Listen to me, This is exactly what ive been looking for.. and This is where it is useful... 1). Tiny homes that only need 110v and outside power (house) or generator power is ran directly into the subpanel. (All appliances are are 110v and no need for 220) 2). Motorhomes where the input power from a house or pole needs to feed directly into the 110v panel. (again no 220v) Thank you for posting this video and showing exactly how to do it and where each colored wire goes. Ive Regained my Confidence !

I'm not an electrician or inspector but I like that someone put in work up front to get the garage ready for a 240v sub panel. Much cleaner (and in most cases safer) than the extension cord mess found in most garages.

Great content Ben! I've watched a few of your videos over and over! Keep up the great work brother. The Union needs instructors like you! 👍

I love all the comments. I’ve pulled a few “less than neat” wiring specials for temporary situations myself, but always corrected them before passing to someone else. I was really amazed at the stories of México electric service. In my last home in Virginia, I had 200 amp service like all the houses in my neighborhood, and I accomplished a “heavy up” to 400 amps when adding an addition and a large pool with spa. Now I retired to a 1960’s home in Puerto Rico. Old Air Force base house with 100 amp service. The few wall receptacles are indicative of the few electrical appliances in 1960’s homes. The house is poured concrete entirely. Adding circuits means exterior conduit!! I’ve seen some interesting “rigging” since I’ve been here! People do what they think they have to do!!

I'm not an electrician, but do most of my own work. This is very similar to the way I added power to my shed I built. Used every other one just like this setup, one breaker for a light, one for an receptacle in the shed and one for an outdoor receptacle next to the shed. The grounds to a ground rod driven into the ground outside the shed, it all works great.

I've done it for a panel from 2000 watt inverter powered by a battery bank. Simple jumper between the legs. Works great. Used the battery inverter system 3x this winter to power a pellet stove and a cpap and lights.

As an electrician, I would say just use 12-3 or 10-3 so you can have 240 volts there in case you ever need it in the future. It is in the nature of people to want more... but safety wise, seems fine

Here is a story of using a 3-wire 240 volt fuse box on a 2-wire 120 volt service. In the mid 1960's I was visiting my grandmother for the summer in Iowa and she had a problem with fuses blowing all the time. I was still in high school, but was interested in electricity even then, and had got my amateur radio license (not that in any way that makes you an electrician, but at least I understood basic electricity!), and I went down in her basement and discovered her entire house, which was about 1500 s.f. was running through a 30 amp fuse. Not only that, but it was a 2-wire 120 volt service. The "main" fuse was a 2 position porcelain fuse holder, with a built in knife switch and both the hot and neutral were being fused. The house was built in 1930 and I think 30 amps was a common electric service for small houses built in this era. The main fuses fed several other porcelain fuse holders (without the knife switches) that fed a few branch circuits around the house. Again, the hot and neutral wires were fused. I am not sure the idea of a grounded neutral was thought much about back then, after all it was alternating current and being 120 volt service there was no concern for which wire was hot and which was the grounded neutral. It was just 120 volts between two wires. Back then people got shocked a lot! All this was mounted on the wall of the basement, out of the reach of a young child, but all exposed and just hanging there with exposed terminals and that exposed knife switch. All the receptacles and lights in the house were wired together on one circuit and it was knob and tube wiring (I could see that in the basement and attic). I discovered there were separate runs of very old looking cloth and rubber insulated sheathed cable for the water pump, a plug or two in the kitchen, and the gas furnace. Newer #12 romex had been recently installed for a window air conditioner in the living room and a washer and gas dryer. The problem was the main 30 amp fuse blowing a lot but there was no way she could afford to hire an electrician to straighten all this out. Usually it would blow when the water pump came on if something else that used a lot of power was on at the same time. Long story short, I bought a fuse box at Sears with 6 positions for screw in fuses. Somehow I remember it cost about $10. I removed the wires coming in to that knife switch fuse block, which was #8 stranded cloth and rubber insulated, that was installed in conduit, taped them up really good, and removed all the porcelain fuse holders, mounted the fuse box and hooked up the incoming #8 to the new fuse box. I did this very carefully and slowly as the service was still hot. Then I installed a single 40 amp cartridge fuse in the main pull out, and hooked up the branch circuits to the six fuse positions and installed 15 amp fuses for the water pump, kitchen, furnace, and the lights and receptacles, and 20 amp fuses for the air conditioner and washer. I knew back then that #14 wire was to be fused at 15 amps, etc. This was a 3-wire 240 volt fuse box. 3 of the fuses were on one leg and the other 3 fuses were on the other leg of where the service connected to the fuse box. How to get all 6 fuses connected to the 120 volt incoming service? I could not wire the incoming line to the line side of both of the cartridge fuses (with two fuses) without overloading the #8 service wires, so I ran a piece of #8 wire between the "take-off" lugs, which are wired to the load side of the main fuses. This connected all 6 fuse positions to the single 40 amp fuse. I cannot remember if the original setup had a local ground connection to the neutral. But I did sort out which incoming wire was the grounded neutral. I did not have a volt meter so I used a light bulb that I connected to a cold water pipe, and the incoming #8 that lit the light bulb was the hot wire. Which of the knob and tube wires was the neutral and which was hot I had no idea, but it probably did not matter because the receptacles were just 2 wire and not polarized. I was hoping that having an extra 10 amps (plus the cartridge fuse was tolerant of short term overloads from motors when they started) would fix the problem and it did -- it completely eliminated the situation of the main fuse blowing, and the house is still standing to this day, although the service has been upgraded since then to 240 volt with a modern breaker panel. When I look back at this, I am amazed at how unsafe all this was, but I don't think that what I did made it any more unsafe than what was there originally.

