Since I will not have the time and money this year to build the new shop I am planning, I decided to fix a few problems and install one of my ventilator fans on the roof of the work bays so I can get some air moving on hot days.
The first problem was the existing breaker box, I was out of spaces for new circuits.

Plus the panel was set into the wall, I could not connect conduit directly to the box. I removed all the existing circuits, labeling them as I went. All the wires were pulled back to the ceiling to allow me to have zero wires buried in the wall. I had to add several new studs to the wall to be able to fasten the plywood properly. Once all the studs were installed I insulated the wall with fiberglass insulation, then I hung the plywood on the wall to cover the insulation.

The old panel was a 100 amp panel the new panel is a 200amp panel, it will allow me to add the circuit for the ventilator and several other new circuits I will need in the near future. The shop is fully insulated now and the late afternoon heat gain has been cut down quite a bit, compared to before insulating that wall. The area over the door has been insulated and plywood now covers it. I used 1/2" conduit to run the power to the light over the door. I will take a photo of that today. There are four circuits left to install, the RPC, the welding outlet, my 240V circuit for the saws, finish the yard light circuit, and another 120V out let for the stereo and phone. I hope to have these done today.
Dan.

I wired the door light in yesterday, this light is wired to a switch that the padlock hangs on when the door is unlocked. The switch is normally closed spring loaded, when the door is locked the light is on, when the door is unlocked and the padlock is hanging on the hook the light is off. I can look out and see if the door is locked this way.

I put wiring in conduit as I did not want the wiring exposed down low.

Junction box for the door light.

Yard light wired in and RPC conduit connector installed in the panel.

240V outlet and welding receptacle wired in to the panel. The conduit for the RPC finished.

Better view of the two outlets.
I have to wait until Monday to finish wiring the RPC in as I need to buy three bugs to lengthen the RPC wiring.
I am going to wire in one more outlet for the phone and the radio.
Dan.

Nice job on the panel. My poor old garage looks like it was wired by the same guy that invented silly string. When my electrician son gets done messing with all that blasted HONDA stuff in there he can do some sweat equity rent payment maybe! I do see why your shop stays so hot though........it's that wallpaper you have in the corner!!!!:)
Terry

Terry, I hate doing wiring, but the only other option would be hire an electrician to do the work and that would have been about $600 for the removal of the old panel and installation of the new panel. I try to do the neatest job I can, a neat job will make it easier to pull the panel and move it to the new shop when I build it. The old panel will be used when I build the front room on the house as a sub panel.
Years ago I helped a friend turn an old pole building into his shop, the wiring it looked like silly string also. The worst part of the system was whomever put it in used short pieces of wire and butt connectors between outlets. Some of the wiring was old fabric cover wire and some was newer plastic covered wire. Scary stuff, when the power company came out to put in the meter for the service they looked at it and said no. They were afraid the place would burn down.
We had to strip everything out and put in a new panel and new cable from the meter to the panel, it took four weeks of working from 6pm to 11pm to get the new insulation up, the walls covered with drywall, and wiring done. He put in the conduit and I pulled the wire and wired the devices. He liked running conduit but pulling wire was to him was like watching grass grow. I learned a lot from him but I could not see doing wiring everyday. He has since added a 40 X 60 addition(for storage) to the original 20 X 40 building. He contracted that out instead of building it himself. He has a nice collection of Case Tractors he has restored of the years since then.
Dan.

Terry the "wallpaper" is from years ago, the Blond in the lower right hand corner is an early poster of Pamela Anderson. I like her looks before all the "fabrication work" she had done.
Dan.

Tomorrow, if it does not rain, I am going to build the curb for my ventilation fan I want to install. I have to be home for a friend to pick up a repair job that I finished today. The curb will be mounted into the work bays roof, the curb will be 28" X 28" X 24" tall. It will be made from 2 X 12's and plywood. The metal roofing will have to be cut and fit around the curb. The curb will have a metal cap place over the plywood once the metal roofing is fit around the curb. The cap will waterproof the joint. Once the curb is installed in the roof, sealed and capped, the fan will set on top of the curb and be screwed to the sides of the curb.
Pictures to follow.
I need to go get the wire splicers tomorrow so I can get the RPC wired into the panel.
Dan.

Oh yes, I just remembered the best wiring in my garage....A lamp cord with the ends stripped off, passed thru the holes in the prongs of another cord and(thankfully!)taped up. I guess that's why codes were made I guess!
T

Rain
I still might get the curb built if the forecasted breaks in the rain happen.
Terry, I have seen some pretty scary stuff over the years, the best one I came across was an extension cord buried in the ground to feed power to a storage building. We cut it with a back hoe while digging for the foundation of an addition to the shop. We could not find where the cord came out of the ground in the shop. We figured that the cord had been spliced to romex cable somewhere under the slab. We corrected that with conduit and 12ga THHN wire. We found the other end of the cord when we dug the new ditch to the storage building. They had put a plug on the romex cable and taped them up with regular electrical tape.
At least the breaker tripped when we cut the cord.
Dan.

Rain? We could use it down here....10:30 AM and 96 degrees!
T

I went and got the bugs to lengthen the wiring for the RPC and got the that done, after that I started on the curb.

These were $14.70

Dikes for size comparison.

