Cost for 50amp pedestal @ home

[cptrick]

I'm in an unusual situation. I live on a floating home. Not for my RV but for my boat I split a 60 amp 220 breaker that originally went to an electric stove (I replaced the stove with a gas model), and ran 2, 65 ft of 8 gauge to a tower I built out on my deck. Not only does the tower have 2, 30 amp outlets but it also has a pump that pulls water out of the river. Total cost $350.00. And $50.00 of that was for permit and city inspection.

[Wyatt]

Originally Posted by TheArthurs

wondering how much (guestimate) to budget for us to have at home?
We are not electrical DIYers.

That depends on a LOT. How much capacity do you have at your house main? I’f you’re maxed out, you might need a new house panel.

Personally, I borrowed power at my main by switching to a gas dryer, which gave me enough for my 30amp service, and freed up a breaker.

How far is the run to your “pedestal” you intend to build? Copper is expensive.

I can only quote you prices from the Bay Area—which are inflated.

A new panel upgrade is about $2,000. The pedestal would be probably another $1,000, again, depending on the run.

[jcurtisis]

Agree with the electrician estimate- we did it that way so there was no safety issue. Suggest you put in a cut-out switch. FYI we had ours run from the junction box through the garage rafters and out to the RV parking spot by going under the rafters (in the plastic pipe required by code) and then down the wall to the outdoor power box. Ours was 30 Amp so it was less ($300) than a 50 amp service I’m sure. Just the same- WELL WORTH IT. Makes getting ready to travel much easier, and even had friends stay in it during a transition time. It was also easy for us to get water & sewer hookups as well. Now we have a “tiny house” available.

[JerryP]

We added a 50A circuit in the wall just under our circuit breaker panel. It cost about $200. A licensed electrician did the install.
We live in a homeowner's association area that's restricted to daytime parking only.
I pull into the driveway and run an extension cord out to the RV. No overnight parking.

Regards, Jerry

[Goodspike]

Originally Posted by jbrattain

We used to have a hot tub. I had to get 50 amp service installed to run it's pump and heaters. We sold the hot tub and later we bought the Winnebago Sightseer. I just plug into the hot tub 50 amp outlet. Lucky me.

Yeah, being able to get rid of that hot tub for money is very lucky!

[jbrattain]

Originally Posted by Goodspike

Yeah, being able to get rid of that hot tub for money is very lucky!

Yeah, it was a really nice one, and a friend of mine who knew it's value and knew it had absolutely no problems, paid me a fair price for it.

Now, if only I could do the same with our in-ground swimming pool we rarely ever use.

[PIC]

Try to find a friend or neighbor who can help you. Here in Sarasota, FL the local electrician
wanted $750!!! What !!! for $150 in parts max??? Needless to say we have put it on the back burner and just use the tandem Honda gens when we need power

[nova 42qd]

Its not difficult to do if you have some basic mechanical skills. There is plenty of info on the internet for how to do it.

Assuming you have capacity in your panel, the biggest cost will be how far you need to run the wire as wire is expensive. Also the size (and expensive) will increase the further you go.

I have RV outlets at three different locations on my property. One is in my RV garage, the others are near the house. Two were wired by an electrician. One I did.

[Goodspike]

Originally Posted by PIC

Try to find a friend or neighbor who can help you. Here in Sarasota, FL the local electrician
wanted $750!!! What !!! for $150 in parts max???

Well, $250 or so might be for permits, which I would highly recommend.

[ThomB]

Originally Posted by PIC

Try to find a friend or neighbor who can help you. Here in Sarasota, FL the local electrician
wanted $750!!! What !!! for $150 in parts max??? Needless to say we have put it on the back burner and just use the tandem Honda gens when we need power

I'm in Pinellas County and paid $1200 to have the entire panel replaced (permitted).$750's a bit out there.
That said I just had some plumbing done and they wanted $600 to replace a shower head adapter. I wonder if the fact that I have an RV sitting in my driveway pushed that price up a bit?

[Griegert]

I recently installed a 50 amp plug. $25 for a surface mount box with the correct RV plug from Amazon. Luckily I had two spare slots in my main exterior electrical box. Electrician charged $100 to run a two inch conduit out of the electric box to the surface mount box. Tried to charge a bunch for the circuit breakers so I picked them up for $20 at home depot. All in all very worth it!

[Topsail]

I was fortunate to have the extra capacity and did the install myself. Since I put it under my breaker panel the cost for flexible conduit, wires, 50amp breaker and new box was $96.67. Since then I had an electrician install a new power panel for $1,200 so we can better market our home for sale. This gave us the proper permits and certification. I will add that the electrician was able to use what I had previously done. I wanted an electrician initially but when We bought our RV electricians were scarce due to hurricane repair work.

[Morich]

One way to be fully in line with most local codes, if your area has them, and still do the work yourself is available. When I did rental property rebuilds, one way to get the electrical changes done and still be in code when in the city was easy. Many places do not say the work has to be done by a licensed electrical contractor but just under the supervision of one.
So get a friend to pull the permit, do the work yourself and have him come take a look for any mistakes or changes. For me it often ran in the range of $40-50 to have it all legal and safe. He did stuff for me and I did stuff for him!
The only time my group ran into trouble was one occurance when my brother had to take a bunch of outlets apart because the inspector insisted the ground screws had to be green as somebody might not know the bare wire was ground if it was not on a green screw! The outlets he had bought did not have green screws so he had to paint the tops to get past the jerk!
So how much it takes to do any work of the sort will vary a lot from time to time and place to place or even when the wind shifts!

[Goodspike]

Originally Posted by Morich

One way to be fully in line with most local codes, if your area has them, and still do the work yourself is available. When I did rental property rebuilds, one way to get the electrical changes done and still be in code when in the city was easy. Many places do not say the work has to be done by a licensed electrical contractor but just under the supervision of one.

