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Greenhouses & Garden Structures

Getting HFGH..Questions???

18 years ago

All:

This forum is really really great. After reading a lot of posts here, we decided to get a HFGH. We would like to bring electric and water to the GH. It will be about 20' from the house. We will use it to grow tropical plants/orchids. My questions are:

1.What size of PVC pipe (1/2") will I need for carrying water? How to a couple copper tube to PVC? How deep do I need to dig to prevent freezing in winter? I live in NJ

2. I will run electrical wire inside another PVC pipe running in the same trench with the water pipe. Is this OK?

3. We will add a vent and 1000-1500w space heater later. I plan to tap into a 20-amp ckt currently use to run a pump in a small pond nearby. Since I will not run the pump in the winter, I think I should have enough juice. Right?

Are there other easier alternatives to bring elect. and water to the GH?

All tips and advice are appreciated. THANK YOU ALL.

We will use 2x10 for foundation; gravel floor and pavers for steps as many of you have.

Comments (2)

jerseyjohn
18 years ago
I just got my HFGH too...probably won't assemble until fall.

Would feel lost without this forum...will keep checking threads (like this one) to pick up any info and ideas from others.

Good luck to you with getting it up and running !
davejnh
18 years ago
Hi,
I just finished running water and electric to the other side of my yard, about 70' away. I dug a narrow trench about 10-12 inches deep. With my rocky ground, thats all I could manage. Most say the trench should be 18" deep. I plan on blowing out the waterline before winter so wasn't too concerned with freezing. In NH, water lines are supposed to be around 4' deep to prevent freezing, NJ maybe less. I used 3/4 black poly for the water line. I used 12/2 UF-B wire(rated for wet locations) inside a 3/4 PVC conduit for the outlet run. Both in the same trench. For the outlet you need to use a 20A GFCI outlet. The outlet should be in a weather tight box on a post. I feed my poly water line from a frost proof, anti-siphon hose spigot from the house.

Tip for pulling the wire.

Glue together the PVC conduit so you have a nice water tight run. Then take a piece of a packing peanut(sized a little smaller than the PVC diameter)and poke a hole in it, then tie a string to the styrofoam peanut and drop it in the PVC conduit. Take a shop vac and duct tape it to the other end. Turn on the vac and it will pull the peanut with the string attched thru the pipe. Now you have a string to pull your wire thru with. I didn't have a 100' snake around, so this worked great for me...LOL.

Dave
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