baseboard heaters

[imported_ian]

I just finished renovating my garage and the electrician that was supposed to help me told me to run 2 wires[14/2] to the place I wanted to place my basebard heater[1500 watt] since then the electrician has been unable to get back to me and I want to hook up the heater.He said that all I needed was 2 open breakers[15 amp] I have a thermostat and want to know how to run the circuit from the panel to the thermostat to the heater.Any ideas on how to do this :cry:

[Wgoodrich]

If you have a total footage of baseboard heat exceeding 6' in length combined then your 14 awg 15 amp rated branch circuit won't carry the load. Be sure to check how many feet you are installing in that garage.

If you are installing 6' or less of heat then a 15 amp 220 volt branch circuit will carry the heater or heaters.

To wire this you would install a 14/2wGrnd Romex cable from the panel to the wall mounted thermostat then run a 14/2wGrnd Romex cable from that thermostat to the first heater then install a 14/2wGrnd Romex cable from that first heater to the second heater if you have a second heater. If no second heater stop at the first heater.

In the panel put a ring of black tape marking the white wire as a hot wire adn connect both the white wire and hte black wire to the two lugs of a 15 amp 240 volt double pole breaker. Then connect the bare wire to the neutral bare or grounding bar of that main service rated panel or subpanel.

Then at the thermostat you should be installing a double pole wall thermostat connecting the two black wires to one set of the two screws on the thermostat and the two white wires to the second set of two screws on the thermostat. Wirenut the two bare wires together under a wire nut adding a pigtailed bare wire connecting that jumper pigtail wire to the green screw of hte thermostat.

Then at the heater install the Romex cable through a Romex connector into the heater and wire nut one of hte heater's black wires to the black wire of the Romex cable and wire nut the second black heater wire to the white wire with a black tape ring on it together. Then connect the bare wire to the green screw of the heater casing.

If you have a second heater then wire nut both black wires to the black wire of the heater and both white wires to the second black wire of the heater. Then at the second heater connect the black wire to the heater's black wire and the white wire reidentified as hot with a ring of black tape wire nutted to hte second black wire of the heater and again connect the bare wire to the green screw on the metal shell of hte heater.

Let us know how you come out.

Good Luck

Wg

[imported_ian]

Thanx for the info.On my heater I have a black and red wire same as on the thermostat[no ground on thermostat[probably thru case to wall mount]so I will just treat the white wire as red.
Cheers
p/s if you hear a loud yelp up BC Canada way just me

[Wgoodrich]

Where I said second black wire your red wire would be that second black wire in my explaination. Yes the white wire is the second hot wire reidentified by the black tape ring you installed showing it to be hot and not a grounded leg or neutral conductor.

Let us know how you come out.

Oh, by the way if you see a big flash of fire you did something wrong obviously but if you could get a picture of that flash of fire I wll be glad to post it in the how not to do this section for you. Ha ha. Just be careful you will do fine.

Wg

[imported_ian]

Well it did not go bang or flash and sorry no flames just a click as the breaker went when I turned up the thermostat,going to give up for the day will go over the wiring tommorrow and see if I have a short some where.Pulled the breaker and wiring back out of panel just in case and will probably find out that my wireing got screwed up somewhere.Will let you know how it comes out6.
hanks for the help.
Cheers

[imported_ian]

When I get to the thermostat I have a total of 12 wires ,4 hot white ,4 black and4 ground[bare].Thats 2black,2white,2 ground coming fron the heater and the same amount coming from the panel now if I understand what you want me to do is take 2 of the black wires and connect them to one side of the thermostat and then take 2 of the white[hot] wires and connect them to the other side.Then connect the leftover black and white wires and connect them together[by colour] and then ground the recepticle out with the bare ground wires.
cheers

[Wgoodrich]

You should only have one romex cable coming from the panel into that thermostat box being one black one white and one bare.

Then you should only have one Romex cable going from that thermostat to the first heater with one black one white and one bare. Then you should have one Romex cable going from taht thermostat to the second heater with one black one white and one bare.

That is a total of 3 blacks 3 whites and 3 bares. Where are you getting the 4th black 4th white and 4 bare wire in that fourth Romex cable? Where is that fourth romex cable coming from and going to?

Wg

[imported_ian]

When I first started to do my reno the electrician I talked to told me to run 2 14/2 wires to the spot where I wanted the baseboard heater to go and run them back to my panel.I thought the double wireing was to handel the load

[Wgoodrich]

The double wiring would be what is called paralleling cables. Paralleling cables are forbidden in any size smaller than 2 awg 100 amp rated wires.

I suspect you misunderstood what he was advising you.

How many feet of heat are you running on this 14 awg copper Romex cable?

Wg

[imported_ian]

You are probably right as the rating on the wire is 300 volts.It was awhile ago that he told so I most probably got it mixed up.the length of wire is approx.25ft.I have removed 1 wire and am also going to a lower wattage heater.I`ll let you know how it comes out.

[Wgoodrich]

A 14/2wGrnd cable will carry a single 1500 watt heater with about 300 watts to spare. You don't really need to lower the heater size if it is rated 1500 watts.

All you need to do is run the 14/2wGrnd cable from the double pole breaker to the thermostat then a 14/2wGrnd cable from that thermostat to the heater. In the thermostat box connect the black and white wire coming from the panel breaker to the two screws marked line and connect the black and white wire cable going to the heater to the two screws marked load on the thermostat. In the heater connect the two insulated wires to the two heater wires that are also insulated.

Let us know how you come out.

Wg