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im installing 3way switches from my house to my barn. its about 300 feet away from switch to switch . is it possible to use the grounding wire as a traveler and just ground each end with a new wire onto a grounding rod? i just dont want to spend a lot of money for a spool of 500 feet of wire if its unnecessary. please help thanks
Hahahahahaha... NO !
Well it certainly would not meet any kind of code. But yes it will work. The ground wire does not carry any current if wired correctly. You will need three strands of wire for the 300ft. Assuming no12 wire the drop will be about 17 volts over that run. I just re read your post. You can not use the unshielded bare copper as any part of the live circuit. Well I guess you could but totally unsafe. Notice that the ground wire does not show in this schematic.
Wiring a 3-Way Switch
This calculator uses K = 12.9 circular mil ohms per foot for copper or K = 21.2 circular mil ohms per foot for aluminum. These values assume a conductor operating temperature of 75 degrees C.
System Parameters
Conductor Material:
CopperAluminum Conductor Size:
18 AWG 16 AWG 14 AWG 12 AWG 10 AWG 8 AWG 6 AWG 4 AWG 3 AWG 2 AWG 1 AWG 1/0 AWG 2/0 AWG 3/0 AWG 4/0 AWG 250 kcmil 300 kcmil 350 kcmil 400 kcmil 500 kcmil 600 kcmil 700 kcmil 750 kcmil 800 kcmil 900 kcmil 1000 kcmil 1250 kcmil 1500 kcmil 1750 kcmil 2000 kcmil Circuit Type
120 Volts 1-phase 240 Volts 1-phase 208 Volts 3-phase 3-wire 120/208 Volts 3-phase 4-wire 277 Volts 1-phase 480 Volts 3-phase 277/480 3-phase 4-wire 24 DC or 1-phase AC 48 DC or 1-phase AC 124 DC or 1-phase AC Circuit Length:
in feet (one way)
Load Current:
in Amps
Answers
Voltage drop:
Volts
Voltage at load end of circuit:
Volts
Percent voltage drop:
%
cma of conductor:
Circular mills
the ground would have been sheilded , but as handyman put it, nooooooo! lol . it was a shot in the dark and i missed the target. i finally got out my wd-40 and loosened up the hinge on my wallet, and purchased the proper amount and size of wire, grrrrrrrr. i was also informed i will need to do much more to bring it up to code. so $1000,00 later i think and i hope i have all the right stuff. but i have a feeling ill be back here in the middle of this can of worms i wish i would have left on the shelf to get some advice from you gents. thank you jim brown u were a great help. and as for u handy man i appreciate the honesty . lol take care all and im sure ill be back