Thanks Benjamin always enjoyed your content.. very humbled human being

What you have there is an elaborate #12 extension cord with a splitter.

Thanks for this video; it is very helpful. I have solar at my off-grid cabin and I will be hooking up an inverter for 120 VAC power. I plan to wire a load center like this to install circuit breakers for my AC outlets.

Years ago I ran into an interesting situation, An electrician hooked up a 120 V panel for gas pumps, but he didn't want to buy expensive gas station breakers. He hooked the panel up with a neutral on one feed, and a hot on the other. Then he used an inexpensive 2-pole breaker for each pump. This complies with the turn both the hot and the neutral at the same time requirement for gas pumps.

Hey Ben, perfect timing with this video. We bought a house, previous owner powered the detached garage with 10-2 on a 20 amp breaker. I want to run 50 amp, but till I do, it's good to know I can put a box out there, and bump my amperage up to 30. Thanks and great videos, very informative 👍

Perfect video. This answered every question I had. Thanks

Thanks for you’re wisdom in electronic’s teaching the in’s & out’s that’s proper !

Great video!! This is how my tractor/chicken shed is wired, and works just fine.

Thanks for the video! One good reason to do this is if you are using some existing wiring. My attic (3rd floor) has a 120v fuse box that was connected to the main panel with 10 gauge wire. With only adding a ground wire, I can use the two conductors to power the 30 amp subpanel at 120v, but would need to run completely new 10/3 just to get 240v when I only need lights and outlets there. Good call on it potentially confusing a future homeowner though, so will label that it's 120v only.

Ben should be on This Old House! Great video as always!

Awesome vid. Exactly what I wanted to know on the exact same box

I have the exact same setup in my small work shop supplied by a 40amp breaker from my basement panel. The 40amp breaker and buried tek cable was already existing when i bought the house, but who ever installed it had an outdoor 20amp gfci receptacle at the end of it for his camper trailer!? Totally not smart or to code… so I removed the receptacle and used the box as a junction to add about 10 feet more buried tek cable to reach my work shop. Then installed the sub panel on the 120v 40 amp service. Its a small subpanel with only 4 max circuits (2 breakers) so I did jumper the two hot legs together. I know its not perfect, but everything works safely, is done neat and tidy, ground separated etc. and i made sure to clearly label every bus, breaker, wire, and wrote on the panel that the supply is 120V 40amp. It works beautifully for my needs and saved me a ton of money and time doing it this way.

