[RE-wrenches] question about pole mount interconnection

[Benn At DayStarSolar]

William,
With Tech90 regardless of the conductor size it always comes with a bare #8 included.  A 3 conductor #10 (aka 10/3) will have red, white, and black #10 plus the bare#8. 
A four conductor will have red, white, black and blue. 

 I have only ever seen or been made aware by my suppliers that the bare is a #8, however would not be surprised if a different size bare could be ordered, if you were willing to pay extra and wait a bit longer. 

We typically pay $15-18ea for the outdoor rated tech connector, which are required outdoors for weatherproofing, however inspectors are fine with an indoor rated flex-connector ($2-3 bucks ea) where weather/moisture will not be an issue. 

For surface runs you may want to support it at more frequent intervals, especially on horizontal runs as it is not rigid and can look sloppy if not adequately supported. 

benn
Sent from a 'smart' phone, with touch screen keys. Please excuse shortcuts and typos. 

On 2013-10-08, at 9:40 PM, "William Miller" <william at millersolar.com> wrote:

> Hilton:
> 
> Can you get this cable with mixed wire gauges, i.e. 3 #10 (white and two
> colors) and 1 #8(green or bare)?
> 
> How does this material look on surface runs?  Can you get it to run nice and
> straight?
> 
> Thanks in advance.
> 
> William
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: re-wrenches-bounces at lists.re-wrenches.org
> [mailto:re-wrenches-bounces at lists.re-wrenches.org] On Behalf Of Hilton Dier
> III
> Sent: Tuesday, October 08, 2013 4:28 PM
> To: re-wrenches at lists.re-wrenches.org
> Subject: [RE-wrenches] question about pole mount interconnection
> 
> We just did a 4 pole installation using DPW top-of-pole mounts. We used
> Teck-90 armored watertight cable between the poles and from the poles to the
> house. The Teck-90 spiral wound metal flex conduit with an
> everything-resistant black sheath on it pre-stuffed with just about any
> combo of wires you might want. We cast 2" PVC sweeps into the 36" dia. 
> sonotubes so the cable could enter underground and come up next to the pole.
> We put PVC end caps on the tops of the sweeps with cable holes in them, just
> for neatness.
> 
> Teck-90 is a revelation. We laid out and buried a double run of 100 feet of
> the stuff in the time it took the excavator to go along the trench. 
> He never got out of the cab. We get it on a 500' spool and mount the spool
> in the back of a pickup. Then we just run off however much we need, cut it
> to length, and throw dirt on it.
> 
> We got it from Graybar for slightly less than the price per foot of the
> equivalent wire and PVC conduit. I had been meaning to write a post on here
> about it.
> 
> We also just did PV on a barn roof and did the spool-it-off-and-clip-it-up
> routine. Made the run from the roof to the inverter on the north side first
> floor in about 40 minutes. No conduit bending. The end connectors are kind
> of pricey, but the time saved is huge.
> 
> Hilton
> 
> --
> Hilton Dier III
> Renewable Energy Design
> Partner, Solar Gain LLC
> 453 East Hill Rd.
> Middlesex, VT 05602
> 
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