easier and can save you some time by pointing out shortcuts and problems ahead of time. You might discover, for example, that a switch-controlled receptacle will provide light in a dormer bedroom more easily than trying to install a ceiling light. You also might need a plan to get a permit, although not every building department requires one for electrical work. A plan will give you an accurate count of fixtures, devices, circuit breakers, and electrical boxes needed for the job as well as an approximate measure of needed cable. You don’t want to go running back to a supplier because you’re short two receptacles.

Adding New Circuits

In some respects, doing a major rewiring job is easier than doing intermittent alterations. For one thing, you don’t have to mess with tying into much of your old wiring because you’ll be replacing it. Instead of updating the critical areas such as the kitchen and bathroom and just living with the inherent remaining limitations of the old system, you’ll have upgrades everywhere. In other words, you’ll be up to code (or mostly up to code) and be done with it.
Once your new service panel is installed (a job for an electrician), adding circuits is something most homeowners can do themselves. Even if you simply plan out and install the cable, you’ll be saving a big part of an electrician’s fees. Getting cable from the service panel to the device is the time-consuming part of the job. If nothing else, in a culture where we are increasingly disassociated from physical work, wiring your house can be a source of great pride and accomplishment. As with any alteration to your electrical system, you must have permits and pass an inspection. Some business consultants believe that a messy desk is the sign of an inspired, creative mind, but this isn’t so with wiring. Freudian analysts might have a field day with electrical inspectors’ obsession with neatness, but that’s what they want to see, so don’t disappoint them. Finally, plan your time. You don’t have to do the entire house at once. You can do some of the work alone, but some is best done with two people involved. Check your calendars and pencil in—or punch into your personal digital assistant—a day that works for two of you.