Pigtail two wires onto the black to feed both hot lugs. As long as the wire feeding the panel is properly protected with the correct size breaker the worst that will happen is nuisance tripping.

I found your video when searching for 120 volt panel. I will be hooking up a 120 volt solar inverter to an electrical panel in the near future. This video verified what I suspected could be done using a standard electrical panel.

I've often come across 120v subpanels in outbuildings in rural areas. The rationale is that there will never, repeat, never be a need for 240v or use of more than 20-30A in the shed, shack, or stable. Because such structures are often wired in 14 ga, but the distance from the main panel in the nearby house or building (often 150 feet or so) might require 6 ga feeders, some installers prefer a small 120v subpanel over simple junction boxes as an easy solution to the dramatic difference in the diameters of feeders and branches. Some property owners prefer breakers to junctions because they intend to use the breakers as an on-off switch for loads that aren't typically installed with one, such as dusk-to-dawn exterior lights. (Property owners also often prefer local breakers in such buildings because of their misguided perception that circuit breakers offer them protection when using electricity in wet locations - since the floors of such structures are often wet or covered with manure or mud.) I think the 120v subpanel DOES serve a certain niche market - primarily in storage buildings and shelters located a long way from the main panel, with intermittent or very limited need for electricity. Installing modern ground-fault breakers in such a 120v subpanel might enhance safety in damp outbuildings more economically than GFCI outlets.

I have a solar inverter system and so I setup a sub panel next to it. Its a 30amp 120v and I did the jumper so I could put 4 circuit breakers in it. I primarily keep track of watts used, not amps and typically runs about 400-500 watts usage. The inverter also has a 30 amp A/C backup from the main panel as well.

Perfec timing, thanks Ben for this topic, i have one question, if my "120V panel" is completely off grid for a "man cave shed" , my power source is either 120V small gas generator or 120V solar panel inverter from 48V battery, do I need to bond the neutral bar and ground bar inside the 120V panel? I did some research and could not find the exact answer. My understand is sub panel never bond N+G because main panel already did, but this is offgrid set up and not connect to the main panel at all.

if you look at this panel the feed wire is 12/2 white cable (12/2 white was changed to yellow in 2001) which was ordinal to the garage and most likely when to the box to the right of the panel. (yellow from the panel goes in the box and white goes out.) Then it looks like the lights were added to the garage. (switch to the left has yellow wire going in.) And new code rules apply. gfi for the lights and arc fault /gfi for the old curcuit.

I would just label the panel as Fed from Breaker/Panel # and 120v Only. I can see a reason for wanting a sub panel there, but find it quite limited with the 20a feed, especially considering at least one of the subpanel breakers is also 20a. This particular setup would make much more sense to me if all the sub circuits were 10-15a breakers. At least then you can use it to create isolated loads, for instance if you had a chest freezer, a beer fridge, and then some lighting circuits in the garage. If the light circuit has a fault, say an LED bulb shorts out internally and trips the breaker, the fridge and freezer continue working. Unless the feeding panel is tapped out, I personally would have run 10/3 and made it a proper dual feed sub panel with a 30a feed. That would open up a lot more utility, even if only using for 6-120v circuits. 15amps on a circuit is pretty easy to use in a garage application, that doesn't leave much headroom on the 20a feed. But with a dual feed of 30a, and individual 15amp circuits in the subpanel, you are much less likely to trip the feed. The price difference between 12/3 and 10/3 isn't prohibitive either.

I am installing the exact sub panel in my studio, previously fed by 2 12/2 cables from house service using ground fault outlets. Studio is 30 feet away. Can each 12/2 be connected to each hot bar, labeled as such and using dual breakers. Use for lights and light tools? Your videos are the best. Watching them daily. Thank you

I did a similar install to a preexisting 10-2 30 amp line to a slab I had a building put on. Only using it for lights and outlets. If I want to upgrade the service to 240v, all I have to do is run some new line.