I think many/most places say it has to be done by a licensed electrician or the owner. So the owner can do it and pull the permit. That's common in Washington in any event.

[ThomB]

Originally Posted by Goodspike

I think many/most places say it has to be done by a licensed electrician or the owner. So the owner can do it and pull the permit. That's common in Washington in any event.

My wife actually pulled the electrical permit to install a tankless/on-demand electric hot water heater that I wired recently. It was an easier process that you'd think although the actual paperwork that they want you to fill out as a homeowner is confusing as heck.

[Morich]

Who can pull the permit is part of the political issue for each location ,so it will vary and how the inspection goes will often vary as well for what we've seen. When pulled by a "normal electrical or plumbing guy, the inspection is sometimes only a walk through that does nothing, while a DIY permit get much harder to get right. After lots of doing it, my brothers and I came around to just getting somebody to get the permit as the cheaper, quicker and easier way to go. We worked in crawlspace territory and the inspectors never wanted to get down and actually look if a pro pulled the permit! Open the access, see how tight and muddy and call it good! If my wife opened the house for inspections, there were no questions asked but if I did the same thing, they might want to know all kinds of weird things that were not part of the inspection!
The funny thing about code inspections is who may be doing them. Sometimes it is just the county judges kid who is just doing it while home from college and all he has is reading it out of a book, so he gets really hard to please as he thinks everybody is taking advantage of him!

[Goodspike]

Originally Posted by Morich

Who can pull the permit is part of the political issue for each location ,so it will vary and how the inspection goes will often vary as well for what we've seen. When pulled by a "normal electrical or plumbing guy, the inspection is sometimes only a walk through that does nothing, while a DIY permit get much harder to get right.

That is likely true many places, but when I had my install of a house A/C circuit inspected it wasn't that picky, but I had missed needing a 120 volt outlet within X feet of the A/C unit. In contrast, when I had my house plumbing inspected the guy didn't go in the crawlspace because he said he knew the plumber and the quality of his work. If I had done that job . . ..

But yes, in my experience inspections done after professionals have done the job is often just a walk through and little more.

[Shedboy]

My house electrical panel was about 25 feet from the RV pad.
1. 50 amp ganged GFI circuit breaker $75
2. 40ft #6 4 conductor Al cable $60
3. 8’ #10 bare copper ground wire $8
4. 5/8” Ground clamp $3
5. RV connection box w 220vac 50 amp, 110vac 30 amp, 2 ea 110vac 20 $130
6. 8’ x 5/8 galvanized ground rod $18
About $300 in parts. My cable was routed through the garage attic without conduit, similar to electric stove wiring. I would guess about $600 with labor.


Regarding using the RV connection box as a way to connect an emergency genset to the house-
Can be done in an EMERGENCY-
1. Make an adapter cord, 220vac 50amp to whatever plug the generator requires, usually a twist lock type.
2. Power failure
3. Turn off ALL house circuit breakers including the main 100/200 amp.
4. Turn off the circuit breakers in the RV junction box.
5. Remove the electric meter (break the retainer lock, remove retainer ring, pull out the meter)
6. Plug the adapter cord into the RV box.
7. Plug the adapter cord into the generator.
8. Check that ALL circuit breakers are off in the house breaker panel.
9. Start the generator. If the generator has an on/off switch (breaker) turn it on.
10. Turn on the 50 amp circuit breaker in the RV box
11. Turn on the 50 amp circuit breaker in the house breaker panel.
12. Turn on one of the 15amp circuit breakers in the house panel and check that the lights work somewhere in the house.
13. If the lights work somewhere in the house, turn on the house breakers that supply power to medical equipment, water well pump, freezers and refrigerators. Most emergency generators will be maxed out with these items.

[Goodspike]

Originally Posted by Shedboy

Regarding using the RV connection box as a way to connect an emergency genset to the house-
Can be done in an EMERGENCY-
1. Make an adapter cord, 220vac 50amp to whatever plug the generator requires, usually a twist lock type.
2. Power failure
3. Turn off ALL house circuit breakers including the main 100/200 amp.
4. Turn off the circuit breakers in the RV junction box.
5. Remove the electric meter (break the retainer lock, remove retainer ring, pull out the meter)
6. Plug the adapter cord into the RV box.
7. Plug the adapter cord into the generator.
8. Check that ALL circuit breakers are off in the house breaker panel.
9. Start the generator. If the generator has an on/off switch (breaker) turn it on.
10. Turn on the 50 amp circuit breaker in the RV box
11. Turn on the 50 amp circuit breaker in the house breaker panel.
12. Turn on one of the 15amp circuit breakers in the house panel and check that the lights work somewhere in the house.
13. If the lights work somewhere in the house, turn on the house breakers that supply power to medical equipment, water well pump, freezers and refrigerators. Most emergency generators will be maxed out with these items.

Or you could buy a transfer switch (preferred) or breaker box lockout. A solution that requires removal of your meter isn't likely to make your utility happy, nor will that be particularly safe once the power comes on unless you have a cover for the meter box.

[Shedboy]

Agree that transfer switch is the civilized way to go, however people in Puerto Rico and Haiti are still waiting for the power to be turned on or their transfer switch to be delivered. If civilization continues to depreciate the value of human life, dialing 911 or what the utility company thinks is irrelevant.


Similarly, I have noticed in several of the recent massive wildfires, individuals have saved their homes by possessing fire hoses that connect to nearby fire hydrants. The fine they pay for disobedience to municipal corporations is around $3000 and they save their home valued at $500,000+.


Having an FSC RV is a temporary reprieve, at least mobility allows one to distance themselves from disasters, natural or man made and offers an alternative to dependence on entrenched "services".