Close up.
The round black part of the bug, is the cap that covers the set screw that secures the wire into the bug. Once you tighten the set screws down you put the caps back on and you are ready to roll.
The Curb.
The curb is built from plywood, 2 X 10's, and 2 X 12's. The curb measures 28" X 28" X 24" high.

The curb took about three hours to build.

Side view.

Setting upright, the curb will be installed in this orientation.
Dan.

It took about two hours of work to do the framing work on the roof, I had to remove a roof rafter, the space between the rafters is 30-1/2". I clamped two angle iron tabs to the beam to allow me to set the curb into the hole. Tomorrow the forecast calls for possible rain in the morning then clearing off before noon, if the weather clears before noon the curb will go in. If everything works right, I am looking at having the fan up and running by Saturday.
The benefit of having this fan is two fold, one the shop will be cooler, two the fan can be use as a smoke ejector while welding.
Dan.

Looks good Dan. Bet that joker will move some air! Good luck with the rain.
T

Terry, the radar shows the rain to the east of me.(Pic#1) The arrow shows my approximate position. I will wait until around noon to start to open the roof up. I am going to add some blocking to the tops of the rafters to support the steel roofing. Once the curb box is in place then comes the hard part of the job. I need to make up the flashing's to seal the curb to the roof.
I have enough galvanized sheet to make the cap that will fit over the curb to seal the top edges of the actual flashing's. The trick will be not screwing up the cricket for the upper side that has to seal the peak of the roof to the curb.
A cricket is a sheet metal piece that directs the water around the curb on the upper side of it. I will see what needs done once the curb is set.
Dan

Still waiting for the rain showers to clear the area. Now it looks like it will be after 2PM before the showers clear the area.
Dan.

The rain stopped and the sky cleared around 1:30PM. The first thing to do was to remove two roof panels. I had nailed the panels down so I had to pull the nails before the roof panels could be pulled up. Live and learn, I won't be nailing the anymore panels down in the future.
Once the panels were pulled I had to cut a purlin out of the opening of the roof framing. I added blocking to two sides of the curb that would rest on the roof purlin that was cut out of the opening. A 1" X 2" strap of pine was added to the peak side of the curb also. These were added to prevent the curb from falling through the opening once I set it in place.
Once it was set in place, I checked it for square and used six 1/4" X 4" screws to attach the curb to the roof framing.
It was then time to remove the extra blocking and add a few pieces of 2 X 6 to support the edge of the roof panels and the flashing. Cutting the roof panels to fit around the curb turned out to be easier then I thought it would be. Once the roof panels were back in place, I could start on the flashing the curb.
The flashing was made from leftover roofing panels, I had to cut and bend them to fit the ribs of the roof panels for the sides of the curb. The flashing for the bottom is made from two pieces of leftover roofing, I bent them to form two L-shaped pieces. The first piece was screwed to the curb with the long leg down against the roof panel, then the second piece was placed with the long leg up against the curb.
Then it was on to the ridge cover, I made the new ridge cover from two pieces of roofing panel that was left from the original roofing job. To make the cover I cut the ribs off the one piece as there was only three ribs left on it. This left a single rib in the center and two flat flanges. The second sheet had five ribs left on it, that left three ribs to remove. That gave me two pieces of ridge cover. I needed 20' of cover to seal the ridge I ended up with three feet left over.
Dan.

After getting the flashing done I sealed the curb for the night.
Dan.

The Ventilator Fan.
I picked this fan up from an elementary school remodel and addition. I was told they worked fine.
The question I should have asked if they were single phase or 3-phase. Two of them have 3-phase motors and the third one I will have to take apart to see if it is 3-phase also. I have a single phase 56 frame motor on the fourth ventilator fan it have here. Tomorrow I will change the motors over.
I will order the new motors once I have the extra money in the tool account.
Dan

Yesterday I had an emergency repair come into my shop, so all I got done was change the motor, get it wired for testing and test the fan.
This fan moves a lot of air! I will have to put a grate over the bottom of the curb to keep it from sucking my hat off my head. It should cool the shop off very quickly.
Today I will pull the motor back off, do the wiring on the bench,no standing on my head, and change the pulleys out. Once the motor is off I need to build "burglar bars" to put in the curb. Install the fan onto the curb and put the hood on it.
I am going to change the wiring around a bit also. So i need a couple of handy boxes and a couple of liquid tight couplings to do the wiring on the fans base.
We will see how far I get today.
Dan.

I removed the motor from the fan to make it easier to wire, then I hauled the fan up on the roof and mounted it onto the curb. Next came the hood, it took a few minutes to figure out how to tie the rope to the hood. Once I got it figured out I hauled the hood up onto the roof and mounted it on the fan. The fan was now weather tight.
Then came wiring the motor, and getting it mount on the fan. I used 12ga. THNN wire, liquid tight flexible conduit, and liquid tight fittings, so i would have the length to relocate the junction box. I wanted the motors weight to be over the strongest part of the curb and that was the ridge side of the roof. Since the electrical panel is to the west of the ventilator I had to move the junction box to the west side of the fan. I drilled a hole so I can mount the conduit directly into the junction box from below, mounted the box onto the fans base and then installed a pigtail into the box. So I could test it, I closed the ventilator up and tested it out. The ventilator moves a lot of air, I can control where the ventilator pulls the air from by opening or closing doors or windows in the shop. I need to get a new belt for it as the old one is a little stiff from setting.
I will see how well it cools the down tomorrow.
Dan.

That should move alot of air/smoke.
Good Job.:)