No real problems with the idea. It is always good to divide electrical circuits as independant than reasonable possible. Consider the right wiring size as inlet and apropriated breaker for that particular feedline though. And you mentioned that well, one is always trying to balance the two phases. In particular in a workplace, I like to feed every socket independantly, that helps to detect faulty portable tools when pluged in. Better protection also when using GFCI's. So, overall: go for it.

New Yorker here. A comment about the jumper from lug to lug. Where I am this idea would fail an inspection. You are not allowed to “double tap” a single lug. The correct way to do so would be to buy and install a double lug. “No two wires under a single terminal. Thanks love ur videos!

Great video, just for you to know, in Mexico almost all the residential services are 120 V. You can apply for a 240 V service, but mostly happens in tropical areas were AC are installed, and you are limited to 80 A. 120 V are all 40 A service

A good explanation.

You just reminded me that it is past time for me to take my Xanax! Why not just run the 12/2 w/g to the garage and connect everything in there on the one circuit in a junction box? That is what you are actually doing.

Thanks for sharing this video. I purchased the same panel to use in my conversion van. My van is connected a 20, 30, 50 amp circuit breaker box, but I am only using the 30 amp 120 volt circuity. I will be using a 10 ga wire connecting from the inlet plug to this sub panel. I plan to have about 3 breakers. What type of breakers should I use for this set up?

Most people are looking at this video and thinking about from an on-grid perspective. However, I looked at this video because I'm contemplating how I would hook up two off-grid 3000 watt solar generators which each have an output to an RV 30 amp/120v connection. This kind of set-up would work to feed the main input to the panel with the first generator, and then use the 2nd generator with a grid transfer switch to use with the 2nd.

Where it becomes a problem, if ever, is loading and demand. I always recall ELI the ICE man as the rule in tech college to explain how these issues need to be observed. That means ELI the ICE man is used to remember the relationship between current and voltage in an inductor and capacitor. ELI the ICE man stands for the fact that voltage [E] leads current [I] in an inductor [L] (that's the ELI part) and current [I] leads voltage [E] in a capacitor [C] (that's the ICE part). While the understanding is typically applicable to inductor and capacitive circuits, The basic rules prevail in part. We typically want to always have more voltage than amperage draw, which is additionally why we use high power tension services and divide the voltage. It's to not compromise service down the line. Putting several 20amp breakers on one 20amp breaker, is not going to hurt anything, it's just that you will never be able to use a total of more than 20amps at a given time. So it simply depends on if you ever foresee yourself needing more amperage. Your not going to be able to run a small compressor in that garage, they typically trip 20 amp breakers. If your only going to use hand tools and lights, your probably more than fine. Throw in an electric heater, and you could be limited.

I am one of your followers and love your work ♥️ ♥️ ♥️

I'd say there's nothing wrong with using a panel like that for 120V, it can't hurt anything. In fact it's quite nice because it 1) serves as a required disconnect for an outbuilding that is required by many AHJs, and 2) is local over-current protection (and GFCI and AFCI) for additional safety. I agree with your reasoning to not to jumper the two load buses of the panel, though. I would use a label maker and put a label on the panel "120V BRANCH CIRCUITS ONLY" or something to that effect for clarity. I have this exact same Square D panel in my garage with a 50A 240V feed. I actually backwired the feed to a 50A dual pole breaker, and I removed the lugs on the buses so that this breaker is actually energizing the buses like a main panel would. You actually need a "hold down" strap for a main or disconnect breaker--research that if you haven't already!

Years ago my parents bought an old farmhouse that had a 30 amp service. It was protected by two 15 amp fuses on one leg (no 240) and only had two receptacles upstairs. One duplex and a single one incorporated into an overhead light fixture. Needless to say they called an electrician.

I had to do this setup for my RV with a 30 amp receptacle.

Great video! I agree with most of the comments I've read so far regarding labeling and your details regarding the jumper. Do I see it as a safety issue as is? Absolutely not. However, if you added that jumper and it wasn't labeled properly, I could see someone mistakenly installing a 240 circuit.

I was going to set something like this up for a 3kw single phase UPS, where I just want certain receptacles for my expensive electronic equipment on the UPS before my generator kicks on. It would be a 30 amp subpanel. Is this a good use case?

Question if you have that white wire the breaker to that panel 30 amps or 50 amps from the main panel

Here is a use case. Running a grid isolation subpanel being fed by a single inverter. Is it only possible to use a single pole/phase? Or as you suggested, energize both poles of the subpanel with one pole/circuit breaker from the main panel?

I have a question about hooking up a meter socket and panel using 350 kcmil cable. The lugs won't accept that size cable. What can I do here? Use a pin adaptor? cut several strands out until the cable fits? Thank you

First of all, the cost difference to run a 120 volt wire to the panel vs. running a 220 volt wire to the panel is very little. The labor is the same. Also if the 120 volt panel is used for some reason, it should be marked with huge labels so that the next person can easily see what is going on. As far as I am concerned not much of a reason to run a 120 volt sub panel off of a main panel that has 220 volts available.

If you add that jumper to the other side to have more room for more breakers, Are you not overloading the circuit breaker and wire(12-2) coming from the house?

Just out of query is the ground coming in from the main box a TT? In the UK we would more likely to have PME which would make that installation dangerous.

An overhead feed between my barns came down in a storm. Upon accessing the nessasay repair I found that the 240v fuse panel feeding the other barn was wired with 120v feeding the panel. To my horror I noticed that the hot and neutral were feeding 2 separate lugs in the panel. With the hot black wire feeding 1/2 the panel and the white neutral feeding the other half. So there are 3 wires feeding the panel. They just wired it as if there was 240 volts coming in. The 3rd wire went to the neutral buss connection in the panel. When we moved here we had the home inspected and we knew that the electrical needed updating but we've not gotten around to the barns yet. The lights have always flickered and I used the few outlets for my power tools and hvent had any problems with the tools. I don't know how it's been working unless by luck the circuits I've been using were all on the true hot leg.

I'm doing this exact thing. Had an existing unused 50A range circuit feeding another area in the basement where I want to add some circuits--and using the main panel would result in very long runs. I have no need for 240V in this area. Existing cable was hot, hot, ground. Using the second hot as neutral and jumping the first hot to the other feed lug. Will be clearly labeling the panel so whoever finds this (after I die) will know what I did. For those asking why one would do this? I'm doing it myself, and with the cost of wire today, this was a no brainer.

I have a large sub panel with more than a dozen circuits which are all 120 volt. I was thinking about installing a breaker in the sub panel with an interlock kit such that I could run all the circuits with a 120 volt solar inverter and battery, but leave the option to go back to pulling power from the main panel if there’s a problem with the inverter. I would just use a double pole breaker for the inverter on the interlock and run a pigtail on the double pole breaker in addition to the hot wire from the inverter. Looking for some advice as to whether that would be in code or dangerous.

My first question was you only have a 20 amp breaker feeding this entire panel that means between the three circuits that apparently look like 3 - 20 amp breaker circuits in the sub panel. Putting loads across those three breakers would trip your 20 amp breaker at the main panel quite often I would think. Seems like it should’ve been wired with a 40 amp main panel breaker and associated wire to support a higher load at the subpanel across the three circuits. But I’m no electrician! Thanks for the video interesting concept

Just wanted to comment on that last bit about balancing loads. If you're conductors are sized properly and you are not bumping up against your service rating on one leg or the other then there isn't a concern to balance the panel. The only time it would become an issue is if you start overloading one leg or if you are attempting to add an additional 240v circuit that would overload a leg then it's time to move a few loads. I have a 12 circuit panel in my housed wired entirely for 120v. I have all my lights, fridge, TV, etc. wired to it as a backup panel. The reason it's 120v is so that I can use a small, quiet 2kw inverter generator to power everything during a power outage. Having it as a 240v panel would require a much larger, louder, more expensive generator. And even then there are no 240v loads I'm going to need to run during a power outage. It just makes more sense to have 120v panel in some cases. I do wish there was a clean way to wire a 120V panel. Most of the lugs are not rated for double conductors so the simplest way to do it to satisfy code is to put in a breaker with a jumper.

If the mains had been jumped providing the same 120v to both poles and someone installed a double pole breaker. Is there any device that could be damaged by not having the correct voltage? That's the only real bad issue I can see. The closest I've ever done was several years ago a customer had me install a 120v 30a 8 circuit disconnect in a tiny home he built. He had it hooked up to a generator. But not quite a sub panel. Thanks for the vid!

Hello could you please tell me how much minimum amps is recommended to install a subpage into a basement

Interesting, never saw a setup like this before.

I have to move my main panel about 4 Feet , a sink was add under panel like 20 + years ago , I think if I add a sub panel where the breaker box was and move the main panel 4’ away from any water . What do you think ? I am open for advice & Legal points ! Ok

Nice video

The only way I would ever do it is in a case where I'm actually currently doing it. My garage (about 20 feet from the house) has a single 120v 15 amp breaker currently feeding it. I'm currently upgrading it and installing a subpanel. I have a few breakers installed and fully wired up, for things like exterior lighting, interior lighting and outlets. Right now I don't have the money to upgrade the service line to the garage and the ground is still frozen. I don't have any 220v outlets currently in the garage (though I plan to install one for a welder plug, and perhaps another for ev fast charge). Those will remain unconnected to the panel until I deal with the service line to prevent accidental use and damage to equipment. If you open up my sub panel it's obvious that it's only fed with a single phase. It's a short term deal that will be finished this summer, and I'm the only one who will be working on it till I sell the place.

I have a question. Say you have a 100 amps for a garage that has a subpanel with the proper 240 volts set up. Can you have another subpanel off of the 100 amp subpanel?

I have a sub box similar but mine should connect directly to a breaker. I only have three wires that come from the 12/2. How would that even hook up?

Pretty sure that power wire going to the lug is 10/2 Romex unless it's the old wiring with the thick insulation?

I'm adding a 120v subpanel from an inverter from a solar array.. the inverter is powered by a 40A single pole breaker from the main panel and/or the power from the array and/or battery. the solar controller/ inverter auto switches its source depending on availability... when there's no sun or the batteries run down, the inverter switched the source to the grid.. and vice versa, when there's power from the array or battery the inverter switches back to those for power. the 120v subpanel is only supplying power to lights and frig. so i would like to use all the slots in the subpanel.. does this sound reasonable?

i know of a garage with a really old fuse panel with 2 circuits coming off a 10 gauge line from house it is so far from house it is hard to get power tools that draw 15 amps to work properly with the voltage drop

Should it not have a larger wire feeding the panel to help prevent overheating when both breakers are in use. Just asking. I am not an electrician

I just had a similar panel put in for a generator hook-up, and the master electrician at the company that did the install said that jumping both rails to the same 120V hot wire was perfectly fine and up to code. A lot of the four- to six-circuit sub panels they sell these days that have interlock switches and ports for installing various plugs for back-feeding from a generator have two rails on them so that they can take 240V sources if need be, which surprised me. But if you want to use a smaller, 120V generator because that's all you need, it's evidently fine to jumper the rails together to power both from the same 120V source. My generator panel is a special case, though. I couldn't speak to how much sense a 120V sub panel like this one would make if you had the option to wire for 240V.

I will have public power coming in on each Leg 120v @ 100A each Phase what’s the technical side of this next to being very very very careful ?

Like everyone is saying yes this wouldn't make sense on a new install, but if you already have a x-2 wire feeding a building I would rather have this than just a splice point. The only time I have tied hots together is in a small reliance manual transfer switch when hooking it up to run off of a 120 volt generator.

The only problem is with balancing. Generally it's a good idea to balance each phase in a split phase system. The neutral only carries the difference from each phase. So if you're pulling 10 amps on 1 phase, and 5 on the other phase, you'll only have 5 amps going back to the transformer on the neutral. Depending on the capacity of the transformer and your load, balancing may or may not be an issue.

Would it be better to use a 30 amp breaker in the house?

Another place that this is useful is for an attached inlaws quarters. A 2 bedroom apartment attached to the main house that runs off of the same main panel. ( again with only 110v)

Let me join the club. I've been searching video after video and I'm so glad that I landed on this one. I gotta question for you guys, tell me what you think. I have a 10x20 shed that I turned into a tiny home/cabin, 220 volts, 30 amp sub panel that's on my offgrid recreational land. My power supply is the Predator 3500 W generator but this only supplies 120 volts with a Max of 25 amps. When I turn on my space heater which is 1500 W, the generator is reading 13.3 amps. My dilemma is, in the winter I will need to run 2 heaters and in general I want the option of running 2 heaters as I've decided not to go with a propane wall heater. But running 2 heaters will overload the generator. If I had a bigger generator I guess that would solved the problem but I've already invested $900 into a generator 6 months ago and even if I had a bigger generator my sub panel is only rated for 30 amps so I'm wondering if that would even make a difference. Electrical issues are challenging for me but maybe you guys can help me brainstorm a solution THANKS

Can I use a 12/3 wire to supply a sub panel at 240 that offers 2 20 amp 120 vac circuits? I’m trying to understand if this is legit as I suspect it would put too much load on the neutral feed.

120v sub panels, while nich, have their uses. if you are building your own van conversion, school bus, tiny home, shed, or other similar projects with a 30 amp RV service you will only get 120v. 50 amp RVs have split 240V but 30 amp RVs run on one hot, one neutral, and one ground at 120v, (yes I know the ground isn't carrying current) so if your building a vehicle or tiny home with intentions of using a 30 amp RV hookup this makes complete sense. also, off grid builds that run off solar and an inverter are most likely 120v. 240v inverters are available but are very costly and usually overkill for your average small to medium sized off grid power solution.

I'm in a situation where this might be helpful. I'm using a detached garage as a workshop where the house is being rented. Power is coming from the basement of the house so when the breaker trips (which happens too often) I have to bother the tenants to reset it. Currently only 20amps supplies the garage and I don't have the option of upgrading, but I think at least having the ability of resetting power at the garage would be nice.

What size wire for 200ft sub panel for 50 amp service. I have #2 Direct B. Haven’t started yet lol

Question ? Do all sub panels need to be connected to their own ground rod ? I understand Ground and Neutral cannot be bonded (in sub panel). Isnt the ground from the main panel serving that function ?

I have a 120v sub panel in my connected garage, similar to what you showed... However, the neutrals and grounds are bonded (both hooked into same bar like the main)! Can I just add a separate ground bar?

I have a question? In my main panel box which is a 100 amp box. I have a 30 amp circuit that's feeding a 12/2 about 10 to 12 ft or less to a junction box wired to another piece of 12/2 running into a sub panel. The sub panel is a 4 circuit panel with only 2 circuits being used a 20 amp circuit and a 30 amp 2 pole circuit. The 30 amp circuit is wired to my water heater. The 20 amp circuit is wired to 2 receptacles that no longer works. Question? The feeding wire coming in is 12/2 Hot to 1 lug Neutral to 1 lug and ground to bus bar, The 10/2 from water heater is Hot to 30 amp circuit, Neutral to 30 amp circuit and ground to bus bar. The 20 amp circuit is wired Hot to circuit neutral and ground to bus bar. Can I just disconnect the 20 amp breaker? I'm in the process of replacing my water heater and wondering should it be receiving power this way? It's been wired this way for more than 20 year's. I appreciate if you could give me some insight or anyone?

As long as you don’t over load the the in coming power wire with to much amps it should be ok because a 12/2 w grn. Is only rated at 20 amps

Great vid. I would not run a 120 v sub panel. Just a simple upgrade, 10/3 240volt would last forever for this “weird” setup.

I read a discussion on this situation before and the consensus seemed to be NOT using a jumper, but using a pigtail to power both would be OK?

If I follow your logic, which I believe I am, if I brought in a four conductor 240 vac cable with ground into your sub panel in the garage, would I still need a ground rod & conductor to add to the sub panel?

A 20 amp 12/2 with ground FEEDING two breakers. One 15 and one 20 amp? New NEC requires a minimum of one 20 amp GFCI in a garage?

As I see! Correct me if I’m wrong. This panel feeds with 12 AWG wire 12/2. Same phase. 3 circuits god please no 6 of them. Current on a neutral won’t get canceled each other out since it’s a same phase. If you would have 3 x 20A loads on breakers. It would be 60A load on that neutral.

Each Phase was set up by An electrician years back with a 100A single pole breaker so by shutting off the breaker the power is off in a sense but the breaker is still very Hot unclip from 1 box and clip it in another and ground the box and run a neutral and I do have a new 3/4 zinc plated ground and I have the solid copper wire I should probably do that also , I had an Electrician some time ago here he did not like the way the ground was set up but it’s been that way for the past 37 years ! But I will fix , I can about 20’ away put the rod down and wire it !

IM NOT ELCRICIAN BUT I LIKE WHAT YOU DO

I thought a sub panel should ONLY be grounded back to the main panel. Is the separate ground rod at the sub panel optional, or required?

I once did a 30 amp 120 volt feed to a detached two car garage. Used two #10 wires which fed a small two circuit subpanel in the garage. One 15 amp for lights and the opener and another 20 amp for receptacles. I connected both busbars together in the little panel. Since the garage was only used to store cars, and there was no workshop or tools being used in it this was really unnecessary. One 15 or 20 amp circuit would've been fine, but the local code wanted some kind of subpanel in the detached garage. Other than an application like this, feeding a small panel with two circuits only, I can't see any other reason to run 120 volts only to a subpanel, unless there's another situation I'm not seeing where it would be needed.

Case is not ground in a sub panel right?

Are the main lugs rated for that small gauge wire?

This is more a question than a comments and help please. lets suppose that 120 volts are coming from one Bus of the main panel, how about if another 120 volts wire comes from the other leg of the main panel and hooked to the of side of the sub panel to get 120 volts on each leg without jumping both leg

I don't see anything wrong with this setup, even if a jumper were placed to energize both bus bars. From a safety standpoint it appears to be a very high quality installation, especially with the dual function breakers, although a garage is not required to have AFCI protection unless some local codes or inspectors require it. Assuming the 12/2 feed is protected by a 20 amp breaker in the main panel, the worst-case scenario would be a tripped breaker and a major inconvenience if the garage needed more power for some reason. This could lead to a future homeowner replacing the 20 amp breaker with a 30 or larger to prevent nuisance tripping, which has the potential of destroying the wire and setting fire to the house. I would use a label maker and write "120 VOLT CIRCUITS ONLY" or simular wording and use bold capital letters, regardless of whether a jumper is used to power all the breaker slots. Having said all that it's not a very useful setup and I would strongly discourage doing this.

That is the same 6 slot QO load panel 4:40 we are hooking up ⬆️

There are starting to be more people doing this unfortunately because of the high cost of GFI breakers. I however agree, probably not the best plan, shell out for the big aluminum conductors and get the phase to phase (240) your supposed to get.

So can you just bring a second 110 line to power box at 240 ? That is taking the line from the other side in main pannel.

Along with panel surge suppressor required per 2020

What would happen if you jumped the two main lugs to spread the 120volts to both legs and then installed a 2pole breaker to feed a 240volt appliance ? Would you get 240 or zero or just 120?

How many breakers do you plan to install? Your wire doesn't look big enough for the potental 40amp load already (8 gauge or bigger) let alone populating the panel with more than half the breaker slots. As far as a balance issue I don't see a problem with 40amps but it doesn't look like that's your plan. It's just another 120v 40amp load in the main panel. I would stop where you're at or bite the bullet and get some 6/3 wire (I know it's expensive) or whatever size for your needs which then makes the jumper pointless either way. I'm still wondering why you ened up with that wire in that situation. Anyone want to rip on my opinion please do, I'm still learning.